Confessions of a Busy Resume Reader

Too Much Data

On a daily basis, my eyeballs look over 20+ resumes. Multiply the 20+ by 20 years and you get a big number. The size of the final number isn’t important but the point is that I see a significant number of resumes in any given week.

I don’t have time to read every resume that crosses my eyeballs so I’ll admit that before reading anyone’s resume, I scan. Call it a time management technique or call it a survival technique. I’m sure that I’m not the only person you’ll send a resume to who is overwhelmed with too much data.

I have a professional security resume writing business but that is not what this article is about. This intention of this article is to tell the resume sender how a busy resume reader actually reads a resume and how to make a resume scanner want to slow down to read your resume from top to bottom.

Make Your Resume Readable and Compelling

You’re probably thinking I’m going to tell you to load your resume with keywords, buzzwords and fluffy verbiage. If you’re thinking that way, you’re mostly wrong and partially right.

Resumes need to carry a significant number of keywords that relate to your specific skill set but don’t go overboard. Keywords alone don’t make a great resume.

Don’t load the top of your resume with fluff. Fluff is that material found in resumes that adds no value and simply makes it harder for the resume reader get to the meat. Resumes scanners don’t read fluff. They skip over the fluff and go straight to where they think accomplishments will be detailed.

Write your resume in an executive summary format that is easily readable and speaks clearly to your accomplishments.

Most Resumes Resemble a Job Description Turned Inside-Out

I didn’t come up with this idea but I do agree. Several years ago, a senior Human Resources executive client of mine pointed out that although I had delivered precisely to his expectations when he retained SecruityRecruiter.com to deliver on a Converged CSO role, but that every resume looked like a job description turned inside-out.

During a phone conversation, Mike began reading the bullets on the one of the resumes I presented. While he was happy with the candidate, I quickly learned that Mike looked at resumes through a microscope. This was the first time I’d delivered candidates to Mike.

He read a bullet and asked me if I though the bullet communicated any level of accomplishment. He read another bullet and asked the same question again. Mike was 100% correct in his assessment. While each bullet he read explained what the security job candidate was hired to do, none of the bullets explained what the security job candidate had actually done to earn their paycheck.

Later that day, I stopped and looked through Mike’s microscope (so to speak) at a dozen resumes owned by security professionals I believe to be some of the most talented security professionals in industry today.

Sure enough, Mike was right. Very seldom did even the best security job candidates deliver a resume that demonstrated accomplishments.

Paradigm Shift

I had been reading and frequently writing resumes for 18 years at the time when Mike opened my eyes. Mike’s detailed scrutiny of resumes caused me to change the way I look at resumes and the way I now write resumes.

Deliver Accomplishments in Your Resume

Every bullet in your resume should be a short story. In other words, stop thinking of a bullet as a short incomplete sentence. Instead, think of a bullet as a mini paragraph. The paragraph should display what you were hired to do, what you actually did and what value your work contributed to your employer.

Here is a bullet on a resume I recently received:

Established partnerships for alternative distribution channels

Could you envision a job description stating that in this role, you will establish partnerships for alternative distribution channels?

Turn this bullet into one that has a beginning, middle and an end. Turn it into a bullet that tells a story, a bullet that shows accomplishment and has meat to it.

Established partnerships tapping into alternative distribution channels. New distribution channels included IT service providers, information security professional services firms and industry trade associations. New partnerships generated $427,000 in additional bottom line revenue for 2009.

What Employers Seek In Security Job Candidates

Employers today are all challenged to get more work done through fewer people. This is true in the security profession and is true across the board in all facets of business.

Security professionals who can tie their activities to accomplishments that positively impacted the businesses ability to do business, rise above those who simply deliver to the job the job description they signed up for.

Write your resume in such a way as to tell the reader what you've accompished, what you've done to add to the bottom line of your employer, what you've done to mitigate risk and to make your current and past employers more secure because of your presence.

Don't hold back in delivering accomplishment in your resume because if you do, your resume may never crack open the door that leads to your next interview.

Jeff Snyder, Security Recruiter Blog