During my decade as a consultant at McKinsey & Company, I was the lead consultant for the on-campus recruiting effort at Stanford for a number of years. My responsibilities included resume screening of all candidates, and in this time I probably reviewed several thousand resumes. I remember the experience well because this was pre-iPad, so I carried the resumes around in giant binders that seemed to weigh three tons each. This post will share the summary of my learnings on how to draft a winning resume.
Keep it to one page
I don’t care how senior someone is; keeping a resume to one page is always a best practice. If you cannot summarize your accomplishments succinctly, it raises questions about how you might handle business communications generally. More importantly, when a person is reviewing a large number of resumes, she may not have the time and patience to scroll through every page. You could be judged only by what is on the first page and no one wants to be judged on half of their accomplishments.
Use the Harvard Business School resume format
Despite being a graduate of the (far superior) Stanford Graduate School of Business, I think that the standard resume used by Harvard Business School (HBS) works well. You can find examples of this resume in resume option 1 here and an example of an undergraduate resume where work experience is still limited here. I have also created a template you can download here. The strength of this template is that it is easy to skim and/or read in detail, the format is clean and uncluttered, and there are no fancy shading or unique graphical elements that make it hard to read. If you are applying for a job as an artist, this format would never do. If you are looking for a role in Corporate America, this is the gold standard format. When I see a resume in this format it also communicates that you are familiar with the way that top professionals do business and suggests you are a candidate I should consider carefully.
Include your educational background as appropriate
If you are still an undergraduate or still in school, your education should be at the top of your resume. If your GPA is 3.5 or above, include your GPA in the education section. If you did very well in a difficult class related to the job you are applying for, include the class name and the grade you received. Once you are more than a year out of school, your educational background should go to the bottom of the resume and your degree should list any honors received (e.g., graduating with honors, etc.) but GPA and specific course work should not be included.
Use “action” words
Each sentence in your resume should start with action words. Examples of action words are: achieved, constructed, managed, lead, built, developed and so on. Page four of this Harvard Career Center document here has a great list of action words. The Muse blog has a helpful list of verbs here that should start off each bullet describing what you did. There is always a way to describe what you have done using an action word. Did you do data entry for business reports? You “Coordinated production of key business analysis.” Did you put together Power Point presentations for your manager? You “Built key communications for interacting with the field.” If this kind of language doesn’t come easily for you, write a comment below describing what you did and I will try to respond to provide more specific examples.
Quantify your impact wherever possible
Numbers are your friend in a resume. They are a non-subjective scoreboard for your accomplishments, so include numbers wherever possible to make your experiences factual. Did you interview people at your summer job? “Conducted research with over 20 large clients to determine key drivers of client satisfactions.” Even better, share numerical outcomes of your work when the data is available. For example, quantify the results of the interviews you did for your summer job. “Insights on client satisfaction resulted in 10% sales increase based on changes made as a result of client interviews.”
Find relevant examples
One of the best ways to write a resume that will get you the job you want is to see if you can find some examples of resumes that got others hired for the same or similar role. Looking at successful examples might help you think about how to structure your resume or what experiences to highlight. Some of the ways I have been able to do this in the past include asking friends, checking your school’s career support offerings, reaching out to fellow alumni, and asking friends.
Put yourself in the hiring firm’s shoes
One of my favorite mentors at McKinsey once commented that people are often so focused on what they want personally (e.g., a job, acceptance to graduate school, etc.) that they fail to consider what they can contribute back to the organization they seek to join. This is great advice; consider what the organization you want to join is looking for and make sure your resume describes experiences that illustrate what you will give back to the organization.
Be honest and paint yourself in the best light
You should always be honest on your resume, anything else will come back to haunt you in the end. At the same time that you need to be honest, you also need to paint yourself in the best light. I find that many people tend to be brutally honest to show they are modest team players at the expense of highlighting their achievements. That’s a mistake. When you are working on your resume, ask people you trust how well you doing against both goals. Modesty is a wonderful quality, but not when you are writing a resume.
Proof read, proof read, and proof read one last time
Your resume is your first impression. As the saying goes, “You only get one chance to make a first impression.” One of the best ways to ensure your resume is error free is to have other people review your resume before you send it. Fresh eyes will help you spot any issues; it is hard to see them yourself sometimes when you have spent so long working on a document.
In Summary
While the approach above has always served me well in writing resumes and describes the best resumes that I have seen over the years, one last option to consider when working on a resume is hiring a professional writer to help you write your resume. I have never used a service like this, but it could be useful if you are feeling stuck. If you do end up trying one, please share your experience below; I would love to hear how it went.
Before ending this post, I would be remiss in failing to mention that if you have a way to ensure your resume gets a close look, take advantage of that connection or opportunity. I sometimes hear people say that they don’t want to leverage a connection they have at the company they are applying to. Trust me when I say that everyone else who has a connection is using their contact, so you should too. I get several emails a month from students at my alma matter who I do not know asking about open positions at my company. I usually make sure those people get interviews because I like their ambition. It doesn’t guarantee they get the job but it helps. Reach out to friends, friend of friends, fellow alumni, or whoever you know to ensure that your resume gets a close look.
I hope that these tips have sparked some fantastic resumes. If you still want more advice on writing a great resume, here are some other good posts on the subject: