How to Prepare a Good Resume For Interview

How to Prepare a Good Resume For Interview

It is said that,
"The first impression is the last!"

The big challenge today for an active job seeker is to prepare a good & attractive resume, which stands between their dream job. People normally copy paste formats, projects from each other and expect a great impact on their career growth and this copy & paste a method is generally followed across all industries.

If you are a skilled professional, but your resume is poor, although you keep applying to multiple jobs/companies you will barely get any revert or interview calls. 

So then you may be thinking about how to prepare an attractive resume which will lead Human Resource manager to call you for interviews.

In this guide, we are going to teach you everything about "How to write a wonderful resume"

• Mention your personal data and contact information on top of the resume
• Write down professional title and summary/objectives
• List your top soft and hard skills
• Mention your achievements
• List your work experience
• Educational qualifications and certificate
• Include additional information's like - Languages, hobbies, etc

Sometimes you also need to tailor your role and responsibilities as per the job posting.

I personally believe if the resume is in good format and showcase brief description of past experience, half of the battle is won.

1) Mention your personal data and contact information on top of the resume  - You no need to mention your complete permanent or residential address, just be precise, write down your complete Name following with Email ID and Contact details, helping the HR to contact you.

You can also provide alternate email ID and contact number just in case you are not traceable. 

2) Write down professional title and summary/objectives - Professional titles would be "Technical Architect", "Project Manager", etc and summarize how your professional knowledge and experience is going to help the company to achieve its vision and targets.

3) List your achievements with soft and professional skills - This is very a critical part of your resume. Every recruiter would love to understand your achievements till the date. This achievement may include your awards, client recommendations, target achieved, promotional & professional growth, major clients handled, etc.

For sales professionals - Handled specific region and increased sales, met sales targets.

For IT professionals - Handled major clients, pre-sales, won more projects, etc.

There are 2 types of skills you can include when writing your resume:

a) Hard Skill - This could be anything from coding to data entry to the architect to cooking.

b) Soft Skill - Active in social skills, communication skills, leadership, out of the box thinker.

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4) List your work experience - There are three-ways to mention your work experience.

a) Reverse chronological resume format - This means that your latest work experience is listed first. This is the most popular resume format and is ideal for people with plenty of relevant work experience.

b) Functional/skills-based resume format – This is useful to those, who lack relevant work experience is a student/recent graduate, or if looking to make a career change, the skills-based format is a better choice.

c) Combination resume format – The combination resume is a great choice for job-seekers with a very diverse skill-set. It’s useful if you’re applying for a role that requires expertise in 3-4 different fields and you want to show all that in your resume.

Say, for example, you’re applying for a senior management position and the requirements are expertise in Management, Sales, and Software Development.

Investigating more on "how to list your work experience".

Job title / Position - Your latest job title should go on top of work experience When an HR manager scans your resume, he should know you are presently working at which position.

Company name/address/description - Mention the name of your employer, office address and small write up about the company if, in case, the organization is not famous.

Role and responsibilities - Describe in brief your present role and responsibilities (you can tailor this according to a job posted by the recruiter as well). You can mention the team handled, target achieved. etc which may motivate the hiring manager to call you.

Employment date - This refers to your date of joining with the employer.

5) Educational Qualifications and Certifications - In this section mention your higher most education on the top along with University name / Institute name which will make you stand out of the crowd.

Certifications are equally important, for great visibility and for getting additional compensation as well. Refer to my earlier blog "Factors considered for salary calculation".

6) Tailor your resume as per client requirement -  This is another important part, for those candidates who have done multiple different jobs and have a good experience.

Such people should modify the resume as per client requirements.   

Add your professional photo on top of the resume and provide social site link so HR can refer to the link and know more about you.

Mention all the languages you know and assign them appropriate level:

• Native
• Fluent
• Proficient
• Intermediate
• Basic

Do you want to add more spice to your resume? List your hobbies and area of interest. Maybe the interviewer and you have some hobbies in common.

Last but not the least, try to make your resume to the point and short, max. of 2 pages.

Finally been getting selected is almost important (Refer to "How To Get Selected in an Interview")