Writing a resume is a chore for most people. I know this because whenever I do an online search for the term ‘how to write a resume’ or ‘writing a resume’, I come across someone tweeting “ARRRGH I hate writing my resume” or “I have been trying to write this stupid resume for weeks. I hate it!!!”

Being the intuitive person that I am, I therefore deduce that resume writing is not something more people enjoy.

Me? I love it!

For me, writing a resume is like a complex puzzle. I have all this information about my client and I have to figure out the best, most effective way to present it. If I get it right, my clients get the jobs of their dreams and that’s pretty cool.

So over the next week or so, I’m going to share with you some of the inside secrets to success when it comes to resume writing. I hope that my suggestions will make you rethink that hatred for resume writing and awaken some of the enthusiasm I feel when I start a new resume writing project. So let’s get started.

How to Write a Resume #1 – Feel Their Pain

When you’re struggling with how to write a resume, you’re likely focused on yourself. You have questions like ‘how do I explain this gap?’ or ‘how do I show I have the important skills?’ or ’should I explain why I left this job after such a short time?’

These are all reasonable questions, but it’s this focus on YOU that gets in your way. Because your resume isn’t about YOU.

I know that sounds nuts, but if you’re focused on you, you’re missing the point.

If you want your resume to grab the attention of employers, it needs to be about THEM.

The most important question to ask when you’re writing a resume

There is one question I ask myself at the start of every resume project and it’s this: What do my target employers want?

You need to answer this question before you think about writing a word. Because the answer to this question will guide you as to what you should include and exclude from your resume. It will help you decide what to do about that gap, or which skills to highlight.

As an example, one current client wants to go back to doing something she last did 8 years ago. Since then she’s had several contract and freelance jobs and run her own business. To ensure that employers see her highly relevant past experience, I structured the resume so that all those freelance and contract jobs were rolled into her consulting business. I then kept that section relatively brief and only highlighted the assignments that were closely related to her target positions.

By doing this, I was able to get 8 year-old experience up on to page 1. I also created a strong profile with headlines that described that older experience in a way that would appeal to target employers because it addressed their main concerns.

This new resume has given my client a real shot at her dream job for one reason and one reason only – we thought about the needs of target employers before we started to write one word of the resume.

How Do You Know What Employers Need?

If you’re staying in the same industry, you will already know this. Think about the most successful people in your field or in your company...what do they do?

Think about your industry...what challenges is it facing?

If you know the company advertising a vacancy, research them to find out all you can about their goals and culture and market position.

But if you’re aiming to move into a new field, you’ll need to do more research.

Read all you can on forums and blogs and company websites and industry association websites. Tap into your network and talk to anyone with knowledge of the industry. Reach out to social media connections to see if they will share their knowledge. Scour the web for job postings and note any common themes.

Next Comes the Good Part!

Once you know the answer to the question ‘what do my target employers want?’ you are ready to start thinking about your resume strategy. It’s that strategy that will get you interviews. It’s that strategy that will guide you as you make decisions about content and layout and font choice and all that good stuff.

How to Write a Resume #2 – What’s Your Value Proposition?

We’ve all been asked that old interview question: ‘why should I hire you?’ Most people dread it, but actually, knowing the answer to that question is central to succeeding with your resume (and your job search).

You already know what employers are looking for. Now you have to figure out what you have to offer.

In my e-course, ‘The DIY Guide to Writing A Killer Resume’ (link below), I take readers through a step-by-step process for pinpointing a clear and compelling value proposition. I can’t go into that much detail here, because the post would go on too long, but here are some pointers.

• Ask yourself how you have added value in past positions?
• Look for common themes running through your career (are you the person who always comes in to clean up a mess? Or maybe you’re the guy who always sees a better way to do things.)
• Ask co-workers or former managers how they would describe you.
• Look back over old performance reviews or reference letters and look for common themes.

Once you have identified your value proposition, try to formulate it into a concise sentence or two.

For example, my value proposition is:

I use my HR and recruitment experience, combined with my writing skills and knowledge of marketing, to write resumes and online profiles that grab the attention of recruiters. And because I have a background in training and development, I’m able to write engaging, easy-to-follow courses that teach others how to do the same.

Good marketers never try to sell a product without knowing its unique value proposition first. The exact same rule applies to job search.

Because once you know what makes you different and valuable, you can start figuring out how to match your skills with the needs of potential employers and that’s where the resume magic happens!

If a recruiter opens your resume email and sees exactly what his client is looking for, you will get the interview – every time. If you’re not getting interviews now, it’s because that match isn’t clear enough.

How to Write a Resume #3 – Strategize!

Learning how to strategize your resume is the absolute #1 secret to opening doors and getting interviews.

No exaggeration.

What is a Resume Strategy?

Developing a resume strategy means sitting down and figuring out exactly what message you want to convey. Most people think of resume writing as documenting their career history but that’s absolutely the wrong way to think about it.

A resume isn’t a history paper – it’s a marketing tool. By developing a clear strategy, you can then shape a message that will sell. A message that will make recruiters and employers want to call you as soon as they read your resume. That’s what your strategy is – it’s the overarching message you want to communicate.

How Do You Settle on a Resume Strategy?

We’ve already laid the groundwork for your strategy in the first two parts in this series. So far, I’ve talked about how important it is to understand what employers need (“Feel Their Pain”) and also why you then have to fully understand what you bring to the table (“Work Out Your Value”).

To decide on your resume strategy, you simply put the two together. You look at your ability to add value and you match that to the needs of your target employers. Where the two meet, is your unique value proposition, and that’s the basis for your resume strategy.

So for a sales person, the key message might be to show how much money he has made for various employers over the years.

A marketer might be targeting companies who sell emerging technologies, and therefore his strategy will be to position himself as the ‘emerging technology guy.’

A web designer might have identified her biggest strength as her ability to delight clients with her designs, and she decides this is what she wants to communicate.

This may all sound very obvious, but the mistake most people make is trying to communicate too many different messages in one document. Decide on your strategy and then stick to it! (By the way, it’s OK to have several different resumes, each with a different target audience and strategy in mind).

Translating Your Strategy Onto Paper

OK, so you know what you want to communicate. Now you can make some decisions about how to do that. Consider the following:

• What will your resume headline say?
• How will you communicate your core message right upfront?
• What evidence can you provide (all the way through the resume) to support your core message?
• How might you use testimonials from performance reviews or LinkedIn to bolster your message?
• What career accomplishments can you highlight that will support your message?
• Are there creative ways to communicate your central message?

By keeping your strategy in mind as you structure your resume, you’ll have not just a boring career document, but what one of our clients called ‘a strategic masterpiece.’

And more importantly, you’ll have a document that will press all the right buttons for your target employers and will therefore give them a compelling reason to pick up the phone and call you.

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And for much more resume help, take my free e-course on resume writing. It comes in 10 installments and takes you through every step of the process.

How to Write a Resume #4 – Design Well!

It’s not just what you say, it’s how you say it

Have you ever been to the website of someone you consider an expert and found an ugly, outdated, template-based site that looks like the expert’s 12 year-old nephew designed it on a rainy weekend? Whenever that happens to me, I instantly think less of that person’s expertise. The bad design screams ‘out of date’ to me. If their web design is so outdated, what am I to make of their advice?

First impressions count. We all know that. You wouldn’t go to a job interview in a t-shirt and sweatpants, so don’t send a resume that is badly laid out. It makes exactly the same impression.

Design with the Strategy in Mind

But there’s another aspect to a well-designed resume and that goes back to what I discussed in my last post – strategy.

If you’ve followed my steps. You have developed a strategy for your resume. You know your value proposition and you have decided on content that will help you communicate that value proposition. This is where design comes in – now you must choose a resume design that reinforces your strategy.

If you’ve decided that the most important thing employers need to know is that you have developed successful brands for leading Fortune 500 packaged goods companies, then perhaps you should create a bold headline that communicates exactly that fact. You might also choose to bold the names of the Fortune 500 companies whenever they appear throughout your resume.
If a sales rep decides that his consistent ability to increase sales is his value proposition, then he should make sure that sales numbers jump off the page all the way through the resume. That can be done with selective bolding or colors and lots of white space. (White space is key to making sure that key information is visible).

Content is Not King

When it comes to resume writing, content is only one piece of the puzzle. The best content in the world won’t work if people can’t read it easily, or if information is bunched up on the page so that they don’t even see the most important facts.

Writing a great resume is a challenge. Balancing design and content, knowing exactly what to include and what to leave out, targeting every word to your selected audience...all these are tricky. But when you get it right, the rewards come in the form of phone calls and interviews. It’s worth spending some time to get to that point!