Hi, everybody and welcome.
When applying for jobs, your resume
is your first impression.
But how can you capture a recruiter's attention
immediately when they may spend less than seven seconds
reviewing the document?
The answer is a resume summary, which
should tell a brief compelling story about who
you are as a professional.
Today, I want to discuss six key tips to create
an effective resume summary.
So let's get started.
The first tip is to put your resume summary
in the right place.
Typically, a recruiter will quickly read a resume from top
to bottom.
During this review, it's possible
that a bullet point with a key accomplishment
can be overlooked, especially if it's
toward the bottom of the resume.
But you can use this review to your advantage.
The most effective place to put your resume summary
is immediately after your name and contact information.
This placement ensures that your key accomplishments
are right at the top of the resume, where
you're most likely to have the full attention
of the recruiter.
Now that you know where to place your resume summary,
it's important to keep it at the right length.
A well-written resume summary, which is also called
a professional summary, is brief--
between two to three sentences.
It should include your years of professional experience,
top skills, strengths, and what you're
looking for in your next role.
Beyond that, it should help recruiters understand
who you are as a professional.
Creating an effective resume summary
is easiest once you've taken some time
to reflect on your relevant skills and accomplishments
and how they relate to the role.
You can create a concise resume summary in three steps.
One, jot down your most important experiences
and skills.
This can include details like any certifications,
soft skills, technical skills, the ability
to speak multiple languages, awards,
or any other achievements you have.
Two, carefully review the job description
of the position you're applying for.
Take note of the requirements or aspects within it
that overlap with your qualifications.
Three, put together a two- to three-sentence summary
that briefly showcases those skills.
Your statement should start with a key adjective for yourself.
Use the active voice and include key action words
to describe your experience.
We'll talk more about adjectives in just a moment.
Some people choose to use sentences,
while others prefer bullet points.
Both formats are useful for explaining
traits or qualifications.
But bulleted lists are especially helpful for entry
level candidates.
They're also a good format if you
have several distinct qualities you want
to express with some detail.
They may be less useful if you have
qualities that are too short to put in a bulletin format.
Now, three is the magic number of bullet points to use.
If you use less than three, the summary might look sparse.
If you use four or five, it can actually overwhelm your resume.
Now, if you're confused because you
thought a resume summary was only one sentence max,
you're not alone.
It's easy to mix up a resume summary
and an objective statement.
For my next tip, I'll explain the difference
and which one I recommend.
A summary and an objective statement boast
about professional highlights at the top of a resume.
While the resume summary highlights
a few important experiences and skills you've acquired,
a resume objective is a simple statement of your career goals.
A resume summary is two to three sentences in length.
An objective is just one.
Let's quickly compare the two.
Here's an example of a resume summary.
Highly motivated sales professional
seeking a full-time sales representative position
with ABC Company, where I can demonstrate my strong customer
service and negotiation skills.
I bring three years of retail sales experience
and a bachelor's degree in business administration.
And here's a resume objective.
Motivated nursing student seeking
to develop more extensive experience
working with elderly patients.
Between the two formats, I would always
recommend including a resume summary
over an objective statement.
A resume summary allows you to tell a story,
while an objective statement is an intent for employment
that a recruiter can gather from your application.
For more information on when to use an objective statement
versus a resume summary, check out this career guide article.
Before I move on, let me know if you're finding this advice
to be helpful by liking and subscribing for more job
search related content.
All right.
My next tip for writing an effective resume summary
is to quantify your experience.
A resume summary aims to get your key qualifications across
quickly.
That means that you want your most relevant skills
and experiences to be easy to find.
Quantifying key details from your experience
allows recruiters to get an immediate snapshot
of your qualifications.
Like with resume bullet point, numbers are your friends.
What metrics or accomplishments speak to your success?
Consider including total years of experience
relevant to the role or industry, the size of the team
you led if you're seeking a management position;
including class information, if you're a teacher,
like how many lectures you conducted
or how many students were in attendance;
accomplishments, like large sales you exceeded
or the book of clients you handled.
For this example, I'll share my personal resume summary.
Seasoned career services professional with 10-plus years
experience in team leadership, recruiting, talent acquisition,
customer service management, and career coaching roles,
with the purpose of helping others find their best fit
jobs.
I'm accomplished in creating jobs exploration programs
and events, developing a career services mobile app
for college students, and most recently,
leading a team of 15 career coaches
that provided advice and guidance to tens of thousands
of job seekers.
My next tip for writing an effective resume summary
is to always use an adjective.
A resume summary should tell a story.
As with any good story, paint a detailed picture
by using adjectives that provide additional insight into who
you are as a professional.
This is an especially helpful technique
for entry level candidates who may lack years of experience.
In this case, consider adjectives
to describe your personality and work ethic,
rather than your work experience.
Use adjectives like enthusiastic, dedicated,
energetic, self-motivated, and customer oriented.
One word of advice, don't use general adjectives
like smart or superlatives like best,
that don't really say much or add anything to your resume.
For someone with limited years of experience,
here's an example of a resume summary to use.
Friendly customer service professional
committed to balancing company goals
while helping all customers find satisfactory solutions.
If you've gained years of experience as professional,
adjectives can be used to combat ageism in the hiring process.
Adjectives like seasoned, innervated, versatile,
adaptable, and qualified are good for summarizing
your many years of experience, while also indicating
your ability to grow and change.
If you're interested in hearing more advice on how
to reduce potential age bias in the job search,
check out the Indeed Job Cast, "Avoiding Ageism,"
that you can view right here.
Now, an example resume summary for a seasoned professional
might be--
dynamic, tech-savvy marketing manager
with eight years of experience building strong social media
followings from scratch, collaborating
cross-functionally to achieve business goals
and developing innovative marketing collateral.
For more examples of adjectives to use
to strengthen your resume, be sure to check out
this career guide article.
My final tip for writing an effective resume summary
is to keep it relevant for the role.
As I mentioned earlier, your resume summary
should tell a story about who you are as a professional
and why you're a qualified candidate.
But emphasizing skills that you don't need for the role,
might indicate that you aren't the right fit for the job.
To avoid this, only include your total years
of experience and key skills and proficiencies
that are relevant to the position.
This is especially important to remember
if you're switching careers.
For example, if you were a restaurant manager
for five years before becoming a software developer,
you would only highlight your coding experience
in your resume summary.
In addition to relevant experience,
you may also want to draw immediate attention
to a specific degree or certification you
hold that's required or preferred for the role.
For example, a software engineer might have a resume summary
that looks like this.
Microsoft Certified Professional with eight years
experience in software engineering.
Extensive background in full software development lifecycle
including design, coding, testing, debugging,
and maintenance of web applications using .NET
technologies.
In depth knowledge of web architecture, development
techniques, object oriented design, design patterns,
and agile methodologies.
So there you have it.
As a recap, create a resume summary
after reflecting on the role.
Then, place your resume summary immediately
after your name and contact information.
Keep it two to three sentences or three bullet points max.
Provide a summary rather than an objective statement.
Quantify your experience, always use adjectives,
and include professional highlights relevant to the role
only.
For more information on how to write an effective resume
summary, be sure to check out this career guide article.
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Thank you so much for watching.
I'll see you next time.