How to Write an Outstanding Resume to Get Your Foot in the Door
As a recruiter, I’ve reviewed literally hundreds of resume to fill anywhere from 5-30 openings at a time, but I only said yes to a few. I found some resumes dreadful; most to be good, decent, or okay, but not always enough to initiate contact; and a few to be outstanding.
I’m going to cover basic best practices that every resume should do and then how to augment your resume from good → great.
BACK TO BASICS
Your audience
Before diving into what makes a resume stand out above the rest, I'd like to put things into perspective: consider your audience.
A recruiter typically has a large stack of resumes to review every day. It’s absolutely mind-numbing, so they scan them quickly to see if any meet roughly 85% of what they’re looking for or at least the top 3 requirements they’ve internally determined for the role. They don't have time to ponder anything confusing or ambiguous.
A hiring manager meanwhile does not typically enjoy looking through a handful of resumes, and they’re often very busy with their actual jobs. They’ll read resumes and look for breadth and depth of skills and experience.
Your resume goal
It's true that you're more than just your resume. You're living and growing. You have a story that doesn't fit on just a black and white sheet of paper. However, recruiters and hiring managers don't have much time. Your resume needs to be a quick teaser of your professional story that compels and intrigues a recruiter enough to contact you for next steps.
BEST PRACTICES
What makes a good “quick teaser”?
Recruiters are used to a set of standards. If your resume deviates too far from that, it can be a little disorienting—and sometimes that sways a recruiter against contacting you. Following a set of simple best practices ensures that your resume is off to a good start.
📄 One full-page resume
Unless you’re in academia or you have MANY years of experience, keep it to one page because the chances of that second page getting reviewed are low.
🔽 Experience and Education information listed from most recent to oldest
Includes details such as job title, employer, timeframe of employment.
Leave off anything that occurred 10+ years ago because in most cases, that experience will be outdated or irrelevant. There can be exceptions to this though depending on the story you’re trying to tell.
Remember that you don’t have to list every single job you’ve ever had. List the ones that are most relevant to the job you’re applying for based on experience or industry. You can also consider grouping your experience differently to create focused sections — useful for career changers.
If you’re a recent grad, list your Education first; it’s part of your “recent grad story,” and explains any lack of full-time professional experience.
🛠 Provide an overview of responsibilities, skills, and tools
Think about your key responsibilities and broadly describe your work in concise bullet points. (Sounds a bit like an oxymoron, right? It’s easier said than done.) Check out some examples below.
Get inspiration from a job description—ideally the one for your job! Use that as a base, but add your own spin to it.
💯 Correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation
A resume is a polished, professional document. If your resume has errors, it says you don’t pay attention to detail.
For some jobs, proper written communication is vital, so they will evaluate grammar, spelling, etc.
If you share a job title with someone else (which you do), 80% of your resume is the same as theirs. So the way to get noticed is by focusing on the remaining 20%—the unique things you bring to the table.
GOOD TO GREAT
What does it mean to “compel and intrigue”?
The average resume follows best practices, which can definitely yield results and call-backs, but when the competition is fierce, it gets lost in a sea of sameness. An employee is hired because they have skills or qualities that generate value. The quality of a resume's job detail bullet points is how the recruiter assess your ability to contribute value to their role.
🤯 Impactful details about your work or the context
Within the overview of responsibilities, skills, and tools (see above), there should be meaningful details that help quantify, qualify, or elaborate on your unique strengths, skills, expertise, and experience. This could look like the volume of work or something that expresses the level of difficulty/complexity or tools.
This helps you stand out amongst your peers who share the same job title. The same responsibility in a small company can vary vastly from that of a large company, for example. Industry, too, varies because of technical nuances.
🔨 Slipping in the methods, skills, or technologies used in your roles is a nice way to demonstrate proficiency
Nowadays it’s so easy to watch a few YouTube videos and self-teach a skill to then say, “Oh yeah, I know how to use Photoshop.” Inject tools and programs into your job details to show when, how, and for what you applied those methods/skills/technologies. For example: “…created web banners in Adobe Photoshop”.
📈 Quantified tasks and achievements (Sometimes you won't have numbers for these, but even a mention that your work has produced results helps you stand out.)
Ways that you have made or saved the company money - “secured fundraising of $2.6 million by thoroughly researching competitors and the market, analyzing market opportunities, and presenting to investors.”
Time saved or efficiency increased - “…implemented a new data input process to reduce task time”
Impact, volume, or scale of your responsibilities - “answered 150+ phone calls a day addressing customer inquiries and de-escalating calls, receiving excellent survey scores month over month”
Survey results, awards, or anything similar - “redesigned an end to end digital experience that led to a 75% increase in DAU and an improved average rating on the app store.”
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: EXAMPLES
“Collaborated cross-functionally with engineers, PMs, and stakeholders to translate usability test insights into feasible wireframes in Figma for a mobile e-commerce experience redesign.”
“Developed strategic approaches for marketing campaigns derived from research and competitive analyses that boosted sales by 36% following launch.”
“Oversaw project planning for several simultaneous streams of work spanning web page design, e-commerce shopping tools, mobile apps, and production.”
SELF-EVALUATION CHECKLIST
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Mediocre resumes tell me what I can already assume based on the job title; they don’t help to evaluate you as an outstanding candidate.
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Ideally, you’ve got quantifiable metrics like “% increase” or “$5M sales.” If not, you can try to describe the value or outcomes of your work.
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Recruiters and hiring managers don’t have time to look through long resumes. Keep it short. Keep it relevant.
When I evaluate resumes for my clients, I review them with a fine-tooth comb, providing feedback on what’s working well and what needs improvement. I work with my clients to teach them how to polish their resume from good to great.