Five things to make your resume stand out

By Merryn Ruthling

Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash

You’ve spent weeks doing the research, reaching out to connections and looking up companies, and finally you’ve found it: your dream job. Now all you need to do is convince them to hire you. To stand apart from the competition, creating a professional and unique resume is a surefire way to make you stand out and land you an interview. Here are a few tips for creating a resume that will land you your dream job:

  1. Tailor your resume. Spending the extra time researching each company you apply to is absolutely necessary and will pay off in the long run. Be on the lookout for key words and values that keep popping up on companies’ websites and on the job description, and emphasize them in your resume. Making sure that you include the most relevant experiences, skill sets and certifications will set you apart from other candidates that have more generic resumes.
  1. Be concise. Many hiring managers do not have the time to do anything more than scan your resume. Therefore, you should use as few words as possible to impress and persuade your potential employer. Keep your resume to one page and spend time thinking about what you want to highlight the most.
  1. Include specific accomplishments. Emphasis should not be placed on what you did but how well you did it! Quantifying your accomplishments is an excellent way to do this. For example, saying you “increased sales by 42% in five months” is much more helpful to employers than saying that you worked on a sales team.
  1. Spend your time building up your resume. There are so many opportunities to get involved and make your resume more attractive to employers. Aside from student organizations and service, UGA offers an Arch Ready Professionalism Certificate and programs such as “Intern for a Day” that can show that you are serious about your career. 
  1. Always, always, always go the extra mile – Write the cover letter. When it comes to applying for jobs, you never want to be the candidate that did the least. If you are the only candidate that did not write one, it says a lot about your work ethic. On the other hand, if you are the only candidate that did write a cover letter, it says equally as much, if not more! Think of your cover letter as your chance to go into more detail about the points in your resume, show off your writing skills, and display how much you want to work for the company.  

Be sure to visit UGA’s Career Center website for more information about how to create strong resumes, cover letters and prepare for interviews. The Career Center is a valuable resource that is easy to take advantage of and can make a huge difference in your job search process!