Top ten resume tips

1. Customise your resume. Your resume should be designed with the positions you are applying for in mind. This will determine whether you place your qualifications or your career history first. What will be most relevant to the positions you are applying for? If you are a student, your qualifications are likely to be most relevant. If you are more experienced, your career history is likely to be most relevant. If you are applying for a position outside of your current field of work, your qualifications or older experience may be more relevant.
2. Brainstorm your relevant attributes. Make a list of your positive attributes and experience that could be relevant. This will help inform which resume sections to include. Do you have a second language? Do you have tertiary level qualifications? What training courses have you completed? Are they relevant? Have you completed any volunteering? Have you received any awards? Do you have any publications? Do you have any memberships of professional organisations?
3. Potential sections. Potential sections include a) personal details, b) career objective or profile or summary, c) employment history or career progression, d) work experience (for school leavers), e) qualifications, f) languages, g) training completed, h) professional memberships, i) skills, j) interests, k) awards, l) referees, and m) publications. Select which sections to include. You might consider having a ‘Career Objective’ at the beginning of your resume where you talk about how you make a difference through your career, or a ‘Profile’ section where you provide a one sentence high level overview of your strengths and attributes.
4. Relevant positions. You do not have to include every position you have ever held and for how long. Group older positions together. If you worked in one organisation and had a range of different roles, consider grouping this together under one heading. Think about the role you are applying for, the places you have worked and the types of positions you have held. Is it the places or the positions that will appeal to your prospective employer? Consider arranging your resume so that either the position or place is first and in a larger font.
   When listing your positions held, try to focus on what you did to make a difference in that role and quantify these impacts where possible.
5. Reverse chronological order. Your employment history should usually be in reverse chronological order with the most recent positions first. Clearly state the year in which you commenced and ended and state whether the position is current. So,
   Customer Service Representative 2008 – current OR
   Customer Service Representative 2008 - 2011
6. How to include your qualifications. If a university qualification, include the full title of your degree, the full name of the institution that awarded it and the years in which you commenced and concluded the degree. If it is an institution based overseas, include the name of the town and country of the institution. For example,
   Bachelor of Education (Psychology Major)
   The University of Melbourne 1995 – 1998
   Is the title of the qualification self explanatory? If you are at the beginning of your career, you might like to include the names of the subjects most relevant to the roles you are applying for. Reverse chronological order applies here also.
7. Relevant training only. If you are at the beginning of your career, you might like to include all of the training you have completed. Think broadly about what you could include. Have you attained your Bronze Medallion? Do you have your First Aid Certificate? However, if you are quite experienced, select the most relevant training and the highest level training and include these only. Interviewers do not need to see every course you have ever completed, including courses for now defunct software etc.
8. Brief personal details. Your personal details are not the focus of your resume. I have seen 7 page resumes with the entire first page dedicated to the personal details. We recommend including two lines of personal details at the top right hand side of your resume in the header section. Include your name, a professional email address (e.g., michaelbrown@blabla.com NOT sexykitten@blabla.com), your contact number, and your address.
9. Include skills and interests sections only if relevant. Advice about whether to include skills and interests sections is varied. Consider what you have that is relevant to the roles you’re applying for. If you’re just getting started in your career, you might need to include skills that are relevant to the jobs you’re applying for. For example, Proficient in Microsoft Word, Excel, Outlook, Powerpoint. If you’re more experienced, your career history may be self explanatory and you don’t need to include skills. The same thinking applies to the Interests section. Include them if you think your Interests will assist you to win the role. For example, when I was younger, I worked at Melbourne Aquarium. I included my scuba diving qualifications in the qualification section and interests as snorkelling, sailing, etc to demonstrate that I was an outdoors/ active/ environmental sort of person. My current resume does not have an interests section. But it might depending on what sort of role I was applying for.
10. Keep it simple. Use a standard font such as Arial, Calibri, etc. No need to use fancy fonts, fancy paper, etc. Your email will usually be emailed or uploaded so keep it plain and simple. No need to include any photos or clip art.

We hope this has been helpful and that your resume is looking fantastic. Leave a comment below to let us know which information you found particularly helpful. 

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