Objective Resume Sample

Does Your Resume Have What It Takes To Survive The First Cut?

Qualifications" or "Personal Profile") uses bullets and succinct wording to highlight what is likely to most intrigue the employer. Before writing this section, make a list of the 5 to 10 criteria that are most likely to guide the employer's choice – then summarize your qualifications in a way that speaks directly to the employer's interests.

The last 15 seconds...

If your resume is visually pleasing and starts with an effective summary, your reader will naturally want to scan the rest of it. At this point, the employer will look for: confirmation that you meet the job's requirements, supporting evidence for your summary section, and any intriguing details that add to the picture of what you would be like to work with.

Your job is to consider where the reader's eye is most likely to be drawn, and use these places to your advantage. They include: section headings, subheadings, the first sentence or two immediately under headings, position titles, bulleted lists (especially the top one or two items), words in bold, words in italic, and numerals (i.e. numbers that are not spelled out).

Consider all of these to be tools at your disposal when creating scan appeal. Is there an accomplishment, for example, that you want to highlight? Try putting it at the top of a bulleted list and including one or two numerals (such as "reduced costs by 10%" or "supervised a staff of 12"). If appropriate, use some bold or italic either within the item or in the wording that introduces it.

Testing for Scan Appeal

Your resume should be tested for scan appeal before any copies go out. You must be able to answer two questions... Given just 30 seconds to convince the employer to consider you, what must you bring to his or her attention? And, what does your resume actually convey in a 30-second scan?

To conduct a preliminary test yourself, review your employment strategy – i.e. list the top five things you think are most important for the employer to know about you. Then look at the parts of your resume most likely to be seen in a scan, and make sure each item has been highlighted in some way.

For an even more telling test, give your resume to several people who don't know you well, and time them as they scan it for 30 seconds. When they are done, have them set the resume aside and jot down everything they remember.

Would the information they noticed and remembered provide compelling reasons for the employer to hire you? If the answer is yes, your resume has excellent scan appeal.

© 2005 Ruth Anderson

Ruth Anderson is the owner of Vantage Point Coaching & Consulting and author of WRITE RESUMES WITH CONFIDENCE: How to Create Outstanding Resumes and Have the Confidence to Use Them with Success. Learn more about her products and services, including the unique INTRODUCTION TO COACHING and JOB SEARCH TUNE-UP programs, at http://www.vantagepointcoaching.com or write mailto:ruth@vantagepointcoaching.com.

MORE ARTICLES:

Creating The Right Resume For The Right Job
So you?ve recently started searching for jobs in your field and have discovered an opening that matches your qualifications and career goals to a tee The only problem is that you?re not sure how to create a specific resume for this job

MatchHire Streamlines Applicant Tracking with Resume Parser
Avidweb Technologies Inc., the foremost online recruitment company, introduced its much anticipated Resume Parsing Solution to their clients. The resume parser built into MatchHire's Recruiting Solution allows recruiters and HR departments to accurately and automatically capture candidates contact details and other information directly into their database.

Resume Success Factors--What Exactly Is A Resume Anyway?
You know you're good..

What You Should Never Put on Your Resume
Liars Get Caught! What NOT to Put on Your Resume"Everybody does it" as they say. Face it, the job market can be a very tough place to compete.

HireMeNow.com Selected by US Department of Labor as the Only Video Resume Job Board to Replace America's Job Bank
HireMeNow.com (www.HireMeNow.com) has been selected to replace America's Job Bank (www.ajb.org), which is closing on July 1, 2007. HireMeNow.com is the only alternative selected offering free video resume hosting for job seekers and free job posting for employers. America's Job Bank (AJB), funded by the U.S. Department of Labor was founded in 1995, is one of the biggest and busiest job markets in cyberspace.

Free Resume Examples: Untold Wealth In 10 Minutes!
Doesn't every job search start with Google?Way back in another lifetime, I was looking for a job after one of my startups failed. Conveniently, everything went to pot in early 2000.

How To Write A Resume Cover Letter That Will Get Your Resume Read
A Resume Cover Letter has only one purpose - to stimulate the recipient of your resume to review your resume. This free resume cover letter tutorial assumes that you will be sending your resume and resume cover letter by email.

Resume Software – Advantages Revealed
The various resume software offered, particularly on the internet, can seem very attractive to job seekers; especially to those not comfortable writing resumes. At first glance resume writing software can provide a number of perks and can appear to be the perfect solution to many job seekers.

Chief Ingredient, LLC Launches gigtide.com; Online Resume Builder
Complete online resume development and job-seeker solutions.

7 Steps To A Job-Winning Resume
A new resume can jump-start your career. Your network contacts may ask for a resume and some industries absolutely, positively demand a resume as the price of admission.

AspireHR?s TalentScout Resume Parsing Achieves SAP® Certified Integration Status
AspireHR, an SAP® services partner and a leading implementer of the SAP E-Recruiting application, announced today that its TalentScout Resume Parsing 6.0 has achieved SAP Certified Integration status for use with the SAP E-Recruiting Resume Parsing 603 application.

Get In The Game With a Stellar Resume
During the job hunter's market of the 1990's, employers were settling for less than qualified candidates because the candidate pool was so small. Job hunters were able to name their price and employers were meeting their demands.

Free Resume Examples: Use Them, But Dont
There are lots of free resume examples (or free resume samples) on the web.Try searching for "free resume example" at Google and take a look at the almost 5 million pages that come back (the less restrictive "resume example" gives you 7 million pages, if you've got more time on your hands).

Choosing the Right Resume Format
If you learned to write a resume more than 10 years ago, you may be thinking, ?I didn?t know there were different formats? That?s because until recently, most workers were pretty predictable: they stayed at the same company?or at least within the same field?throughout their careers