Start the New Year on the Right Foot With a Brand New Resume

 

2018 is right around the corner—now is as good a time as any to give your resume a quick once-over to make sure it’s updated with all your latest information. If you’ve been out of the workforce for quite some time, or are moving from one job to the next, it’s imperative your resume reflect your latest career developments, including your most recent work experience and newest skills.

Even if you’re not currently in the job market, it’s still a good idea to treat your resume as a living document so it shows everything that happened in your career over the past year and the years before that. Listed below are four quick and simple ways to do just that.

 

1. Add Your Latest Skills, Achievements and Work Experience

This is especially important if it’s been a while since you looked for a job. By now, it’s safe to say you’ve acquired new skills, experience and training. You should also use relevant keywords to reflect your skills, experience and achievements to show hiring managers you are the right person for the job.

 

2. Modernize Your Resume

If your resume had an edgy design the last time you looked for work, make sure you give it a more contemporary look. Modern design has leaned towards minimalism, so it’s a good idea to remove unnecessary design elements that were popular “back then.” Likewise, you might want to switch your old-school fonts (Times New Roman or Arial) to newer alternatives like Calibri or Helvetica.

 

3. Add Your Social Media Profiles and Digital Portfolio

If your resume doesn’t contain links to relevant social media profiles, add them to this new version. It might be that social media wasn’t as big the last time you looked for work. Be sure to link to a profile that will actually help you in your job search, like your LinkedIn account. You should also link to your digital portfolio or published articles and other content assets under your name.

 

4. Highlight Important Points

The job market has never been more competitive—a typical hiring manager only  spends a few seconds looking at an application before making some kind of hiring decision. An effective trick around this obstacle is to make your resume easier to read by highlighting the most important aspects:

• Start with a short bio at the top of your resume right under your name.
• Use bullet points to describe achievements under each entry of your work experience.
• Quantify achievements using numbers, percentages, statistics—hiring managers eat that stuff up.

Be sure to check this blog for more career insights and guides. If your job search needs a little push in the right direction, the staffing services experts of The Reserves Network are more than happy to help. Call our offices to learn more about our staffing services.