4 Resume Writing Tips for Students

manuel — Tue, 24 Mar 2020 02:05:40 +0000

With 6 seconds or less to convince a hiring manager to call you for an interview, how do you do it? Here are 4 resume writing tips for students to help you land that crucial interview.

Tip 1: Focus on the Top

Recruiters are spending less and less time looking at resumes. The first place a hiring manager looks is the top 1/3rd portion of your resume. This portion should definitely include:

Clear Contact Information
Be sure to include a good contact phone number and a professional email address. It would be wise to include a friendly LinkedIn URL if you have an optimized LinkedIn profile. Depending on your industry, you may need to include a link to your online portfolio. This could be your personal website or another website such as Dribble or Github.
A Personal Summary
Your personal summary is a detailed statement expressing your qualifications and what you can bring to the position you are applying for. This is generally the first message that the recruiter or hiring manager will see. Because of this, you need to ensure that you have a strong personal summary that effectively highlights why you are a perfect fit for the position.

Tip 2: Prioritize Your Information

Organize your information depending on their relevance to the position and company. Identify relevant information within your resume and move content around based on the job listing specifications. Be sure to place higher value information towards the top of your resume.

Tip 3: Make it Relevant

Your resume is like a needle in a haystack. You have to make every effort to stand out from the rest of the crowd. This means that you MUST tailor your resume to fit the job specifications. Be sure to:

Have a Clear Message
Identify Relevant Keywords
Reflect Those Keywords in Your Resume

To ensure your resume is relevant to the employer, you should focus on:

How you can fulfill the company’s needs
Why you are a great fit for the position

By focusing on these two points, you can craft an effective resume that is properly tailored for each position you are applying to.

Tip 3.1: Identifying Keywords

To make your resume relevant, you need to be able to identify keywords that relate to your employer. You can do this by looking closely at your job listing.

As shown above, you should identify and highlight keywords from the job listing. This will help you adjust your resume to fit the employer’s preferences. Once you have identified a list of keywords, be sure to reflect them throughout the language of your resume!

Tip 4: Highlight Your Accomplishments

Many students make the mistake of summarizing the duties of their positions that they have held in the past. They explain all of the various responsibilities that they were delegated. Instead, convey measurable results of accomplishments during your time in that position.

In the above example, the student uses a more specific example of their contributions to the company website and uses a measurable value to express the importance of that contribution. This is much more valuable to an employer.