Resume Revamp: Information Overload

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And now, on to this month’s before and after...

This month’s winner did not have a resume, but rather a novel! With over four printed pages of information in ten-point font, the old resume was definitely a case of information overload. Our first task was to sift through the information to find what was relevant and what could be excluded. Extreme length of a resume, whether too long or too short, is always a symptom of another problem. The job seeker was not sure what to include. He was afraid to leave anything out, so he just included everything.

Too Many Technicalities
Starting with the summary, we streamlined this section in his new resume by more than half to gain impact and develop a stronger emphasis on the job seeker’s big-picture, strategic management skills. At the same time, we also reduced the emphasis on basic duties and hands-on technical skills since he was targeting a job at the Director or VP level. Technical skills were important when he was in the trenches but he needed to show he has a broader view of the business spectrum to make that move up to the VP level.

Continuing Education
We moved the college degrees to the end as his work experience is what interests employers most. He also had good additional professional development through the Sloan School of Management at MIT, so we brought that into the education section as well.

An Eye for Editing
The professional experience section received major changes to enhance focus and reduce redundancies. Throughout the original resume there were repetitive statements concerning basic job duties that were the same from job to job. By removing these we improved the flow of the resume, added more punch and established a clearer focus. There was superfluous information (i.e. the technical environment of each position) that was not truly relevant. Rather than outlining facts, we sifted through and showcased the information that best represented his skills and positioned him for that VP job.

Emphasis on Most Recent Position
In addition to streamlining the job descriptions, we created more focus on the most recent professional experience. This was accomplished by devoting more space to it and shortening the amount of space given to the older positions. The most recent position is the first thing the employer or recruiter reads. It’s important to bring focus to the more recent work history, especially when a job seeker has a technical background. Technology changes so rapidly that methodologies and processes from just a few years past can be defunct or no longer in demand. The key in this resume was to show the higher level management skills that were most recent.

Backward Achievements
In a market flooded with well-qualified candidates, achievements are what differentiate one candidate from the next. We increased the impact of the achievements by moving the results to the beginning of the sentences. Many job seekers write about their achievements in a “backward” fashion. When a document is being skim-read in a fast 35-second reading, the results need to come in the first half of the achievement statements in order to gather the most attention.

Our last step was an overall spiff-up in the design and visual appearance to help fit in with what recruiters like to see. Aside from content, we changed some more minor issues, removed the months on the dates of employment and pulled the company descriptions out separately to keep them from being muddled in with the job descriptions. We also avoided the all-bullets format and only used bullets to draw the eye to achievements. In the end, we created an interview-winning resume for this job seeker.