Boring resumes.

As a career counselor at a private university, I spend a lot of time teaching how to make good resumes, reviewing resumes, and seeing what works and what doesn't with employers. Today we're talking about how to get yourself noticed. I mean, that's the point of all that work you put into the document, right?

We're not talking about formatting, spelling, or whether you should use square bullets or round ones. There are a million opinions on how layout your resume, and everyone has their opinion. Just make it consistent and check spelling to catch 'their' versus 'there'. Spell check won't catch that, and your resume will look sloppy. Besides that, what matters?

What matters to employers is that they see what they're looking for. That's really all there is too it. If you hide or otherwise obfuscate the material they want to see, you won't get The Call. And we all want The Call (or The Email), when an HR representative contacts you to say they want to schedule an interview.

Think about your resume as an exercise in self marketing. Which it is. If I am shopping for soap, what do I want to see? Information that helps me find the best soap. Is the soap going to get the engine grease off my hands? Is the soap soft to my skin? Liquid or bar? Your mind makes those calculations and comparisons among brands as you quickly scan the aisle, and your employer does the same thing when he looks at resumes. Knowing that hiring managers spend 10 - 15 seconds looking at your resume, how are you going to sell them on the product of YOU?

The good news is that employers tell you what they want to see. It's called a job description, and when combined with your research about the company's culture (we'll talk about that in a later post), you basically have an open book test. Easy, right? Here is what you do:

1) Read the job description. Find key words and themes that appear throughout the posting. Write these down. Note how things are phrased.

2) Think about your experiences and background. Do you meet or exceed these requirements?

3) On your resume, in a summary section near the top of the page, state that you meet the requirements. Preferably use the words that were on the job posting. For example, if the posting says "Must have 5 years experience managing teams" then your summary should say "5+ years managing teams."

Rise, wash, repeat for each key theme. The point is to speak the language that your employer wants to speak, so they don't have to go digging through your resume to see if you meet the requirements. Who has time to dig through your resume when there is a stack of equally qualified resumes right after yours?