How to Make Your Resume Stand Out

Writing your resume can be daunting, as it is the key that opens the door to new opportunities. When writing your resume, pay attention to details and be as detailed as possible with the description of your current and past positions.

Recruiters and hiring managers see only your resume or LinkedIn profile before making the decision to reach out to you. By making sure you have all the important details in your resume or LinkedIn profile, you can exponentially increase your chances of being contacted. Details such as clearances, certifications, job titles, and dates are all key details that hiring managers and recruiters search for in resumes.

Adding the specific tools and technologies you have used helps hiring managers and recruiters find you in the sea of applicants. Many positions in the technical field are looking for someone with experience in the specific technologies the team is currently using. Always make sure to tailor your resume to each position you apply for, to highlight what makes you a qualified applicant based on the job description.

When writing your resume, it is absolutely beneficial to describe the scale and scope of your current environment to help the recruiter who champions your qualifications during the submittal process.

If you are currently responsible for managing hundreds of terabytes of data with large ingests of log data on a daily basis, that’s worth expanding on. The same holds true for topics like number of end users, endpoints, transactions, microservices, nodes, and servers. Adding this information to your resume will allow the technical team to correctly grasp your ability to handle similar complexity, and it will provide comfortable talking points during your interview.

Keep job titles and responsibilities as specific as possible for each role listed on your resume. If you have a background in front-end development with some exposure to networking and you are applying for a developer position, you should emphasize your development experience to cater to the requirements of that role. I recommend having different resumes for different types of roles so that you can include relevant language and key words.

If you’re transitioning from military service to civilian work, you’ll want to translate all the military terms and jargon on your resume to language that civilian recruiters can understand. Adding leadership terms and a short description of collaboration with highly ranked officials, along with a list of both hard and soft skills, will create an impressive resume.

Clearance status is a major advantage that veterans hold over civilians. Make sure that hiring teams don’t have to search too long for this information. List it in a clear and obvious place on your resume. To a potential employer, having a clearance means they get the benefit of an employee who is trusted to work with privileged information without incurring the cost and time it takes to qualify and train one.

Do your research on companies to make sure they value the experience you can bring them. If they openly display a positive veteran environment that will provide you with mentors, that could be a great company to work for.