I have crowdsourced so much data in regards to the topic about figuring out what I need to do to improve my personal resume. I have talked to hiring managers at various companies to see what they are looking for and a handful of six figure earners to see what they did to get their interviews at their respective careers. So many things have been inconsistent across the board, depending on who I spoke with or what I read online. However, this is what seems to stay consistent, no matter who I speak with.
1. Make sure your resume is one page long.
Be a minimalist. Take out all the unnecessary data. Some people receive hundreds of resumes daily. Others receive thousands. Recruiters have a limited time to screen candidates and more often then not, they will never make it to the second page.
2. Put the most important information on the top 1/3rd of the page.
When recruiters are bombarded with resumes, they will only get a chance to glance at the top portion of your resume. Make sure whatever you feel sticks out most about you is listed above the fold. If they find these things about you intriguing, they will continue to read further. If what they read isn’t sticky enough to grab their attention, your resume will be passed up, never to be seen again.
3. Make sure your resume is easy to skim, yet is detailed with the proper information.
Formatting and grammar is very important, especially since people won’t have time to look into depth of what your resume states. Always list your achievements and what you have accomplished, not your day to day tasks. As opposed to listing simple bullet points, job descriptions should be full sentences that start with verbs and include percentages and numbers, because they are able to reflect your work experience and what type of company you worked at before. Sales is vague. Increasing revenue 300% is still vague, especially if the hiring manager can’t tell if you came from a small company or a conglomerate. Attaching that 300% to actual numbers ($100,000 to $300,000) shows a more detailed perspective of your capabilities, experience and what type of company you came from.
From spending months researching and gathering data from various sources, these are what hiring managers and six figure earners state are the most important parts of a resume. Everything else is opinion based.
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Originally posted on Quora.