Resume Writing Tips: 4 Tips To Improve Your Resume

If you are applying for any job, your resume is the one thing that speaks out for you. It is the first thing that employers get to see before they meet you in person and it can make or break their decisions as to whether or not they should hire you.

If you are applying for a high in demand post, chances are you will be one of many applicants. If all you have is a piece of paper to present, how do you get yours to stand out?

Here are a few resume writing tips that you can implement to get your professional resume in place.

1. Format it well

Employers and HR managers don’t want to look at a block of text and messy paragraphs. They want to see something that is neat, well-formatted, and organized. This is one of the main resume writing tips that professional writers stress on, and is something everyone looking to apply for a job must pay attention to.

Let’s say a recruiter is looking for the ideal candidate for the job. He has one resume that is just paragraphs and paragraphs of text. The other one is well-formatted, complete with subsections and bullet points. All the keywords are highlighted and it gives the recruiter a look into their professional life, even when they are just skimming through it. The recruiter is always going to choose the latter over the former. Having a well-formatted CV also shows the employer that you are familiar with the good organization and can get things into order, which is a big benefit for companies.

2. Support your claims

A lot of times, people tend to include generalized words and sentences in their resume writing when talking about their past experiences. They aren’t very specific about what you want to convey and often leave recruiters more confused about what you used to do, rather than satisfied with it. Using statistics, including letters of recommendation and including awards and certificates in your resume is a great way to show proof of your professional accomplishments.

Consider this example to understand the point better: You have a line about your past work experience that you want to include. You state that you were a manager of a grocery store that played a big part in improving the profits that they had been seeing. Instead of leaving it there, add in a few statistics about the growth and profit rate that your company experienced to give substance to your claims and to prevent recruiters from just skipping through them.

3. Modify your resume for the job

This mainly applies to people who are sending their resumes to a variety of job opportunities. If the industries that you are applying for differ from each other, those hiring managers will want to see something that shows that you would be good for a job. It’s important to tailor your resume for each position and take care to use keywords from the job posting to appeal to that specific job.

For example, let’s say you are applying for two different jobs. One is a team leader and the other is a financial advisor. The recruiters hiring for the position of team leader would be looking out for excellent leadership skills, which should be highlighted. On the other hand, while applying for a financial advisor’s job, listing your analytical and number crunching skills would improve your chances of getting a job.

4. Spell check

A lot of people don’t realize that small things like spelling mistakes can make a recruiter completely turn a blind eye to them. Something as simple as running a spell check will save you the embarrassment of having bad spelling or grammar and will save you the trouble of being rejected solely because of that one factor. Recruiters like to see resumes that have been read over and checked. This tells them that the person that they are hiring has an eye for the smaller details and can identify and correct mistakes.

Apart from introducing yourself through your cover letter, your resume is the first impression that you make on a recruiter. A well-written CV is always bound to get more callbacks than one that is just thrown together. Paying attention to these points is sure to improve your resume, so that you can be more prepared to get that job!

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