Resume Elements to Stand Out From the Rest

Resume Elements to Stand Out From the RestHere’s how to get your resume picked from the pile.

Competition for some jobs can be fierce. Anywhere from 100-300 people may apply to the same job online, making resume reading and screening a tedious job. But an experienced professional only needs about 6 seconds to make an initial determination.

If you want to stand out from your competitors, you need to make clear what you have to offer in a format that’s easy to follow. It has to be easy for a resume reader to understand your skills, experience and career progression. Consider the following key points in your resume:

Headline

This is found right under your name and contact information at the top of your resume. Your headline in bold can be a job title you aspire to have or a catchy description of your experience. (You can look for suggestions online if you need inspiration.)

Personal Branding

Feel free to include objective statements in your resume that relate to your personal brand. They should show your personal qualities, including your areas of expertise and past achievements. Your branding should motivate the reader to learn more about you.

Killer Skill Set

Do you have any key skills that will set you apart from the rest? For easy scanning, create a column text box and briefly enumerate your interpersonal and hard skills within it. Do not include generic skills like “detail-oriented.”(Everyone claims to have that one.) It’s far better to focus on specific skills you have that are related to the job you’re applying for.

Achievements

Use bullet points to demonstrate what you’ve done in the past and explain how you fulfilled your responsibilities. Use powerful action-oriented verbs in each bullet point and explain briefly how you achieved your results.

Education

It’s always important to highlight your major area of study and degrees earned. Don’t forget to include the name and location of the school where you pursued your education.

Volunteer Work

Be sure to include this section if you have a track record of volunteer work, especially if you’ve been volunteering for a long time. Just make sure to exclude organizations tied to politics or religion (unless you’re applying for work in those fields).

Leverage your job search by making these small but effective changes to your resume.

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Alan Carniol

Alan is the creator of Interview Success Formula, a training program that has helped more than 80,000 job seekers to ace their interviews and land the jobs they deserve. Interviewers love asking curveball questions to weed out job seekers. But the truth is, most of these questions are asking about a few key areas. Learn more about how to outsmart tough interviewers by watching this video.