Students fresh out of school usually have a hard time drafting their work resumes. Having only little to no work experience, they won't be able to fill a page or two. But this should not dampen the morale of fresh graduates! Being out of college gives you many opportunities. Luckily, we have some tips for you when it comes to writing your resume.
With the advances in technology, there are several ways to make your resume stand out. You can either upskill or volunteer to different activities to add to your resume as well. However, it is best to remember that your job should fit your skills, talents, education, and goals.
Regardless, just because you don't have existing working experience in the outside world, does not mean you are less qualified for the job. No work experience? Don't worry! You can always craft your resume with these easy tips!
Organize Your Education Background
This section is the easiest to fill out. You have to organize this to help employers understand your educational background. Don't forget to include the name of the institution you've enrolled in and also the corresponding years you attended it. This is so your employers can easily track much you've achieved in school. If you have any scholastic achievements, it is best that you include these so you can effortlessly impress your employers!
Attach A Resume Objective Statement
A resume objective statement gives your employers a glimpse of who you are, professionally. This sentance or paragraph consists of your hopes in applying for the job. This is very important as it is one of the first few things that your employer/s read. You should know how to keep them interested in you by drafting an enticing resume objective statement. You may talk about your goals and expertise here. Focus on how you can be an asset to the company and what the company can expect from you. Remember not to brag too much.
Choose The Right Format And Be Consistent
There are three basic formats that you can use when crafting your resume. These are the chronological, functional and hybrid formats.
A chronological resume format starts with a chronoloogical list of your work history. Here, you may include on-the-job training you had back in your university days or even part-time jobs will do. This is the most common type of format for resumes and is highly recommended by employers because they can easily read the positions you’ve already held.
A functional resume format highlights, in particular, your experiences and skills rather than the positions you have already handled. As a replacement for your work history, you can put a paragraph long section of your accomplishments or your experiences. Job applicants often use this kind of format especially when they frequently change careers, or they have a gap in their employment history.
Lastly, a hybrid resume format is a combination of both the aforementioned types. You may include a paragraph-long content of your expertise and skills, and after that, you can place your work history. With this kind of format, you can easily highlight your skills that are relevant to the job you are currently applying for.
Make Sure Your Resume Is Error Free
This is one of the most important pieces of advice you can get in drafting a resume. Some employers might immediately disregard your application without second thought if they find a sentence with grammatical issues. This is part of the basics. Make sure to not only review your resume a couple of times but also invite a friend to evaluate your drafted resume. Again, it is of the utmost importance that this document is error free.
Use The Right Tenses
When crafting a resume, make sure to use past tenses. Unless you are still currently holding a position, use tenses like (directed, managed and hired) to effectively establish that you are not tied with any company. If you use present tenses, you may have to exert extra effort explaining to your hiring managers that you no longer work in that position.
Send PDF Versions Of Your Resume
To avoid format disorders, make sure you save your documents as PDFs. Otherwise, there might be a possibility that the template you sent is not readable or it might turn out disorderly on the recipient’s end. Also, the employer may have a hard time reading your resume when it is properly organized.
Maintain Your Resume’s Readability
Don’t worry if all the details you want to write won’t fit on one page or two. Remember to not compromise readability over the fear of using too many papers for your resume. You can adjust the size of the font according to your preference but never go below 11 pts.
Make It Visually Appealing
Never forget to glue your photo on the resume you’ve created. How else are they going to know if it’s you? Also, be consistent with your font style. If some titles are bold, make sure the other titles are also bold. Additionally, to make it look more professional, only use black as the color of your text. Otherwise, there might be situations when your employers won’t be able to go through your resume properly because you used the color yellow as your font color and it is too hard to read.
Don’t Include Your References Yet
Don’t use more pages to write the names, positions, contact numbers, addresses of your references if they don't explicitly say to do so in the job posting. Leave that decision to your hiring managers if they want to contact you and delve further on your information. Hiring managers will usually let you fill out a separate sheet containing all the necessary details that they need to know about your references.
Don’t List Everything That You’ve Accomplished
As much as we want to impress the hiring managers and get the job that we want, avoid listing all your achievements. Aside from using a lot of space, it will also give your employer the burden of having more to read through. Try to include only those that are significant and impactful.
Conclusion
These tips are a lot to remember for a fresh graduate. The process of going through pre-employment and job searching can be difficult to navigate. With this advice, hopefully you have the means to create an effective resume.
