No matter how much time and effort you give to the creation of your resume, the fact is that it isn’t going to receive a lot of attention from a hiring manager or recruiter before a decision is made whether or not to pursue your candidacy. That’s right: The very document into which you pour your heart and soul to communicate a lifetime of work will, initially, receive a glance.

Therefore, it is important you give your resume the right kind of attention to ensure it becomes your ticket past the screening process. Lily Zhang’s article, “12 Tiny Changes That Make Your Resume Easy for Recruiters to Skim,” provides a checklist of resume format items that are often overlooked or simply not considered.

Line It Up

With different options available to justify text, it’s important to use them with a specific purpose. Here is your guide for your resume:

Align all text to the left. Our eyes want to move to the left after finishing a line of text, so create a document that supports this. Aligning text in the center disrupts the natural reading flow requiring time and effort of the reader. Make it easy on those from whom you want positive attention! Stick with left justification for your resume to create text hiring managers are used to reading.

Also, do not justify your text. While the visual bonus for this may be a sleek look, doing so creates strange gaps between words.

The exception to the align-left directive is with regard to dates and locations. Align those on the right. When professional titles and organizations are stacked on top of dates and locations, a cluster is created that takes up valuable real estate on the page. Move dates and locations to the right on the same line as the title and location. The right alignment creates white space between information supporting the readability.

Make It Stand Out

While all of the information on your resume matters, it’s important to highlight certain aspects to make an impact during the glance review. There are a number of ways to manipulate text on the computer, but there needs to be some intentionality when deciding what to apply to the resume.

Using bold is a good option. Be mindful that it can be overdone thereby losing its emphasis. Choose to either bold your roles or the organizations for which you have worked but not both. Make the decision about which to bold based on the following: If you want to emphasize your professional career track, bold your roles; if you want to highlight specific experiences and affiliations, bold the organizations.

While using bold is a good tool, do not use font size to emphasize a point. The font should be same size throughout your resume. With the exception of making your name a little bigger, the rest of the resume text should be in same size for the greatest readability. Also, reserve using the very-difficult-to-read all-caps key for your name, or completely omit it.

To Read With Ease

You already know it is important to restructure your full sentences into easier-to-digest sentence fragments, otherwise known as bullet points. Maximize this method with a focus on the first five words of the point. That is the length Zhang identifies as the number of words most likely seen by a hiring manger or recruiter before moving on to the next point. Of course, pay attention to the content of the entire point for those times a reviewer is intrigued enough to keep reading. But, in general, make sure those first five words count. And, make sure the bullet point is no more than two lines long. The more concise the point, the easier it is to digest.

Another detail to tweak for the purpose of skim-ability is how to structure numbers. Numbers are important as they quantify time and outcomes. Give them their due emphasis and attention by always using the numeral. It is much easier to read, remember and again find 50% than it is fifty percent.

Emphasize It

While you certainly put your relevant skills in their appropriate context within bullet points, adding a separate skills section is a good idea. Not only does it highlight them, but it also creates a concise space for later reference.

No matter how you emphasize your points, or even whether or not you follow direct alignment advice, make sure the entire document is in a consistent format. Each piece needs to look the same in terms of order of information. This not only supports a strong flow, but it also helps a hiring manager go back and quickly find information.

While you can’t control how much attention your resume receives, you do control utilizing strategies to make it the strongest document possible. Make sure your resume gets the attention your candidacy deserves!

Zhang, Lily. “12 Tiny Changes That Make Your Resume Easy for Recruiters to Skim.” The Muse. Daily Muse, Inc. 2016. Web. (3 July 2016)

Nancy Stoker is a Senior Client Services Representative and Research Associate with ExecSearches.com. ExecSearches provides various recruitment and executive search services for nonprofits including its nonprofit job board.

Last updated on July 23rd, 2016 at 12:12 pm