How Do You Write a Professional Resume?
1. Selecting Your Format:
Before you start typing one single thing, you have to decide what you want the overall resume to look like. In general, you’re most likely to cover and/or include sections on the following:
• Relevant Work Experience
• Education and Certifications
• Your Skills, Abilities, and Accomplishments
• Systems or Software Experience
By far, the most common option is Reverse Chronological order. This means you organize your experience from most recent to prior experience. Use a professional type font such as Times Roman or Arial in WORD format for best presentation, and make sure you organize your resume with Education and Technical Skills at the bottom. Since the average Hiring Manager reads a resume in less than 30 seconds, make sure your resume is in a concise format.
2. Start With Your Basic Information:
Your name and contact information should always go at the top of your resume. In this header you’ll want to include anything that could be helpful for a Hiring Manager to contact you.
• Full name
• Phone number
• LINKEDIN Web URL
• Personal email address
3. Work Experience:
This section will most likely be the bulk of your resume. Even if you’re changing careers, employers still want to see where you’ve worked, what you’ve done, and the impact of that work to get a sense of your background and expertise.
• Your “Work Experience” might be one entire category, or you might choose to break it up into “Relevant Experience” to highlight the skills that are most important for Hiring Managers. Either way, you’ll almost always want to have your most recent experience at the top and your previous experience down below.
4. Highlight your Accomplishments or Benefit Statement:
Emphasize any of your relevant accomplishments that may have enhanced processes, saved money, or improved company procedures. Think in terms of how your previous employers have benefitted as the result of your hard work. A benefit statement demonstrates that you were a major contributor to your organization! If you’re a recent graduate, you might also include activities, such as business clubs, organizations, or leadership experience.
5. Education and Certifications:
Make sure your Education is highlighted at the bottom of your resume. Certifications should then be clearly stated below your Degree, School, and Date of Graduation.
6. Systems or Technical Skills:
Highlight any relevant systems or technical skills at the very bottom of your resume.