Resume Tips: What Career Coaches Tell Their Clients

As career coaches, we review hundreds of resumes. Here are the insider tips that make the biggest difference.

Top 10 Resume Tips from Career Coaches

1. Lead with Results, Not Responsibilities
   BAD: "Responsible for managing a team of 10"
   GOOD: "Led a team of 10 to exceed quarterly targets by 23%, generating $1.2M in revenue"
2. Customize for Every Job - Use keywords from the job description. ATS filters out non-matching resumes.
3. Quantify Everything - Numbers stand out. "Increased sales by 35% in 6 months."
4. Use the XYZ Formula - "Accomplished [X] as measured by [Y], by doing [Z]"
5. Kill the Objective Statement - Replace with a Professional Summary (3-4 sentences).
6. One Page (Usually) - 1 page for <10 years experience. 2 pages for 10+. Never more than 2.
7. Remove These Immediately: "References available upon request," full street address, high school (if you have college), irrelevant jobs from 15+ years ago.
8. Format for Readability - Clean fonts, consistent formatting, white space, bullet points.
9. Include a Skills Section - Match to the job posting. Hard skills + select soft skills.
10. Proofread - Then Proofread Again - One typo can disqualify you. Read backward, read aloud, have someone else review.

The Reader You Are Writing For

A resume is scanned before it is read, usually by someone who is not the hiring manager and who is matching against a short list of requirements. That reality drives almost every practical decision: put the matching evidence where a scanner will find it, and make the first third carry the argument.

Lead With Outcomes, Not Duties

A duty describes the job that existed. An outcome describes what changed because you were in it.

• Duty: "Responsible for managing the scheduling process."
• Outcome: "Rebuilt the scheduling process; cut the weekly backlog from three days to under one."

Where you have a number you can defend, use it. Where you do not, describe the change qualitatively and accurately — an invented percentage is a bad trade for a claim that falls apart in an interview.

Match the Language of the Posting

If the posting says "accounts payable," do not write "AP." If it says "stakeholder management," use that phrase where it is true. This is not keyword stuffing; it is removing the translation step for a reader who is matching quickly. Never claim a skill you do not have to make the match — the interview finds it immediately.

Formatting That Survives Automated Parsing

• Standard section headings: Experience, Education, Skills.
• One column. Multi-column layouts and text boxes frequently parse into nonsense.
• No critical information inside images, headers, or footers.
• Dates in a consistent format, with months.
• A common font, and a file name with your name in it.
• Submit the format they ask for — if unspecified, PDF is usually safest.

Length and What to Cut

One page early in a career, two pages when there is genuinely two pages of relevant history. What gets cut is easy to identify: anything more than roughly fifteen years old unless it is directly relevant, duties that repeat between roles, and every line that describes the job rather than your contribution to it. Objectives statements can go entirely; a short summary that names what you do and for whom is more useful.

Gaps, Changes, and the Things People Hide

A gap is not disqualifying; an unexplained gap invites the reader to invent a reason. State it briefly and move on — caregiving, study, redundancy, illness, a business that did not work. A career change needs one line up front connecting the past to the target so the reader is not left to guess. Attempts to disguise dates almost always read as evasive.

Tailoring Without Rewriting Every Time

Keep a long master document containing everything you have done. For each application, build the version from the master: reorder bullets so the most relevant sit first, adjust the summary line, and cut what does not serve this specific role. Ten minutes of tailoring beats an hour of rewriting, and it is far more likely to actually happen.

The Last Check

• Can a stranger tell in ten seconds what you do and what you want next?
• Does every bullet describe a contribution rather than a responsibility?
• Is every claim one you could talk about for two minutes under questioning?
• Are your contact details current and does the email address sound professional?
• Has someone else proofread it? You will not catch your own errors.