You’re Thinking About Your Resume All Wrong (Plus Five Practical Tips to Get You Hired in 2020)

Change is in the air. As the holidays come to a close, we can look forward to a new season, a new year, a new decade, and for some—a new job.

Unfortunately for many people, here’s how the job search typically starts out:

• Hmm, recruiters are all over my linkedin profile. Job market must be heating up.
• [Does some Googling.] Unemployment at record lows? Job seekers market? Talent gap? I think this might just work out in my favor.
• [Quick search on Indeed.] Wow! Look at all these great roles. They’re perfect for me. All I need to do is send my…
• [Blows dust off resume.] Shit, haven’t touched this in years. I’ll tackle this…tomorrow.
• [Two weeks later.] Uh oh. Those three jobs already disappeared. I better update that resume now.
• [Types. Deletes. Types. Deletes.] Please help me.

The resume writing process can defeat even the most optimistic job seeker, turning unbridled excitement for new opportunities into a painstaking trek of agony and gloom.

But why? What is it about this glorified outline that creates so much tension?

I have a theory: Resumes create stress because we forget their purpose. Many people feel like their resume is a career mirror—a reflection of who they are professionally and what they’ve accomplished at work. If you treat your resume like a mirror, you’re going to suffer. Instead, you should view your resume for what it really is—a stepping stone to an interview.

That’s it. A 24-kilobyte movie trailer. The chorus from your most famous song. A flashing banner that says “Click me! Click me!” When you approach your resume this way, you put more focus on the most important person in the process. (No, not you—the job poster!)

Job posters don’t care as much about getting the best person in to interview as much as getting the right fit for the job. The first question you have to answer for them before even being considered is “can you get this job done.” That’s the point of your resume, to succinctly match your capabilities with the needs of the role. Things like culture fit, personality and potential are all incredibly important…just not yet.

With this newfound perspective in hand, job hunting becomes much less about you and much more about each individual role. You realize there is no final draft, but instead many iterations that highlight your capacity to fill different roles. You no longer have to debate your proudest moments or most glaring failures, you simply have to match experiences to the needs of job seekers. Mirror shattered.

My Five Favorite Resume Tips

Now that the pressure is off of you, here are some practical tips to help you reboot your resume for your job search.

1. Build a master resume. The “master” resume is a template of sorts. It should contain every job you’ve worked at, and include all the most important tasks, responsibilities and achievements for each. You should never actually submit this resume, but instead use it as a holding tank for all the cool stuff you do. This will drastically improve your ability to customize individual resume files without spending valuable brain power (and motivation) recalling your best bullet points.
2. Make it easy to read. Is your font size so small that I need glasses to read it? Did you decide that margins were optional? Is everything bold? If you answered yes to any or all of these questions, we need to have a talk. There are too many damn good resume templates available today to use the “I’m not a designer” excuse. Like a movie trailer, your resume needs to capture the viewer in seconds and keep their attention long enough to say “let’s give ’em a chance.”
3. Let the job listing guide you. You apply for a job as a graphic designer. The job listing says that you should know Photoshop. Luckily, you’re a Photoshop expert. So let me ask you: Should you write “Photoshop expert” or “Adobe Creative Suite Expert”? If it sounds like common sense, it is. Use the words that the job listing uses, not the words you think are important. Additionally, you don’t need to mention that you’re CPR certified when applying for an accounting role. Which leads me to my next point…
4. Highlights only, please. Not every job you’ve ever worked needs to be on your resume. It’s okay to omit experiences that don’t fit the role that you’re applying for. If you feel really guilty about leaving jobs out, simply add a small subsection near the bottom of your resume called “Additional Experience” and list company names, titles and dates as single lines. Remember, you always have the interview to go more in-depth.
5. Take the time to customize. This sounds silly, but trust me on this one. Personalization works! I encourage you to drop in the company name, job title or both somewhere in the resume. If it doesn’t make sense, at least save your resume as firstname_lastname_resume_companyname.pdf. By putting in even the tiniest amount of effort here, you may catch the job poster’s eye and show them you care at least a little about their listing.

Happy New Year, and good luck on your upcoming job search!