A recent graduate can be in a Catch-22 situation: he won’t land a job because he has no experience, and without employment he can’t gain experience. But everyone has to start from somewhere. How can a just-out-of-college person get a job? The answer is through a powerful resume. It must highlight your education and skills in an effective way.
Tailor your resume to the job: Before you prepare a resume, go through the job ad. Make a note of the keywords / key phrases in it. Some examples of these from different ads are “strong knowledge of C++”, “should have completed advance-level courses in marketing”, and “possess superior verbal and written skills in English”. Then, check if you’ve most of the skills. If yes, begin writing your resume. Ensure that you match your resume with the needs of the job. Weave your resume with the keywords in the ad.
Craft a powerful summary: Do you know that employers spend only about 30 seconds on a resume? In this time, your resume has to convince the recruiter of your talent. Write a summary of your internship, skills, projects and educational accomplishments. Again, your summary should have a clear focus on the job needs. Use about eight to ten sentences to build your summary. The summary should build a bridge to the other parts of your resume.
Turn the spotlight on achievements: Employers like to know how you can be an asset to their enterprise. Focus more on achievements in your resume. Some examples are internship credentials, completing studies with a distinction, receiving an award for a project, and fluency in a foreign language. Your accomplishments info—in relation to the job needs—makes your resume stand out from others.
Use a simple Language: A straightforward choice of words in your resume helps the hirer to evaluate your fit for the job. Convince the employer not with grand words, but by your qualifications. Use active verbs like managed, designed, and wrote and explain your skills. Construct short sentences. Format these with bullet points.
Select Standard Fonts: Use a serif font like Times New Roman or Palatino. Don’t use fonts that you like, because (a) such fonts may not be available on the viewer’s computer and (b) fancy fonts may project your resume in poor light.
Leave White Space: It improves readability of your resume. So, leave a one-inch margin for the top, bottom, left, and right margins.
Check the grammar and spelling: Be aware that your resume holds the mirror to your talent. Make sure your resume doesn’t have grammar and spelling errors. After you write the resume, take a break. Come back and check it again to catch any errors. Have someone proofread your resume for you.
Create a Text Resume: Today, many people apply for jobs through the websites of the companies and also through career portals. While some sites allow uploading resumes in Word format, others allow resumes only in text / ASCII format. At sites like the latter and where you’ve to cut-and-paste relevant resume sections into boxes, a text resume helps.
How can you prepare a text resume? It’s easy. In Word, Click File>Save As. From the “Save as type” field in the Save As dialog, choose Plain Text. Type a name for your file in the “File name” field and click Save. When you save a .DOC file as a text file you lose styles like bold, italic, and others. You can use, however, hyphens, tildes, and asterisks to highlight sentences. Note you can also create a text resume with Notepad.
Resume Format for Recent Graduates:
1. Personal Details – Name, address, mobile and landline numbers, and e-mail address
2. Summary
3. Certifications (if any) – List certifications that match the job needs
4. Percentage / Class / GPA – Use this section only if you’ve above average grades
5. Awards (if any) – List only academic / internship / project-related / job-related awards
6. Internship Experience – Emphasize accomplishments rather than mere job duties
7. Projects – Give a brief description of your role and contribution to the projects, application and benefits, technological significance, and others.
8. Core Courses – Highlight courses that directly relate to the job
9. Computer Skills / Other Skills – Give priority to advance skills
10. Education Details
11. Co-Curricular Activities
12. Voluntary Work (if any) – List it only if it’s related to the job
13. Student Membership (if any) in Professional Associations / Societies
14. Extra-Curricular Activities
Note that you may have to re-arrange items in 3-10 above based on the needs of the job. Items directly related to the position take higher slots. For example, if computer skills are a key need of the job, move it to slot number 3 or 4. Skip details like of hobbies, if they are in no way connected to the job.
With a well-crafted resume that effectively addresses the needs of the job, you’ve a bright potential to receive the all important interview call / letter.
Author: S.B. Viswa kumar
hi to all…..this is very useful website…while reading this i learned so many things..thank u