7 Executive Resume Mistakes | JobSearchTV.com
Executive resumes, C level resumes, have their own brands of mistakes. Here are seven.
Putting Your Resume Together
Executive resumes, C level resumes have their own brand of mistakes that people make. Let me talk with you about a couple of the mistakes I see people making much too often, that I don’t want to say dooms your candidacy, but it lessens you in people’s eyes, and thus hurts you in the process. So, even if you get the interview, there’s this little nagging doubt that people have about you.
So, the first mistake I see is that people use unreasonably small fonts. So that number two, they get a one page resume. These are linked together. So unreasonably small fonts, and one page resumes. Go for a two page resume. Have the fonts of your resume large enough so that they’re easily readable. 12 point is really ideal. If you have to go to 14, go ahead. But I think 12 is a certain size that for resume works well.
Number three is they insert an image on the resume, which makes any sort of tracking system cough. I know the desire is to make something look good. But if the system can’t handle it, you have a problem and thus, it parses badly. And it impacts whether or not you’re interviewed. Number three, I’m sorry, number four is the two column resume. Two column resumes don’t work. And I know there could be some very nice visuals with a two column. But systems don’t like them. People like them. And thus, if you’re working directly to someone, by all means, two column is great. Same with images. However, if they tell you “could just send it through the system, too,” you have to strip this stuff out.
Next, not tailoring the resume to the particular role. And the easiest way to do this is by, at the top of the page, you have the title of the role you’re competing for. So for example of the Chief Financial Officer. You’d have that term, perhaps set aside by lines toward the top of the page or not set aside by lines, but you do the Chief Financial Officer title along the top of the resume. Thus, if you’re going to submit it to a tracking system, it recognizes the term and sees you as being viable for that role.
Using objective statements. Why would you possibly use an objective statement? Seriously, all these things allow people to see that you have a throwaway line there, or something disqualifying about yourself. There’s nothing positive that comes from it.
Last thing, forgetting to have quantifiable achievements. When I first started recruiting, we didn’t know about stuff like this. So everything was responsible for. Okay, you’re responsible for the partner 14 charged with and that was fine. But once you get done, and we didn’t know that back in the stone age’s. Eventually, we learned that this was a way to differentiate people.
Because, for example, a project with two people was different than a project with 20 people, 200 people or 2000 people. A role that had a budget of $20,000 was different than one with $2 million $200 million, a billion dollars. So having a sense of quantifiable achievements, giving people a sense of how large these projects were, or how much revenue your department went through. These all give people an idea of what you’ve accomplished.
When You’ve Been Made Redundant, Fired, Laid Off, RIF’d
ABOUT JEFF ALTMAN, THE BIG GAME HUNTER
Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter is a coach who worked as a recruiter for what seems like one hundred years. His work involves career coaching, all as well as executive job search coaching, job coaching and interview coaching. He is the host of “No BS Job Search Advice Radio,” the #1 podcast in iTunes for job search with more than 1800 episodes and “The No BS Coaching Advice Podcast” and is a member of The Forbes Coaches Council. “No BS Job Search Advice Radio” was named a Top 10 podcast for job search. JobSearchTV.com is also a Top 10 YouTube channel for job search.
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