Competition is tough these days, especially if you’re trying to break into the tech industry or startups. What you need is a resume that really stands out. These resume tips are designed towards top tech careers in areas such as software, data, and digital marketing.
Your resume is the first thing a potential employer will see and it’s important to optimize it. Learn how to really sell your valuable experience and transferable skills. If you’re interested in career development, here are some top tips for a better resume.
Use an easy-to-read layout
It’s important to effectively illustrate any relevant experience in a clear and concise manner. Don’t make potential employers work to find it. Often resumes go through a sifting process nowadays, and computer programs search for key information. Clearly divide your resume into work experience, education, and other certificates and skills.
For tech jobs, formatting is also important. This is an opportunity to showcase your IT skills. Choose a template that’s appropriate for the job. Employers will also look for specific examples of skills and how you demonstrate these. Ensure they jump out when they’re scanning your resume.
Objective statement
Write an Objective Statement that describes exactly what you want. While your overarching goal, for example, maybe to get a job, your resume statement may state that you want a specific job. Objective statements provide precise details about how you plan to achieve a business goal. If they need to talk about the problems they are looking to solve.
Your personal statement is a short advert for why they should choose you. It’s important to tweak it to each role and use specific examples. Mention your most impressive experience and put the length of time for example “IT project manager with over five year’s experience”. Add notes and goals for career development relating to the position you’re applying for.
Lead with your best experience
Most resume tips are based around the fact that your potential employers will only skim read. It’s crucial to catch their eye with your best and most relevant experience. This should go at the top. If you’ve got work experience it’s better to lead with this. For recent graduates, talk about specific projects that demonstrate the skills needed for the job.
It’s important to lead with examples your potential employer can relate to. Go through the job description and describe how you tick all the boxes. Pick out important keywords and incorporate them into the first parts of your resume.
Highlight your technical expertise
For a tech job, it’s going to be necessary to highlight your technical expertise. If you are proficient using programming languages, software or hacking methods, for example, mention these clearly. It’s simpler to list these in bullet points and ensure that you include the ones on the job description.
Do some research into the most recent or popular software for the type of business you’re applying to. Potential employers are ideally looking for candidates with experience in the same or similar programs. Depending on the job role, you might want to do an online course in a particular software or language.
Demonstrate relevant soft skills
These are transferable skills that are important for career development. Certain application procedures will assess candidates based on their demonstration of skills such as problem-solving, decision making, communication, and providing excellent customer service.
These skills are equally important as technical skills in the tech industry and it’s important to provide a clear example of all of the ones mentioned in the job posting. Also, the ability to learn and adapt to new technologies is a very important personality trait, if you can demonstrate this in your resume that would be very helpful.
Back up your examples with clear evidence
It’s not enough just to express that you have great customer service skills. Employers will be looking for a specific situation in which you provided an excellent service. It’s a good idea to make a note of these for each type of soft skill.
Provide numerical and technical evidence where possible. For example, if you helped increase the number of conversions on a client’s site, give them the details. If you work in cybersecurity mention the percentage you managed to lower security threats by.
Include links to your site or social media
If you’ve already established yourself online, as it’s a good idea to if you want to break into the tech industry, include links to these pages. It’s a good demonstration of the technical and networking skills you’ll need when working for the tech industry or a startup.
A professional website or at the very least LinkedIn profile will give you a lot of credibility. Not all potential employers will take the time to look at the first stages of the application. It’s known that companies often google candidates and check their social media at a later stage, however. Make sure they’ll be impressed by what they find.
Get a mentor to check your resume
It’s ideal to have a mentor go over and edit your resume. Ideally, they should be someone who works in a similar role. If you have recently completed a training course or studies, you could ask one of the teachers. There are also plenty of guides online if not.
A second opinion is always a good idea before sending your final draft. Even if you only ask a friend or member of your family. They might be able to point out any mistakes you didn’t notice when proofreading it yourself. Tech professionals need attention to detail and even the odd spelling or formatting error won’t go down well.
Find out what tech employers are looking for
As you go through job listings make notes of any common technical and soft skills employers are looking for. This will help you prepare your resume. Sometimes the best resume tips are just about doing your research. Find out as much as you can about what’s required of the job role and this will help you in the interview as well.
Your resume is essential for your career development. A well-written resume can be the golden ticket to finally getting your dream job. Check out our blog for more resume tips and advice.