The most effective change most resume writers can make is to avoid listing the responsibilities of the position—as if writing a job description—and focus instead on your notable successes and contributions. List personal accomplishments, not daily activities, and use specific numbers whenever possible, such as ranked #2 out of 10.

Most employers are not that interested in learning the fine details of each of your jobs–they can ask you for more details in an interview if necessary. What they really want to know is how well you performed in the position.

List the successes for which you can take full, or at least primary, credit; don’t list trivial items, though, as that will give the appearance you contributed nothing of substance. Obviously, any performance based award you received from your employer should be noted.

If you are a manager, listing accomplishments can be challenging, as they often involve the efforts of many subordinates. For example, an increase in sales achieved by a division may be directly attributable to the efforts of the division’s sales manager, but the cause and effect relationship must be spelled out on the resume or it may appear that the manager was simply in the right place at the right time. A secondary benefit of elaborating on one’s role in effecting change is that the hiring manager sees the method underlying the success, instead of just the before and after.

Michael G Smith

I don’t think there are reliable shortcuts for reviewing resumes. The more time you take with each one, the less likely you are to set aside a viable candidate.

I don’t reject candidates for reasons not relevant to the job; that is, I don’t reject a candidate because the resume has spelling or grammar errors. I have found blunders in the resumes of successful journalists and authors, so unless I’m hiring someone to write resumes, I don’t use resume mistakes as reason to reject candidates.

I feel the same way about interviews; I don’t particularly care how well a candidate interviews, I’m only interested in how qualified the candidate is.

Screening resumes effectively depends on having a very specific list of qualifications required of a candidate in order to perform the job being filled. As a recruiter I have often found that the qualifications provided by the employer are too vague, irrelevant or simply too numerous. It’s best to boil down the qualifications to the two or three truly essential for the job and then reject all candidates lacking them without concern for rejecting a “golden nugget.”

I don’t think it makes sense, for example, to reject a candidate with, say, 10 years of appropriate experience because they don’t have a college degree. Of course I’d prefer the candidate to have a degree, but I’m trying to find the best candidate in a pile of resumes, and since this candidate’s experience demonstrates he or she is qualified, potentially even the best qualified, I’m not going to reject based on a preference for a college degree.

By looking at the last two or three jobs on the resume, I can quickly evaluate the candidate for two key considerations: 1. evidence of job stability; 2. appropriate work experience at the proper level of responsibility. Job stability is the most important consideration as far as I’m concerned; the candidate’s resume should be dominated by positions with at least three, and preferably five, years of tenure. A habit of job-hopping assures the resume will not be read.

Appropriate work experience is clearly a decision factor. If I need candidates with experience in nonprofit fundraising, then either nonprofit fundraising is on the resume or it’s not. I then evaluate the level of responsibility and the years the experience. Typically, I’m filling management positions, so the resume must list managerial experience of the scope, and for the length of time, that I previously determined are required.

If the requirements for the position are not entirely clear, or qualified candidates are likely to be hard to find, then I may decide to sort resumes during my initial review. I label resumes as: “unqualified,” “possibly qualified,” and “qualified.” After I’ve gone through the batch, if I have enough “qualified” resumes, I probably won’t revisit the “possibly qualified” batch. If not, then a more extensive reading of the resumes in the “possibly” batch is warranted, combined with some online research on those candidates.

Aside from job hopping as a reason to reject, any misrepresentation, intentional obfuscation, or lie will cause me to reject a resume without hesitation. If a candidate has no reservations about fibbing on the resume, they will fib on the job.

Michael G Smith