On Slaying the Résumé | Part 1

While my personal writing trends toward fiction, my professional writing involves drafting analytical papers and editing for academia. And then I sometimes do the slow, boring work that drives the motor of the universe: résumé editing.

(Yes, the ongoing war.¹)

My knowledge of this genre stems from sitting in seminars and editing one-too-many military performance reports, which (surprisingly?) mimic résumés if you ignore the jargon central to that discourse community.

So I find myself flush with both to review, amused by their similarities and easy simplicities—and I say this wryly since the bane of civilian or soldier often swivels to these genres.

And now, gifted with a moment to consider the finer points that separate good from great, and aware of the Great Slog™ that writing and editing these documents of our professional histories can be, I’d like to offer advice to (hopefully) alleviate some of that drag. Take what you will. Or don’t.

I’ve attached a bare-bones résumé template that you may find helpful. It covers many of the points below. Use it. Iterate on it. Make it pretty.

This post is Part 1 of 2 (available here).

Basics

Résumés provide employers a brief review of your professional history, skills, education, and achievements—and I emphasize brief because I recently reviewed résumés exceeding five pages and had to extract my eyes from the back of my skull. Your résumé shouldn’t exceed two pages if you want people to read it. And if you think you can’t meet that 2-page limit, I assure you, there is always a way.²

The following is a list of content typically appearing in a résumé:

• Contact information
• Objective statement (optional)
• Relevant work experience
• Education (covered in Part 2)
• Skills (optional; covered in Part 2)
• Publications and other miscellany (optional; covered in Part 2)
• Editing (covered in Part 2)

Contact Information

• Name. I include my name and “current as of” (CAO) date in the header in case my résumé is printed. CAO dates aren’t required, but I find it nice to let employers know they’re receiving your latest and greatest.
• Address. This is an antiquated element of the modern résumé, and the only good it does is tell employers how much they need to pay to move you. Instead, remove it. If an employer wants to hire you, they’ll figure it out. Or the universe will.
• Email address. If you went to a prestigious university and have an alumni email address, this detail may attract an employer’s eye. Your personal email will also work if it’s more professional than UnicornHunter99[at]hotmail[dot]com. I would avoid using your work email if your current employer is unaware you’re planning to jump ship.
• Phone number. If you’re less than enthusiastic about using your personal number, opt for an emulator or burner phone. Google Voice is a useful tool.

Objective Statement (Optional)

The objective statement is a concise 2–3-sentence paragraph describing your professional experience, skills, and goals or interests. For example:

Operations officer with 10 years of experience leading flight taskings for the U.S. Army Air Corps. Proven ability in tackling difficult problems and coordinating disparate parties to achieve mission objectives. Interested in fusing qualitative and quantitative approaches to provide accurate metrics for flight analysis.

Since space is limited, consider forgoing this element to expand your professional experience or skills. If you plan to include it, ensure it’s tailored to the job you are applying for. 

Relevant Professional Experience

Most people use their résumé to list what they did for their job rather than include what employers care about: why they are the best person for the role compared to other candidates. This begins with providing experience that is relevant to the listing. (Do I include my college summers working at Bath & Body Works on résumés for research positions? No, not unless I can tie it to the position in question. Use your space wisely.)

Definition

For each entry under Relevant Professional Experience, you should include the name of the company or organization you worked for, your role, and your period of employment. This information immediately establishes your experience, seniority, and longevity.³ If you have gaps in your résumé or frequent job changes, be prepared to discuss them if you are invited to interview. 

Space

While you want to give potential employer an idea of what you did in each position on your résumé, avoid listing every task you completed. I recommend limiting individual bullets or statements to no more than 2 lines and no more than 5 statements per position to make the content easy to skim. I usually reserve the first line to elaborate on my daily tasks, then move into the substance of interest with my most significant achievement listed near the top or end to ensure visibility (people tend to skim the middle). For instance:

• A description of my job, in brief
• Accomplishment 1 (strong accomplishment)
• Accomplishment 2 (okay accomplishment)
• Accomplishment 3 (better accomplishment)
• Accomplishment 4 (strongest accomplishment)

Feel free to add an additional accomplishment or two, but short and succinct increases the likelihood that all the content you include will be read.

Substance

Would-be employers use the content of your résumé to determine if you’re a worthwhile return on investment, and a list of what you did tells them little; however, matching what you did with effect speaks volumes. In the military, we are clubbed to death with the idea of “action, result, impact,” which means defining what you did, what resulted, and how it affected the overall force. Don’t give your future employer a list of quotidian tasks. Give them the highlights of your success. Give them substance! You have such a small space to make your accomplishments shine; don’t waste them writing bullets with the tone of “what I did during my 9–5 for the past 3 years.” Condense your key contributions into a few succinct lines that demonstrate your return on investment.

Again, I typically use the first bullet point under a job entry to define what my job involved, then I list the key contributions I made with quantifiable metrics to demonstrate why I’m better than Susan or Dave.

Metrics

In addition to defining what you did and why it mattered, include measurable effects. To say that you drastically improved operational efficiency is a problematic statement. Our definitions of drastic vary, and I have no measure to determine if your perception of drastic matches mine; however, if you drastically improved operational efficiency by reducing production timelines by 50%, we share a common language. Measures matter. 

Language

Your statements should be written in the active voice with action verbs, like “Built the administrative framework of a 429-person organization” or “Coordinated two multimillion-dollar research studies.” Your language should also be clear and accessible. Use plain language that anyone can understand. (Caveat: If you are applying to a position that requires specific terms and language, use the language best suited for your audience.) If you need to use an unfamiliar acronym to save space, spell it out the first use—for instance, Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). 

Takeaways for Relevant Professional Experience

The following summarizes what you should consider when drafting this section of your resume:

• Begin with your most recent position and describe your experience, skills, and impact, ideally in a bullet format for easy reading.
• Start each line with an action verb. Indicate the action taken, the result of the action, and the impact of that action. 
• Quantify where able (e.g., saved $1M; reduced timelines by 67%). 
• Draft resume bullets in plain language that anyone can understand. Remove unfamiliar acronyms (or spell out their first use) and limit abbreviations.
• Keep sections short so they are easy to skim (e.g., limit bullets to ≤5 per section; keep lines to 2 or less, if able).
• Avoid personal pronouns.
• Be consistent with numbers (numerals are hconcise and easy to skim).

Part 2 covers education, skills (optional), publications and other miscellany (optional), and editing advice. My Good Art Friend also has a two-part post on negotiating raises, which lends well to résumés and job titles (emphasized in note 3).

For now, good luck and Godspeed, traveler. There’s a war going on out there.

* * *

1. The Husband’s contribution to this post: “Knowing what you’ve done is half the battle, but showing what you’ve done wins interviews.”
2. Two points: First, a résumé isn’t a curriculum vitae (CV). A CV is for academia and includes publications and teaching/research experience. Most people are not writing CVs. Second, if I can condense a 6,000-word research report into 3,000 words for a peer-reviewed journal, I can fit your life history on the top of a thimble. This is why writing is an art.
3. Please—please have sage conversations with your managers and supervisors to regularly update your duty titles. Having the same duty title for years can signal that you’re stagnant, even if you are a high-impact performer. (And while your company may say “duty titles don’t matter,” that doesn’t mean that they don’t matter to other companies.)