The People, Process, & Progress Podcast - How to Make a More Attractive Resume | PPP #89

Episode Date: October 7, 2021

Sharing the combined four decades of my and my wife's professional experience and guidance from industry leaders on how to make your resume stand out and stay evergreen in 2021.

Hey everybody, welcome to People Process Progress episode 89, five considerations for your 2021 resume. Why is this relevant now? Well, job market has changed over the past 18 months. People are working remote, doing a hybrid, all these kinds of things. And I've seen on Reddit and on LinkedIn, a lot of questions about and discussions about different resume formats. Hey, I'm new in the job field. How do

I get this or that job? So I figured I think that'd be a good thing to share on the show. Talk to my wife, who's also been a professional for a couple of decades like myself, looked at some other websites, and I'll mention those Forbes, LinkedIn, ZDN, Indeed, those kind of things. And I'll share links to some of the references that I looked at. Some common themes there. And so we'll talk about these five things that I know from my experience, my wife's experience, and then really that some of the professionals and best in show, so to speak, out there recommend. But before we get started. Please silence your cell phones.

Hold all sidebar conversations to a minimum. And we will get started with people process Progress in three, two, one. Hey, everybody. Kevin Pennell again. Thanks for coming back to the show, going to the website, peopleprocessprogress.com, People Process Progress on Facebook and Instagram, connect with me on LinkedIn, et cetera. Thanks so much for your listenership. I appreciate it.

A little later in the week for the main show. Of course, we'll have Foundations Friday tomorrow, so be sure to tune in again there. So let's jump into the five considerations for your resume, I think, for all time, but it's 2021. So let's tack that onto the title of the show. The first thing to consider is that the keywords in your resume are key, right? And they should change, and they should change because there's these things called applicant tracking systems or ATS. And that's when you submit something. And for anyone that's applied for a job recently or seen applications or systems or whatever, it's changed from right,

just send a copy of your of your resume, whether it's a Word document or PDF to kind of recreate your resume in these online systems. But at any rate, folks that send in resumes, and for those of you out there in HR, if you're listening, feel free to comment on this when I do the blog post or anywhere else as well. But they have these applicant tracking systems, and they score resumes based on match, right? And a part of that match is, you know, the words that you use. And so the keywords that you use in your resume should include words that are relevant to the position that you're applying for and are from the posting, right? So there's a match there. We're looking for this kind of skill. Oh, we see those skills in your resume. So you get the gist of it. And again, it's automated. So a human person most likely won't be the first one

to look at your resume. It'll be a system that scans it. And if you don't have the right words in there, the right keywords that match up with the posting and the position and those kind of things, you won't be in the higher percentage. So if you're out there trying to get that new position, it won't match up for you. So also think about when you're looking at the posting,

how does that match with the skills that you have on your resume and use the keywords to match your skills up and your certifications, right? Spell those out if they're relevant. If they're not relevant, I tend to not include those. I have some public safety things that aren't relevant to what I do now, but certainly my project management professional is. And this is related to the last one of just keeping it up to date. So the first thing is your keywords. you got to use keywords in your resume, it's got a,

you know, you should use the words from the posting, and just make sure that it'll get those hits on those applicant tracking systems. The second thing is facts, not just fancy words, right. So we all want to say that we created and we and, you know, all the kind of adjectives that make us sound awesome. And, you know, I certainly have of adjectives that make us sound awesome. And, you know, I certainly have some of that on mine and others do. But we also want quantifiable things. I did these number of these type of things, or installed this number of things or supported the project or coordinated the project that did this number of things, saved x amount of money was in the top percent of performers, etc, etc. So you do want to talk

about impressive feats, right? But you want to have some numbers tied to those. You want to have some measurable, quantifiable type things because we've all facilitated effective process and improved efficiencies and things like that. But improved efficiencies that reduced costs by this much is a tangible kind of measurement. So just consider that you use,

you know, facts, not just those fancy words. The third thing is good formatting, right? This is a pretty administrative kind of thing. But if your resume looks like crap, and you get past, you know, the applicant tracking system, and you've got some impressive feats in there, these quantifiable things, but then you look at it and go, man, this is some fancy, neat font versus a really legible one. It's all over the place. The sections don't really go together. It's hard to follow. Then just like a book that's hard to follow, an HR recruiter is not going to want to go through it, right? It shouldn't be a challenge to do that. Here are some tangible settings, if you will, if using Word or whatever product that I've seen recommended through some of those sources that I talked about,

is the font, right? So the style of letters, the size between 10 and 12 point, not popular using the New Times Roman, that was a class kind of that classic font, right, the default and a lot of things. But using something else that's, you know, that's easily legible, but it's not, you know, a bunch of widget symbols are trying to be fancy on their mind is aerial Nova. I also like Calibri and those kind of things. And there's some other great suggestions. But just think about the font that you use. Remember, it's not an art project. It's a professional document, right? Spacing margins half inch to an inch, I like to use the half inch meaning on the on the left and right. So you have some space there. And you can fit more and you can keep it like we'll talk about. So it's not you don't want a three or four page resume, you want one to two. So if you can make each page, you know, have a half inch to an inch

margin, you can fit more on there. And that'll get into kind of, you know, the next thing that we'll touch on in a second, single space, half line, one and a half line spacing, the length of words. And this was interesting, too. So I talked about one to two pages, I always try to keep mine to more than two, I saw one suggestion from one of these sources, one page, which is really hard to do, which really would get us challenged to super summarize in like a bullet, perhaps, especially if you have a significant work experience. But between 400 to 600 words was kind of the range between a couple of different sources here that I mentioned, you know, whether it was Forbes or LinkedIn or Zeddy or Indeed, one or two pages I mentioned

and chronological, right? So we'll talk about, you know, we have a summary, we have our contact stuff at the beginning, and then we get into maybe some skills. And then we want to start from where you work now, and then work backwards to whatever your history is. So like mine, for example, goes from what I do now as a senior project manager, back to when I was in the Navy, that was kind of, I had jobs before then, but that was my first kind of full-time career, right? So that's where I stopped my chronology. I don't include when I worked at a veterinary hospital or delivered car parts or things like that

when I was younger, just from a space standpoint, right? I think it's all relevant. It helps now when I'm helping coordinate big projects and we have to move a lot of things, an understanding of I know what it was like to get an assignment, get some parts, put them in my car, take them somewhere else, deliver them, make sure they're good to go, those kind of things, deal with animals, all that. So is it relevant to me as a whole, as a professional, as a person? Yes. Will it fit on a one- to two-page resume plus the other 20-some years of my work? No.

So something to consider there. So make sure we're using those keywords first, make sure we're using facts, quantifiable things, not just fancy words, and make sure we format it well. And there are so many examples of resume formats out there, just use the old Google, and you'll find some really good ones. So what I shared is what seemed to be again, some common themes and some of the things that I know of as well as far as the fonts and spacing and things. The fourth thing is to, right up front, summarize your awesomeness, right? So this is where some folks have a challenge of being too humble. And I certainly try and practice humility, that's good leadership quality from so many different sources. But your resume is where you say, here's why you want me to fill whatever position I'm going to

apply for, or why you want to ask me to come to your company or something. And so right up front, you know, what years of experience you have, you know, whatever professional in whatever position or whatever sector with X number of years experience that has made the impact and then kind of put in, you know, if you can fit it in there, like three, four sentences, maybe what impact you've made or what improvements you've done or savings or something like that. You know, it's a 30,000 foot view versus the bullets that you'll put in your experience pieces. But you still could throw in some quantifiable stuff, but that should be pretty high up on your resume. For mine, I have my contact info at the top, LinkedIn link, and then it goes right to my summary.

It's like, here's why I'm the best person for this position or why I think I am. So now that we've summarized our awesomeness in well-written, quantifiable kind of things, not too long, no more than four sentences, I would say, and that's probably pushing it. Before that, we have formatted well, we're using facts, not just fancy vowels, quantifiable things, and we have those keywords in there. Then we need to consider keeping it evergreen. And that doesn't mean that you're not at a place where you are trying to jump ship or change jobs every year or however often, but it's just a good practice too, right? It keeps a chronological list. And this is especially true for project managers or other folks that have to use professional experience to get their credentials, like for the project management professional credential, the PMP, you have to show a log of why you're eligible to sit for that exam. And so having an up-to-date

resume helps track that. And there's on the peopleprocessprogress.com website, there's a spreadsheet there that I used and have shared and it's been downloaded quite a few times, but your resume is a great starter point for that. The other thing is, you know, in 2021, and it's been around for longer than that is your LinkedIn isn't necessarily exactly the same as your resume. And there's articles about that too, but it helps you maintain your presence there. If you want to be involved in professional discussions on LinkedIn, or you're going to use that to get noticed or share content like I do. But then you can kind of mirror and use similar reference points between your resume and LinkedIn. But you know, keeping your resume evergreen is important because you never know,

right? You don't know what opportunities coming up. You don't know internally. Maybe there's a position that you have to apply for, right? Within your organization. And so it helps to have that list of what are projects that you've supported or what are other things you've done in different capacities in the same organization you work with. And if you have that on your resume, the other thing is you should update it for everything you apply for. So going back to the first thing about keywords officially, you have to change it, right? Because the fact that I can use the incident command system and facilitate a, you know, track 7,000 people as a resource unit leader is not as relevant as the actual kind of

coordination of a lot of things, those kinds of stuff. But the terminology from public safety and incident command system and those kinds of things aren't used the same way. So that though is where you also consider the work that you've done is important, you know, not regardless, but at any level, right. And you can make it, you can write it the way. So let's say you led a volunteer group during this COVID stuff, right. You, you led, you were doing screening with clipboards or, you know, whatever it is. You can turn that into a nice quantifiable statement. Primary coordinator of the COVID screening team for over 10,000 residents of wherever, right? That's pretty awesome and real work. And so if you think

about that and you're trying to get into say project management or some kind of special event planning, well, you've worked with a lot of people. You've coordinated a lot of the public. So you have a lot of the key elements there. So think about when you're writing your bullets, your experiences under your chronological history. Really don't discount the work. Just think about how you can make it sound like what the job is looking for, but more importantly, what's realistic and the skills that you have, and those help translate. Another big area that I know my wife is really good at and a leader in here is networking, right? So balance your resume, which is, you know, and should be evergreen, but it's kind of a static, it's a document, it's there, it lives wherever on LinkedIn or a PDF or

whatever, with networking events, right? So making connections, knowing people in different industries, or in other departments in your same organization, right? So making connections, knowing people in different industries or in other departments in your same organization, right? Because networking is beneficial, whether it's in your organization or external to your organization, in your region, state, all that kind of stuff. It helps, you know, it's helped me get guests on the show. It's helped me meet and go to other, you know, organizations because I knew folks there. And just to get out, you know, events like PMI, the Project Management Institute, they have regional groups that get together. There are techs, there's conferences, there are after hours get togethers.

Try and take advantage of those. And, you know, I guess these days depends on your comfort level and, you know, what restrictions are where. But if there's virtual events, take advantage of those. If there's in-person events, certainly, you, certainly try and get back into the swing of those. But networking is a bonus that will help get your resume in the door places or get you known places. But a quick summary of my two cents from some of the resources I talked about. And again, I'll link to those when I post this on the pupilprocess, progress.com website for the episode. Uh, and for my wife is, you know, keywords are key because, uh, applicant tracking systems are going to pick

those up initially. And then someone that reads it is going to want to see those as well. Facts, not just fancy words, quantifiable, measurable things, good formatting. It's got to look professional. Um, it's got to read well, and there's some really neat, more modern kind of styles than there used to be that, that seemed to be popular out there these days. So again, hit the Google up there, summarize your awesomeness, right? So have a good summary right up front that says, why me? Why I'm the one for this career for this position for this organization, etc. And the fifth thing is to make it evergreen, right? So it shouldn't just be updated once and then it sits

there. You should kind of brush that off every now and then and just have it ready for internal, external things. And just as a good practice, right? It's good practice to write that stuff, talk about that stuff, and try and try and network. I think you all that have reached out to me that have been on the show before for networking with me and allowing me to network with you and be on your shows. And for everyone that's listened, we're creeping up on 30,000 downloads now, which is pretty awesome for a show that's part-time. And that's totally up to you all that listen and have shared the show and done reviews. So I am really grateful for that and appreciate you taking the time to listen to me for the time

that I've put in here and shared. And I hope it's helping, right? I hope, you know, the, you as the people that are listening, me as the person that's putting this out there, sharing processes is really helping us all make progress. Um, I hope you're staying safe out there. I certainly hope you're washing your hands and I wish you all Godspeed.