Are you confident enough with your resume when you hand it over to recruiters and potential employers? Maybe you should hire a resume writing service or have someone who works in that industry look it over. Make sure they are qualified enough to give a good critique. Asking a doctor to read your resume for an engineering position is just counterproductive. If you need to overhaul your resume or just start from scratch, resume writing services will help you get started.

What Does A Good Resume Get Me?

A resume represents the key to get through that employment door. So it better fit. A good resume tells your future employer that you can add value to their company and that they better hire you first or else their competitors will snatch up your talent. It cannot be passive and has to engage the reader throughout. You can write a resume like a story filled with bullet points that build up your case. Some people do this through a chronological ordering of the resume. The point is to make it so they spend more than 10-15 seconds glancing. So how do you do it? How do you get the right key?

• Find out what the are proper keywords that employers will search for when looking for someone to fill that position. That means you look at other people’s resumes (preferable ones that were successful) and modify it to fit yours. I am not advocating plagiarism. In the end, you must be able to express the credentials you have written out on that resume during the interview.
• Learn how to use spell check and grammar checkers. A spelling or grammar mistake is like a zit on your nose. It is visible and anyone who is not staring at it is just being nice.
• Read your resume and read it out loud. By doing this, you can eliminate a lot of mistakes that a computer will skip over.
• Order your work history, duties and projects into a story. For example, you can write, in bullet point form, how you managed a small group of people and then with more experience, you were able to manage a larger group of people with positive results. This shows you were able to grow your experience. If you write out a resume where you continued to do with the same things over and over, it is hard for the employer to imagine how the company will grow if you are not able to. Showing your ability to grow is a great way to implant that impression into the employer’s minds.

Finally, all you should think about when writing a resume is how to get that interview, not the job. The job comes a lot later after interviews, background checks and additional interviews. Focus on that.

Many job seekers spend hours meticulously checking and re-checking their resume yet often over look the value of creating a flawless cover letter. More often than not, a resume’s cover letter will be the first piece of paper an employer will see as it is typically attached before a resume. A carefully sculpted cover letter is just another integral part of creating a stand out resume that will get noticed by employers of all kinds.

Cover Letter Tips

Below are some tips on helping you create an appropriate cover letter:

1. Some people are convinced a cover letter should be an autobiography but it is important to keep in mind your audience. Most employers have little time to read through hundreds of resumes let alone drawn-out cover letters. Be sure to stick to the facts of your employment history, why you are interested in this particular position, and that you are available to talk as this is the purpose of your cover letter. Avoid including salary requirements or history as those can be deal breakers for an employer. These kinds of information can be saved for the follow up cover letter.
2. Make sure you carefully create your cover letter layout. Remember that less is more! Hiring professionals do not want to feel overwhelmed but rather intrigued when viewing your cover letter. Long paragraphs and a high word count will make your cover letter too time consuming to read and your reader will become disenchanted. Stick to a short and sweet version by only including the MOST important details. Leave any additional comments for the interview.



3. Avoid the generic cover letter jargon and be yourself. Be sure to research the company of which you are applying and include some relevant statistics and facts to show you have done your research. A cover letter with a personal touch will get noticed over a “cut and paste” version. This is your chance to hit your audience with what makes you different from all of the other candidates.