Getting a new job is hard work. For starters, 98 percent of resumes are sent to the applicant “Black Hole”—the place where resumes are sent and never seen by a recruiter. And, according to Zety, one corporate job opening averages 250 applicants. How do you stand out? You can tailor your resume to the position. Here are five ways how to tailor your resume.
Why Tailor Your Resume
Why should you tailor your resume? There are several reasons to do so. According to Indeed, crafting a resume that is matched with the duties and responsibilities of the position helps boost your application. Major companies often use applicant tracking systems, and aligning your past experiences with the responsibilities allows an applicant to pass the ATS. Also, by proving your skills align with the company’s needs demonstrates your interest in the job. The fact that an applicant took the time to craft their experiences to job duties shows a potential employee has researched the position and company.
1. Contact Information
First, you need to include your contact information. Add your name, email address, phone number, and city. You may want to include your LinkedIn profile and your portfolio website address if you have it. One way to tailor your resume here is to match any color scheme your resume uses with the one the company you’re applying to work at has. This is a subtle way to demonstrate you researched the company.
According to Fast Company, this is the area known as “above the fold.” Again, use details here wisely, since this is the first impression that a recruiter will get of your resume.
2. Headline/Summary
Let’s say you’re applying for a project manager position. You want to demonstrate you have experience for the role, even if your title wasn’t an exact match. Study the job description, and come up with a headline that speaks to the role you want. Make sure you use the priorities that the organization highlights. If the role mentions certain responsibilities within the first few bullet points, you should include them too.
For example, if you were an enterprise resource planner for many years, you can create a resume for a project manager job. Here’s a way to tailor your summary:
Summary: Over XX years of Project Management as an Enterprise Resource Planning including…
3. Skills Section
Next, you want to focus on your skills. In the skills section, you need to highlight your key skillset as they pertain to the responsibilities. Again, study the job description. Highlight how you have the qualifications to the key bullet points they list.
So, for a project manager role there are some relevant skills useful for the job. Again, you want to highlight how you have these skills. These are some examples you would want to include:
- Communication skills
- Interpersonal skills
- Time management
- Team Management
- Conflict management
- Organization
- Problem-solving
4. Experience Section
Also, one of the five ways how to tailor your resume is to add an experience section under each company/role. Here you want to list jobs that are relevant to the industry you’re applying for. Project managers are responsible for planning, organizing, and directing the completion of specific projects. Therefore, you want your experience section to reflect these responsibilities. Make sure you use action verbs to make your resume stand out more.
Again, make sure you’re honest. While you might not have had the same title, you still need to have done the job responsibilities during this time. Here’s an example of how you can use your ERP background and craft it for project management:
JD Edwards, May XXXX-September XXXX
- Planned procurement for parts for supply chain operations
- Organized supply chain operations
- Directed day-to-day activities to ensure project completion like accounting, risk management, and manufacturing
Keep in mind, you can remove sections that don’t align with the role. If you want, you can divide your resume into two work experience sections. You can include “Industry Experience” and “Other Work Experience” to prevent any long gaps on your resume.
Also, you want to use key performance indicators (KPIs). By showing measurable results, your resume will stand out to hiring managers. Hiring managers will be interested to see how you provide value to a company.
5. Education Section
Finally, include any relevant education, and always list any college degree you have. Regardless if your major was in a different field, a college education shows the ability to learn different subjects. Also, if you earned any certifications that are related to this field, add them. Here’s an example:
Fairleigh Dickinson University, Sept XXXX-May XXXX
BA, Communications
Google, Dec XXXX-June XXXX
Project Manager Certificate
Remember, you need to tailor your resume for different positions. So, if you’re applying for a supply chain engineer, you would need a different version of your resume.
Resume Example
Now here’s an example of a project manager role, and how you tailor your resume to it.
Project Manager
Successful, fast-paced company in is looking for an experienced Project Manager. We specialize in large-scale construction projects for universities.
Responsibilities include:
- Plan, direct and coordinate projects for on-time completion and within budget
- Inspect work in progress with multiple team members to meet industry standards
- Identify solutions to potential problems
- Communicate and work closely with construction teams and architects
Requirements:
- Minimum (5) years relevant experience
- Effective oral and written communication skills
- Aptitude for math
- Computer literate with skills in Microsoft Office
- Willingness to learn Trade Software packages
- Critical thinker and problem solver
- Team player with a focused attention to detail.
- Education: Bachelor’s (Preferred)
- Language: English (Required)
- Work authorization: United States (Required)
Lara Smith
lara.smith@gmail.com
123-456-7891
Summary: Over 7 years of Project Management as an Enterprise Resource Planning looking to bring my proven track record to a company as a project manager.
Skills
- Strong communication skills
- Exceptional math skills
- Well versed in Microsoft Office
- Aptitude to learn Trade Software packages
- Critical thinker
- Problem-solving skills
- Team player
Industry Experience
Enterprise Resource Planner (October 2014-Present)
- Planned, directed and coordinated ERP system updates for on-time completion and reduced costs by 5%
- Inspected work in progress with multiple team members to ensure user requirements were met
- Identified solutions to the governance, functional, and operational aspects and processes for our ERP system
Education
Spelman College, 2010-2014
BA, Engineering
And, if you’re looking for a new job, you should consider reaching out to Applied Resource Group. As Atlanta’s top staffing firm, we can connect with you now and start a conversation. In fact, working with us can lead to a lot of places that you wouldn’t have even known about.
Recent Comments