How one represents themselves is important to “first impressions”, of course. There is nothing novel or controversial in this opening statement or the title of this article. So, why do business executives forget or ignore such a reality in their process of “expanding awareness of themselves”? Why is the need for a resume to stand out with an immediate excellent impression not applied much more often than it is? Over the course of nearly three decades, HGI has reviewed many thousands of executive and professional resumes on behalf of satisfied clients. The firm also receives unsolicited resumes daily from those seeking to make a change. To the latter, HGI has a long-standing culture of extending the courtesy of help or council. To candidates as well as those executives seeking advice, we underscore and reinforce the reality entitled here.
This is a suggestion of a few easy adjustments to how an executive resume opens as well as fulfills its primary objective: bringing about an interview. That is, to motivate the recipient to want to learn more about the subject of the resume. Like the answer to the proverbial Elevator Speech question “Who are you?”, the best resume addresses the inferred inquiry in a direct, succinct and impactful manner. It is clearly considerate of the reader’s time. Yet, a majority of resumes seem to expect the reader to hunt for “Waldo”. Yep, that’s an overstatement – for emphasis, while the point here is that the best resumes get to the point quickly.
Achievements are the proof of capability
They are how an individual verifies they represent a strong positive ROI potential to their next employer; done so by way of evidence they have been just that for previous employers.
First, a reminder of three rules of a resume.
- The subject must be totally comfortable with the content and format.
- The “20-Second Rule” is reality, so keep it in mind when building your resume.
- Virtually anyone considering a resume hopes to be knocked off their chair.
Note: Bios and resumes serve different purposes. Plus, there is validity in the difference between a resume that’s primary purpose is to catch attention, stand alone in introducing the executive, verses a different version and style that might better fit the situation of a handout at an interview. In this suggestion, we are dealing with a CV where the purpose is to serve as an independent summary introducing an executive, the primary goal of which is to stand out and effectively capture initial interest.
The following direct-approach suggestions address the second two of the “rules” above, by being considerate of the resume reader’s time. There have been articles about this resume style for years, some promoting executives to make the most of the first four inches of their resume, and others recommending that successful executives should headline their resumes. “The Elevator Speech” is broadly encouraged advice about being direct and impactful in answering the question, “Who are you?”. Yet the vast majority of resumes open with a “soft sell” generalized paragraph to seemingly provide fairly broad background characterization of the subject of the resume. It’s a paragraph to define the subject as “standing in” a general group, as opposed to standing out as a proven achiever. Then, most often, follows something akin to the near classic three-column list of skills or proficiencies, the longer and more inclusive seemingly the better.
After that comes typically the reverse chronology career history, which finally gets to hopefully some clear statements of how an executive was a verified contributor to their previous employers. We’ve even seen resumes that make indications of accomplishment challenging to pick out of the career history section. Do the subjects of such resumes understand the premise of this article, or have they just not led any recognized achievements on behalf of an employer?
The 20-second scanning eye usually skips those opening paragraphs and key word columns, hoping to find reason to be knocked off their chair. The above mentioned first four inches and headline advice, around for years, comes from the Newspaper Industry, where the objective is to grab attention… “front page, above the fold”.
If you yourself can relate to received resumes getting ~20 seconds of quickly scanning down to find the “meat”, then stop, reflect and “play to the audience” in how you structure yours. In those valuable first four inches, grab attention and motivate real interest to learn more about your difference-making, leadership-proving career history. Right after your Name and Contact Info, open with headlines that clearly define you as someone who has been a recognized good ROI, materially contributing to your employer’s success. Imagine you’re answering the Elevator Speech question, “Who are you?” with a couple very direct statements of Accomplishment, to Affirm your Ability.
Headlining your resume
As you probably have more than a couple recognized accomplishments, how do you decide which to headline? At HGI, we’d typically suggest an exercise sitting at one’s keyboard, resume face down, and reflect over one’s career, recording one acknowledged accomplishment after the other, independent of employer, job title or chronological sequence. Just make a list. Come back to it later and consider carefully which two would likely catch the attention of the most and/or broadest group of recipients.
A tip is that Headlines are not Paragraphs, not necessarily even properly structured sentences. In fact, the best rule is to express the accomplishment in one easy to grasp by a scanning eye line, incorporating reference to common, widely applied business metrics, for example, P&L. Play to the audience that is hoping to be highly impressed. Clearly delineate one accomplishment statement from the other, maybe with a bullet or just a single line and line spacing that’s easy to comprehend when scanning. They are just that, “headlines” that only foretell what is covered in further reading. And that’s the objective: to stop the scanning and start the reading. The same accomplishments should be clarified in somewhat more detail, in the career history section, under the appropriate employer and title, with additional points that can motivate the reader to want to learn further about the executive who is the subject of the resume.
HGI suggests a goal of showing two accomplishment headlines to open a resume, acknowledging that many reading this article will not be able to resist including a third. Hopefully you can control your urge at that point. Plus, if you happen to have a secondary college degree, it’s along the same lines of playing to the audience to include reference to it, as “MBA from Upper Central University” in the first four inches. At this point, in the top half of the first page of your executive resume you have highlighted a majority of what most hiring managers seek as they first view your resume. They have enough to decide conveniently whether to read further and learn more about you, without making them hunt for “Waldo”. Plus, they have your name and contact info to set up initial contact, all within 20 Seconds.
As probably only around 10% of the resumes HGI sees apply this convention, the overall format of the front page is conventional to common resume layout and yet the headlines make it notably distinct in appearance.
Still, the first rule noted above is that the subject of a resume absolutely needs to be comfortable with it. The most common objective of this kind of resume is to attract a request for an interview; while to a portion of the executive population, the above suggestions may seem a bit too forward. Fully appreciated; these ideas are not for everyone. At the same time, if you’re selling your company’s product, you probably don’t start the promotional material with a soft sell, generalized paragraph of broad features and feature categories. You quickly get to the product benefits customers are reporting they like about the product. Those are often the headlines of the ad.
Other suggestions
Here at HGI, we’ve had courtesy discussions with very many executives regarding their pursuit of the next career step, and how their resume can be most effective toward that aspiration. While what is contained here is probably the most frequent point of advice, those conversations regularly delve into far broader areas of content, format and other suggestions over the remaining inches and pages of those personal advertisements. For instance, clients seldom hire based on the resume subject’s demonstrated skills at applying elaborate formatting or colors and charts to their resume. Keep it simple and standard. The interview is the time for more detail clarity.
Our advice in these areas is pro bono, as we are not a source of resume writing or candidate marketing. We are just always glad to be a friendly sounding-board when we may be constructive to an executive in or nearing transition.
Remember, employers, as have you when hiring, seek ability to contribute to their company’s success, and the quickest way to get their interest in considering you is by way of your recognized Accomplishments.
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