One of the most important sections on your resume in today’s job market is your Professional Profile or Professional Summary. As I rule, I usually entitle this section Professional Profile if you have seven (7) years or experience or less. If you have eight (8) years or more experience, I would give this section a title of Professional Summary.
The importance of this section stems from the evolving nature of brevity and speed in today’s society. For the most part, if an agency or corporate recruiter does not see something in this section with which is relative to the position they are trying to fill, they usually discard it and go on to the next resume. That is why writing your profile or summary in such a way that highlights your relevant experience to the job for which you are applying is crucial. Loading this section with keywords and phrases is usually going to get you on the results page of an applicant training system search as well as cause the recruiter to read deeper into your resume for more detail. This is exactly what you want.
Your Summary or Profile should be between 4-8 lines in length and should specify your strengths, your entire background, some of your relevant job titles and mention some of your personal characteristics such as exemplary communication skills. This will entice the reader’s curiosity and may get you on the short list for a phone screen.
Your Employment section is where you tell the reader what companies with which you have worked, what location and when you worked for them as well as your title or titles. This section is far more than a listing of responsibilities and duties. This will be the section where you actively try to market and sell the reader on your abilities. An important aspect of your Professional Employment is not only what you did or are doing on a daily basis, but also what you accomplished when you were there. Companies want to know what you can do for them and by including your accomplishments, you are telling them that “I can do this for you if you hire me.”
The last section on your resume that can be important to prospective employers is your Professional Memberships/Affiliations/Organizations. If you have any of these, sometimes this can tilt the balance in your favor, all things being equal.
Finally, if you have specialized skill sets, as in computer languages or hardware/software skills, and if you have continuing education, those things are always good to have on your resume, but usually at the end where they can be seen but do not take up the crucial space of the other sections. All in all, your content is what will generate the interview or phone screen for you if it gets read. That’s why formatting is the top priority.
Ecclesiastes 3:1
