Resume Tips

Your Resume is an advertisement for you!  It should summarize your background and provide enough details to give an employer the information needed to assess your qualifications.  However, at the same time, it should be concise.  An effective resume will get your foot in the door.  A resume has one purpose and that is to get you an interview.
 
Resume Parts
 
Your resume should contain the following parts: a header, career objective, your experience and your education.
 
Header
 
This should include:
  • Your full legal name
  • Your complete mailing address
  • Your telephone number (include area code)
  • Your fax number (if you have one)
  • Your email address
 
Career Objective
 
This is a concise statement that indicates the type of position you are seeking, you should modify the wording of this objective to fit the position you are applying for.
 
          Avoid writing statements such as:
  • “An interesting job with challenging opportunities”
  • “An interesting position where I may utilize my skills and training.
  • “A job working with people”
  • “to be hired as a management trainee in a large company and eventually rise through the ranks into general management.”
 
You don’t want to be too general as in the first three. And the fourth one would not appeal to the interviewers because all too often applicants mention a desire to rise to the top of management.  Remember you want to grab the employer’s attention, and stand out from the other applicants.  Making your point early and fitting your objective to the specific job you are applying for is going to be the most affective technique.
  • “To obtain a Service Tech position with XYZ Irrigation that involves sprinkler system diagnostics and repair.”
 
Experience
 
This is usually the key part of your resume.  This section will tell employers what you have previously done on the job.  Always begin with your most recent or present position and work backwards from that.  List your duties and responsibilities and make sure you emphasize what you have accomplished and the results of that accomplishment.  But once again you want to be concise in this section also.
 
Education
 
If you do not have any formal education add any special training you have, workshops you have attended, or any certifications you have obtained in this section.
 
 
Construction of your Resume
 
Consider your words carefully 
  • Omit the personal pronoun I
  • Use phrases or short statements; do not use sentences.
  • Begin statements with strong action words
  • Accomplished, Achieved, Adapted, Administered, Changed, Coordinated, Compiled, Controlled, Created, Demonstrated, Developed, Devised, Doubled, Designed, Initiated, Installed, Interpreted, Managed, Processed, Produced, Recommended, Simplified, Solved, Streamlines, Standardized, Supervised, Trained, Translated, Upgraded, Verified. 
Employers like to know about results you have achieved not just responsibilities. 
  • “Supervised landscape project…”
  • “Created templates for Sales Department….”
  • “Developed streamlined….”
  • “Flexible in handling multiple tasks…”
 
Maximize Readability
  • Use a simple, clean structure and attractive format
  • Be clear and concise
  • Use bullets and listings
  • Leave as much white space between sections as possible
  • Use parallel structure for similar items – if a period ends an item place a period at the end of all items, if heading is bold use bold for all headings
  • Use simple, professional fonts and keep fonts to a minimum no more than two different fonts
  • Keep resume to one page if possible
  • Keep capitalization, bold type italics and underlining to a minimum
  • Print your resume on white or cream nontextured paper
  • Print on one side of paper only
  • Proof several times eliminating spelling, factual, grammatical, punctuation errors.  Have someone else proof for you too.
 
Use this checklist to evaluate your Resume:
 
_____Perform spellcheck
_____Carefully proof every word
_____Ask a friend/relative to proof
_____Consistency of punctuation
_____Consistency of text
_____Use of present tense to describe duties at current job and use of past tense for previous jobs
_____Consistency of date format
_____Check abbreviations of States (all must be two letters with out periods)
 
Now that you have double checked your resume to make it appealing to the reader, let’s review the resume from the perspective of a potential employer. Can the employer answer the following questions from your resume?
  • What has this person actually accomplished on the job?
  • Is there a match between this person’s skills and experience and the skills that I require for this position?
  • What can this person do for our company?
  • Does this person seem to care about the quality of his/her work?
  • How does the resume look?
  • How organized is the resume?
  • Is the resume error free?
  • How well has this person communicated to me?
  • Do I want to take the time to meet with this person?
 
If you can answer all of these questions by reading your resume then you have done it!  While you are actively searching for your green industry career, don’t forget to post your resume on our database so that potential employers can search for you.  Then just sit back and “Let the Worm Hook a Job for You”
 
Good luck from the Earthwormjob.com family.