Entries Tagged 'resume tips' ↓

One of the most common things that people write are their resumes. Sadly, people make a lot of errors when they are writing their resume. Clearly this is not a good thing as you are relying on your resume to get you a job interview.

It helps to know the common errors that are made so that you can look over your resume and see if you are making any of those errors.

A great post on Finance is Personal was posted yesterday on The Five Most Common (And Most Avoidable) Resume Errors.  You should click through to the site for the entire article. But in summary, here are the top 5 resume errors they have identified:

1. Using the verbage “responsible for”
2. Using a paragraph format
3. Repeating things
4. Giving your job description instead of accomplishments
5. Using objective statements

If you are like most people, you have written your resume by yourself. Most likely you used a template on Microsoft Word for formatting. But is that really working for you? How many requests for interviews are you getting when you send out that resume?

If your resume is not getting you calls for interviews then you need to tweak it a bit until you start getting interview requests.

One of the first valuable bits of information on tweaking your resume are the top keywords that actually weaken your resume.

• Vague wording is something that weakens your resume. Examples include: assist, support and contribute. The problem is that these are not descriptive enough.
• Saying you “effectively” or “successfully” did something as opposed to stating exactly what that success was. Sometimes you may even have it spelled out but add in the “successfully” part which can be both redundant and confusing.
• Listing out things that you are “responsible for.” Again this is a telling and not showing your successes. Instead of saying “responsible for phone coverage” it would look much better to say “answered 15 line phone” or something similar.
• Confusing the reader with fancy words or buzzwords. A lot of times you can get a HR person that has no idea what your resume is talking about. I have actually had this happen before. What a nightmare!

On the flipside of keywords and resumes I also found an article about keywords that strengthen your resume.

• Teamwork. People love to hear that you can play well with others. And it also means to employers that you can be counted on to pick up the slack if someone else on the “team” is falling behind.
• Flexibility. They want to know that you are willing to wear many hats. It’s like multi-tasking, only with more hats.
• Detail-oriented. Employers like it when you are anal and super organized. It means you can be counted on to get things done without someone having to stand over your shoulder.
• Self-motivated. Employers want to see that you will take the initiative and seek out work without waiting for it to be handed to you. I think this goes with flexibility as this kind of person will wear many hats.