In terms of resumes and CVs, you can say that Tina Nicolai has seen it all. She started working as a recruiter for Walt Disney World back in the late 1990s and later on started her own company where she's read over 40,000 resumes in her career.
Tina realized that most applicants and candidates did not know how to market themselves and their accomplishments at any level or in any industry. This sparked her idea for creating Résumé Writers' Ink in 2010.
Tina shares this 5 resume mistakes that she commonly sees again and again which are "pretty irritating".
1. Sloppiness
The single most common mistake jobseekers make on their resume writing: laziness. This means writing sloppily and putting poor attention to details. Misspelled words, inappropriate punctuation, lack or improper formatting, outdated, missing or irrelevant information speak volumes to the recruiters. A resume bears your personal brand, make it a good one.
2. Extended summaries
Summaries are supposed to contain the gist of the point one is trying to communicate. It's supposed to be concise and correct. Writing an entire paragraph for a summary loses the attention of the reader.
It's better to use bullets and one liners to "summarize".
3. Buzzword flooded
Resume jargon can often leave an impression that the document was copied or patterned from someone else's. There's really nothing wrong with mimicking the form and layout of information presented on your resume.
However, a "unique and resourceful team player with exceptional communication skills" can probably present themselves more creatively or authentically.
4. The 'responsible for' bullet
Job seekers make this all too common mistake that it could be a deal-breaker.
Telling the recruiters your job responsibilities doesn't speak about your accomplishments, it doesn't even show how the applicant fulfilled the task.
If you put in, "Responsible for creating sales leads and conversions to generate income." It doesn't tell the recruiter if the job seeker did create leads and how much the company earned from those conversions.
Instead write, "Created XX [number of] leads with XX [number of closed sales] and generated $XX [income amount] for the company for [yearly or quarterly period].
5. Too formal
While resumes are supposed to be formal, don't forget to add some personal touches to make it more engaging.
