QUICK TIP TO STRUCTURE RESUME CONTENT

One solid piece I give to everyone is to update your resume twice a year, even if you have the best job in the world. In today’s newsletter, I will give you 1 actionable tip on structuring your resume content.

But first, let me address why you should update your resume even if you are very happy with your work!

As a former recruiter and career coach, I have seen people lose jobs overnight multiple times. They would have a fantastic appraisal today and given the notice within the week.

So, always keep your resume updated. And now onto our mid-year resume update.

Think of the contributions you have made and value you have provided to your role and company in the last 6 months.

If you are struggling to “quantify” your achievement, may I invite you to start having internal conversations to see if you can contribute to stretch assignments or enhance the direct impact of your work?

You see, if you are struggling with your impact, chances are that your leaders can’t either and these roles are the first ones that get axed in a reorganization.

And if during this exercise, you have realized that you don’t have a new contribution for a year, now you need to really ramp up your work as well as networking efforts

I wrote an article on Switching Off the Career Auto-Pilot 6 years back which rings true even today.

The whole point of updating your resume brings me to a very basic question. What is the best way to showcase your achievements at work through your resume?

“Start with a powerful action verb” followed by “what you did” and then “impact on organization”. You don’t need to go into details about how you did it – that is what the interview is about.

Eg.:

Spearheaded Channel Refresh Program across markets optimizing partner portfolio for 5 to 10 partners contributing between US$1 billion to US$1.5B in transactions per year.

This one tip for creating bullet points in your resume is going to make a massive difference in how you communicate your value. And remember, it is not the best candidate who gets the best job, it is the person who can communicate their value well who does!