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The Two Most Important Aspects to Remember When Writing a Resume

Written by Bernie

Bernie Frazier, SPHR is the Founder and President of CAREERCompass, LLC, a speaking and career coaching firm in St. Louis, MO. She also spent almost 25 years recruiting talent to six organizations across four industries and led the talent acquisition function for four of those organizations, including one global team.

A couple of weeks ago, I responded to the LinkedIn question, “You’re looking for a new job. How can you use your resume to stand out from the crowd?” My response received attention so I thought I’d share with you what I shared with those who saw my response:

As a recruiting professional who has viewed candidate resumes for almost 35 years, you can imagine how many THOUSANDS of resumes I’ve seen:

  • Too long;
  • Too short;
  • Too confusing;
  • Written in cursive (yes, this actually happened once!);
  • Powerful;
  • Impressive;
  • Exciting;
  • Everything in between

Resume styles have changed:

  • Add an Objective, don’t add an Objective;
  • Include your mailing address, don’t include your mailing address;
  • “References available upon request,” no references
  • Summary, your personal LinkedIn URL, one page, two pages,…..

However, no matter what styles are in or out, there are two things that have and never will change to make your resume standout from the crowd and make it appealing to employers.

  1. RELEVANCE – Candidates often feel if they showcase everything they’ve done it will land positively with the employer because they’re showing they’ve done a lot. However, this is not what employers want to see. First, they are SUPER busy. As such, they don’t have time (or the interest) to learn about everything you’ve ever done. Second, because they are super busy, their #1, #2, and #3 priorities are to see if you have experience, achievements, and/or education that is relevant to what they are looking for. You might have exactly what they want, but if it’s buried underneath a bunch of…..stuff, they’ll never see it and you won’t get the call.
  2. RESULTS – Many candidates focus too much resume space on their work duties and not enough on results or accomplishments. If your resume reads more like a job description, change it up. Focus on the results you achieved and the impact you had from performing your duties, and not just the work. Without the results, it’s like watching 1:40 of a 2:00 movie – you’re left wondering how did it end? So, instead of telling me you expanded the number of referral sources, tell me, “Expanded the number of referral sources which led to a 12% increase in total sales for 2023.” Which one would prompt you to call the candidate?

Of course, there are other things you should do to enhance your resume to make it stand out, but without addressing relevance and results, nothing else will really matter.

Until next time….