Resume, CVs & References

What is a Resume?

• A quick-glance, one or two-page document highlighting your backgrounds, skills, and experiences
• A snapshot of your personal brand and the skills and experiences you have that align with the job you want
• A necessary tool to produce job interviews 

What it is NOT

• A lengthy document recounting every detail of every experience you’ve had
• False representation of who you are and what you’ve accomplished
• A list of only your job duties and tasks

Key Outcomes for Using a Resume

• Demonstrate how you meet the needs of the audience (an employer, graduate school, etc.)
• Receive an interview offer from interested party
• Impress your prospective employer with a snapshot of your career, skills and accomplishments

What Makes a Resume Stand Out?

• Demonstrates the key skills and capabilities that the reader would value using key words (also called targeting your resume)
• Directs the reader to important information quickly and clearly using easy to read, professional formatting
• Tells your story of not just what you have done but where you want to go

When you apply for a position online, your application materials are filtered through an application tracking system (ATS). Application tracking systems sort and rank resumes based on algorithms created to filter through qualified candidates.

• Create your resume in a Microsoft Word document, but not in templates as they are often not compatible with ATS
• Customize (or tailor) your resume to ensure that your skills and experiences fit the field or industry

We recommend that you DO NOT use a resume template from Word, Canva, or the Internet. Templates can be difficult to modify to fit your information.

• Use CAPS, italics, underlining, or bullets to separate different sections
• Keep your resume at one or two pages
• Margins should be between 0.5”–1.0” on all sides 
• Use 10–12 point font size for most of the information; larger fonts can be used for headings 
• Font should be in a professional style, no colors or fancy font styles
• Do not use first person pronouns, instead of “I coordinated travel for a team of five sales executives,” use “Coordinated travel for team of five sales executives”
• Verbs should be in present tense for any current experience and past tense for any past experiences 
• Dates should include a year and month, day optional
•  All information on resume should be in reverse chronological order, your most recent information should be first 
• If you are in an artistic or creative field, your resume can be more visually creative and include more color and graphics 
• Proofread, proofread, proofread—to ensure correct punctuation, grammar, and syntax

Your name and contact information should be the first thing an employer sees on your resume.

Be sure to include:

• Name (you may choose to include personal pronoun choices) – use larger font than any other sections on resume
• Email
• Phone Number – include one number that is best to reach you
• Address (optional)
• Customized LinkedIn profile URL (example: http: / / linkedin.com / in / FirstNameLastName), or links to personal websites, and digital portfolios (optional)

Best Practices:

• It is not expected that you include your full address on your resume, but it is typical to include your location such as city and state
• If you are searching for positions outside of your current location, you may want to include the cities or states you are willing to relocate to or merely include “open to relocation”
• Your contact information should include a reliable email address and phone number
• Set-up a personalized phone greeting on your voicemail and be sure that your email address is professional and easy for employers to identify with you
• You may choose to use your Louisville email, especially when applying to graduate programs or internships, but should also set up a professional email at Gmail, Outlook, etc. for your job search
• Website links can be left hyperlinked if submitting electronically so they can easily click on the link to visit your page

If you are applying for a ‘creative’ role such as a position in photography, advertising, or a role that works with social media, your personal social media or portfolio work would show your skill and experience in that field. You may choose to share those links in your contact information.

You may choose to use a summary, also referred to as a career or skills summary, professional summary/profile, or personal branding statement. This summary allows you to tell the employer what you have to offer and why they should be interested in you. Your summary should include knowledge, skills, and expertise that meet the needs of the specific position to which you are applying. The summary can be in paragraph or bulleted format, and you may also bold or italicize keywords that you want to highlight. 

Objective statements are less popular in most industries today. If you choose to include an objective statement, it is recommended that you make it as specific and targeted as possible. Include details about the position or field and the skills you can bring to the organization. Avoid generic statements that do not offer additional information to the employer. 

Note: It is not necessary to use an objective or a professional summary. This information can be included in your cover letter. Many people choose to save this space to include additional information in their experiences.

Summary Example (health care field):

SKILLS SUMMARY 

• Strong critical thinking and problem-solving skills using creativity to overcome challenges 
• Knowledgeable in providing preventative, therapeutic, emergency, and rehabilitative care 
• Excellent customer service, communication, and teamwork skills 
• Skilled in maintaining accurate and detailed records

Action Verbs or Resume “Power Words” 

Use action verbs to create a descriptive and effective resume. We recommend using your creativity to avoid repeating the same action verbs in your accomplishment statements. Try to avoid using common verbs like “assisted, handled, etc.” and switch it up by utilizing strong, compelling action verbs that will catch the readers’ eyes. See our Resume Action Words tip sheet on our website for suggestions of action verbs for your resume.

Highlight the relevant and often required education and training needed for the position. You may also choose to highlight honors and awards, relevant coursework (especially advanced or relevant elective courses), thesis/dissertation titles, or study abroad experience in your education section.

Items to Include:

• Name of the institution(s), city, and state
• Official degree titles and major(s)/minor(s)—(example: “Bachelor of Arts,” “Master of Science”)
• Graduation date - the terms “anticipated” or “expected” are not needed
• GPA and scale (optional—recommended for GPAs that are >3.0)—example: 3.5/4.0

Best Practices:

• List in reverse chronological order with your most recent experience listed first
• If you completed a degree from another institution, include that information in this section
• You do not need to list incomplete degrees from other institutions as those credits are often transferred to your new degree path
• Include the official degree title for your program; check your department’s website to find the official degree title for your program

Experience is a broad term and can encompass experiences such as paid positions, internships, campus involvement, extracurricular activities, or volunteering, etc. Experience included on your resume can be paid or unpaid. It is possible to have multiple types of experience sections. 

Examples of Potential Experience Sections:

• Related Experience
• Additional Experience
• Leadership Experience
• Internship Experience
• Research Experience
• Field or Practicum Experience (for some majors)

Best Practices:

• Work experience should be listed in reverse chronological order, start with the most recent position first • Include job title, organization, location, date, the impact you had and accomplishments that demonstrate your skills for the job
• Be positive and honest about your experiences, skills, and capabilities
• Highlight accomplishments using short bullet statements; start each bullet point with an action verb, list current position in the active present tense verb and list previous jobs in the past tense verb (example: create, manage, organize; created, managed, organized)
• Target your resume by ordering bullets by most relevant to the job description
• It is not always necessary to list every job you have ever had; if you have questions about which experience should be listed on your resume, connect with your career coach

Experience Example:

RESEARCH EXPERIENCE 

Student Research Associate, January 2021–April 2021
Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY

• Conducted research on the effect of vaccination on household transmission of SARS-CoV-2 
• Designed and executed the analysis of data gathered from the Centers for Disease Control on all laboratory-confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Kentucky in which data on all persons sharing the same address are linked
• Presented a written report of the research findings of the project to the Governor of Kentucky and the Louisville Department of Health and Wellness
• Published a review paper in the Journal of Public Health today about the relationship between vaccination and household transmission of SARS-CoV-2

Accomplishment Statements

Accomplishment statements help the reader to understand the scope and context of your experiences. In a modern job search, it is not enough to just list out job duties, tasks, and responsibilities—employers are interested to know how you can add value to their organization. 

SOAR Method 

Accomplishment statements can be developed by using the SOAR Method, which stands for:

• Statement of Action—What did you do? (Action verb) 
• Occurrence of Action—How often action occurred/took place (daily, weekly, annually, etc.) 
• Amount of Action—How much or how many? (20%, 50+, +$1MM, etc.)
• Result of Action—Result of efforts/why was what you did important? (increased, decreased, designed, save, improved, etc.)

SOAR Example

Let’s say that you had an on-campus position as a student assistant at the library. You might be tempted to say, “Shelved books.” But with using the SOAR method, you could elaborate on that accomplishment.

• Statement of Action—inventoried books 
• Occurrence of Action—daily 
• Amount of Action—250+ books 
• Result of Action—improved library organization and patron satisfaction

Full accomplishment statement:

EMPLOYMENT

Ekstrom Library, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY
Student Assistant, August 2022 to May 2023

• Inventoried 250+ books daily, which improved library organization and patron satisfaction

Campus Involvement/Community Service

Campus involvement and volunteer activities should be formatted similarly to work experience and, in some cases, (especially if you have little work experience) can be combined with work under the header “Experience.” 

If you have minimal involvement with an organization or have only participated in short-term volunteer opportunities, it may not be advisable to add them to your resume. Again, you want to demonstrate your impact and involvement. If space is an issue, it is acceptable to list just the organization, volunteer role/position, and dates of involvement.

Hobbies and Interests

This section is typically not included on a resume. If there is relevant information related to your hobbies and interests, it can most likely be incorporated in another section or your cover letter.

Writing a Freshman Resume

Writing a resume as a freshman can be a challenge. When employers review resumes from college students, they don’t want to see high school information. They only want to see what the student has done while in college. However, most freshmen are just getting started in college and don’t have much to list on their resume. That is why it is okay for a freshman to have some high school information on the resume while they are transitioning into their college experience. As the student advances in college, the high school information should be replaced with college information. 

This same concept holds true for college graduates transitioning into their first post-graduation work experience.  As college graduates advance in their career fields, employers will expect to see less information from the college years. Of course, the degree and major are always listed on the resume. However, their importance decreases as more experience and skills are gained.

The following will help you develop your “freshman” resume:

Why a Freshman Resume

A resume will be helpful for many of the following:

• Apply for an on-campus part-time job
• Apply for an off-campus job
• Join a student organization
• Complete a homework assignment in a class
• Practice for getting ready to apply for internship or co-op job search

Common Mistakes on a Freshman Resume

• UofL education not listed or not listed first
• Degree, major and anticipated graduation date not listed and/or not spelled out.
• Inclusion of personal information such as birth date
• Unnecessary employment information listed such as hourly wage, previous supervisor’s name, employer street address and zip code. This information may be needed for a formal application but not on the resume. 
• References listed on the resume itself (References go on a separate page)
• Overall general lack of information; work experiences not described to bring our transferable skills
• Use of resume templates.  Templates limit ability to make future edits and pose limitations.  Templates with designs may make the PDF file too large. 
• Blank lines at the end of the resume resulting in a blank page when converted to a PDF.

A Competitive Process

Whether it is applying for a part-time job, an internship, or a post graduate entry level position, the application process is a competitive one.  There can be many candidates vying for the same position. The candidate with the clearly written resume will stand out favorably in the process. All the other techniques for resume writing should be followed.  The Career Development Center’s Resume Writing Guide may be found on our website at: www.louisville.edu/career.