General Philosophy
Resume advice is inherently biased. My recommendation is to understand best practices as they pertain to your target audience (the people and organizations you will send your resume).
Merriam-Webster offers the following definitions for résumé:
a short account of one's career and qualifications
a set of accomplishments
According to the Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, résumé originates from the French word résumer which translates in English to "to summarize."
From my perspective, your resume is a marketing flyer. It is not a comprehensive record of everything you have done. A marketing flyer is not going to close the deal; it's designed to entice follow-up conversations (interviews). Your resume gets you interviews, and your interview performance gets you the job.
Frequently Observed Detractors and Alternatives
Do not attempt to cram everything you've ever done in your career into your resume. Instead, select the most impactful and position relevant content to feature in your resume. You may benefit from having a repository of your previous positions and achievement bullets, so that you may select the most relevant ones to include in a tailored resume.
Do not dedicate a lot of space to non-position relevant content. Instead, maximize position relevant content, and minimize content that is not substantially relevant to the position you are seeking. This isn't to say that experience does not matter; it is to say that you have to prioritize your use of space. I've summarized eight years of experience that I am very proud of in a single bullet, because it wasn't the most relevant content for the position I was seeking.
Do not list a bunch of keywords, such as an exhaustive list of tools or skills you have used. Instead incorporate the keywords into your bullets. If you know the position you're applying to values skills and experience using a tool, incorporate that keyword into your accomplishments.
Do not list a bunch of job responsibilities. Instead, summarize your most impactful achievements in that role.
Length and Substance
Your resume should be a single page of position relevant content that articulates your most impactful achievements. The idea is you have a history of delivering results which implies there's a higher likelihood that you will deliver results for your future employer. You can ascertain what is "position relevant" by analyzing the job posting and conducting research on the organization. If the job posting is a series of boxes to check, your resume should be checking as many of them as possible.
Many people use their resume to list previous positions and job responsibilities. This tells the reader what you were supposed to do; it doesn't tell the reader what you achieved. As a general rule, I say "if I can copy and paste your resume bullets into a job posting, you need to rewrite it."
One model you can borrow from is STAR: Situation, Task, Action, and Result. STAR is useful for interviewing, because it helps you tell a story. For a resume, the full STAR may be too verbose. Focus your resume on "Action" and "Result." If those achievements come up in your interview, you can fill in the "Situation" and "Task." In writing this blog, I decided to extend "Action" and "Result" to include "Measurement." I now refer to this as "ARM." To remember this, imagine flexing your ARMs 💪 .
As part of your "position relevant" research and analysis, you may desire to incorporate "keywords" into your resume. Your bullets are the opportunity to do this. Below we will start with a badly crafted bullet and evolve it into a better one.
Here's an example of a job description-like bullet:
- Collect information from human sources in response to intelligence requirements.
This first version is generic and only describes a responsibility a person had. I could copy and paste it into a job description and post it to solicit applications from candidates. It's not good.
Here's an example of a bullet that captures ARM:
- Produced 200 intelligence information reports leading to the elimination of 5 high value targets.
This second version captures the action you took, the results of that action, and provides measurements. It's decent.
Here's an example of a bullet that captures ARM using a higher level metric to describe the total impact and includes a skill keyword "HUMINT":
- Produced 200 HUMINT reports leading to the elimination of 5 high value targets and a 90% reduction in enemy attacks within the area.
This third version extends the second version to include higher level impact. It's great you produced a bunch of reports, and those reports were used to eliminate high value targets, but so what? This version captures a higher level so what. It is better.
Note: This is just an interesting "on brand" example. You may not wish to highlight something like "elimination of 5 high value targets" and instead just mention "90% reduction in enemy attacks within the area." The importance of tailoring cannot be overstated.
As an alternative information security oriented example incorporating ARM and a tool keyword "Crowdstrike Falcon":
- Discovered, investigated, and remediated 3 intrusions using Crowdstrike Falcon preventing approximately $30M in losses.
Content Order
Assume whoever reads your resume will not read the entire thing. You will want to be thoughtful about what content you put where. Figure out what material is most important for your target audience, and ensure that is the lede. If your target audience cares deeply about certifications, then certifications should be featured at the top of your resume. If you're being highly targeted in your resume, if you can assess what a hiring manager cares most about, you can tailor your resume to speak to that person.
In my field, I believe the target audience values things in this order: skills, experience, certifications, and education. The good news is if you are a person with limited experience, you can hone your skills and feature those in a higher order on your resume.
Tools to Produce Your Resume
There are plenty of free tools you can use to produce a nice looking resume.
Microsoft Word is probably the most familiar to most. The free cloud implementation will allow for you to export in docx, pdf and odt. It has some built in templates you can use.
Google Docs is a free user friendly cloud first option that has built in templates you can use. It allows for you to export in docx, odf, rtf, pdf, txt, html, and epub.
Overleaf is an online LaTex editor. LaTex is very powerful but the learning curve is high. I have seen a few LaTex resumes, and they were impressive, but there's a steep learning curve compared to other solutions.
Final Thoughts
I review many resumes, and almost all of them are bad from my perspective. Yet, I've still hired a lot of great candidates who went on to be amazing teammates. That means a bad resume, to me, is not a deal breaker. However, I wrote this blog to help the people who want to gain any advantage they can in a highly competitive job search.