Resume Guidelines

Objective:
Top level candidates have career direction. They accept new positions, take on new responsibilities, and even volunteer for special projects at the office because they understand how it will impact their careers. Your objective is where you can showcase your career direction to potential employers. Try to keep it no longer than two sentences.

To help you develop a strong career objective that you can be committed to, think about:

• Where to do you want to be professionally 5 years from now?
• What skills will you need to develop to get there?
• What projects, positions, teams, or companies will allow for you to develop those skills?
• What skills need to be developed first?
• Why is this career objective important to you?
• Have you talked about your career objective with your family? Are they behind you?

Professional Experience (Career Path):
Many people like to put education credentials first. At Protis, we feel that it depends upon the industry. Typically, with highly technical positions, or career paths that require advanced education levels to excel, it will make sense to put educational credentials and accomplishments before the career path. For other positions, we recommend that you put your career path first.

Your career path information should be chronologically organized starting with your present employer and position. Try and use no more than two or three sentences to outline your basic duties and responsibilities.

• Employers do not want to have to hunt for information that will tell them why they should hire you. Therefore, use bullet points to outline your major accomplishments. To help you develop a list of accomplishments, we recommend you start by taking a self-inventory. We all do things that bring value to our employer that we don't think about on a daily basis - hopefully, this process will help you to think deeper about your value, experience and accomplishments.
• Use the SAR method to formulate your accomplishments. S = situation (describe a situation that relates to the question), A = action (what did you do about the situation, R = results (what was the quantifiable outcome of your action - was money saved, if so provide $,.)
• To help you get started, consider the following:
  • What major awards have you won?
  • What major projects have you worked on that no one else wanted? What was the end result of that project?
  • What projects did you work on that helped your company generate revenue? What was the amount?
  • What projects did you work on that helped your company control costs? What was the cost savings?
  • Have any people that you managed excelled?
  • Have you been honored with any company awards? Describe what helped you achieve the award.
  • Have you been honored with any industry awards? Describe what helped you achieve the award.
  • What problems or challenges did you face that stretched your skills and allowed for you to grow professionally?
• Limit your bullet points under each position to two or three that reflect the skills and abilities that you feel identify with what the employer is looking for in a candidate. If you are working with one of our Search Consultants, they can help you in this area.

Education:
Organize your educational path chronologically, starting with your most recent formal education first. Be sure to include any specific accomplishments, awards, or clubs in which you participated.

List any continuing education classes you feel appropriate. You might want to list various computer training you have had, night school classes you have taken, or even seminars you have attended.

Hobbies:
What do you like to do outside of work? Employers like to see well-rounded people. Workaholics do not always make the best candidates. Rather than just list the activities or groups you are involved with, try pulling out specific points of responsibility that relate to what a company may view as being of value to their organization. For example, if you are the Treasurer for the local Rotary club, be sure to highlight what your fiscal responsibility was.

Additional Comments:

• Use short sentences.
• Be direct.
• Use bullet points to isolate specific points of interest.
• Highlight position titles and company names.
• Do not try to fit too much information on one page. It will look cluttered and be hard to read.
• Use a clean font that will fax with clarity.
• Have several people proofread your document, and use spell check as well.
• Have a copy of your resume ready to e-mail.
• Be sure to use descriptive words that help to paint a visual picture of what you can do and who you are.
• Do not put your resume in a fancy cover.

References:
Be sure to provide at least three business references. If you do not want to list anyone from your current employer, think about customers, vendors, or competitors that you may have dealt with at one time or another.