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16 Top Resume Tips to Help You Land a Job in 2025

Written by 糖心vlog官网观看 Staff 鈥 Updated on

Your resume is a place to showcase your talents and experience. Here are some tips to help your application stand out.

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A resume is your opportunity to showcase your work experience, qualifications, and skill set to potential employers. But, at only one page long,聽it鈥檚 essential to make sure that you鈥檝e prepared the most impactful resume possible when you hit submit.听Looking to stand out from the overcrowded job market? You've come to the right place.

In this article, you'll explore 16 of the top resume tips to help you build a compelling application to land your next job. Covering everything from how to format your resume to how to organize your experience and make the most of all-too-often underutilized skills section, this article will lay out suggestions for crafting a stand-out resume.听Afterward, if you want more resume guidance, consider enrolling in the State University of New York's How to Write a Resume (Project-centered Course).

How to format your resume

A resume鈥檚 format is one of its most important and overlooked features. In this section, you'll explore some top resume tips for ensuring your resume鈥檚 formatting stays impactful.听

1. Keep the design simple and scannable.听

Although it might be tempting to personalize your resume with eye-catching graphics and unusual formatting, simpler designs are almost always better.听

The reason is straightforward: hiring managers only scan a resume for a handful of seconds before moving on to another one, and a simpler design makes it easier for them to find the most important information.

To make your resume and cover letter more impactful, researchers suggest job seekers format them in a simple manner, with clearly marked sections and job titles in bold. They also recommend using clear, easy-to-read fonts (like Times New Roman) and bulleted descriptions below your job titles with some white space around them [].

2. Make it ATS-ready.听聽

You should also make sure that your resume is easily read by the applicant tracking systems (ATS) that many organizations use. These automated systems scan resumes by converting them into plain text so that they can filter and organize applications by factors like relevant experience, education level, and skill level. By converting resumes to plain text, though, the ATS can cause problems for those that rely heavily on graphic elements.

To make your resume ATS-ready, do the following:聽

  • Keep a simple design with clearly marked sections.

  • Use common fonts like Times New Roman or Helvetica.

  • Submit your resume as a word document or PDF.

  • Include relevant resume keywords from the job description in your work experience, skills, and professional summary section. Make sure to only use the keywords in a context that makes sense. Keyword stuffing can sometimes lead to your resume being thrown out.听

Read more: Resume Keywords: How to Find the Right Words to Beat the ATS

3. Consider a professional summary or objective.听

A professional summary gives you the space to outline your professional experience, key qualifications, and skills to hiring managers, while a resume objective focuses on your career goals. These sections can be a good way to give recruiters, who are skimming your resume, an easy-to-read overview of your career and job preparedness.

4. Use a professional email address.听

Your email is your digital calling card, inviting potential employers to reach out to you online. As a result, it鈥檚 crucial to have an email address that is both professional and easy to remember.

To create a professional email address, use a commonly accepted email provider, such as Gmail, and make an address using your name.听If your full name is already taken as an email address, use a variation that isn鈥檛. For instance, you might put your last name before your first name or separate your first and last name with a period, such as 鈥渁braham.lincoln@coursera.org.鈥

5. Omit a references section.

In the past, it was common to include a references section on your resume, but today that isn鈥檛 required. The same goes for the phrase 鈥references available upon request鈥濃攊t鈥檚 not necessary for your resume.听

The reality is that most hiring managers in this step of the hiring process don鈥檛 have the time to call any references, so a section devoted to them takes up way too much space. Instead, use the extra space to flesh out more relevant information, such as your career experience.

If a hiring manager wants you to send over references, they'll likely just ask you before or after your interview.

How to list work experience on your resume

The work experience section of your resume is where you鈥檒l highlight your relevant work experience. Follow the guidelines below to create an impactful overview of your work experience.

6. Put your experience in reverse chronological order.

The most relevant work experience to many employers is your most recent work experience. To highlight your most recent work, list your jobs in reverse chronological order on your resume. That means putting your most recent at the top of your resume and the least recent at the bottom. This career chronology helps recruiters notice the positions you held most recently and see how those positions prepared you for the job.

Learn more: Chronological Resume Guide: Template and Tips

7. Tailor bullet points to the jobs you're applying for.

The bullet points in your work experience section are meant to elaborate on the duties you performed in your previous positions. Rather than including every past responsibility, it鈥檚 wiser to tailor the duties you include in your work experience to match the relevant skills and experience with those of the job description.听

This way, you鈥檒l highlight the key responsibilities that overlap with the advertised position, effectively demonstrating your suitability for the position.听

8. Translate technical language into plain language.听

If you're in a specialized industry, chances are that you have a wealth of technical knowledge that the general population doesn鈥檛 know. While this will undoubtedly improve your capacity to do specific tasks, it can also obscure your abilities to hiring managers who don鈥檛 have the same expertise.

As a result, it鈥檚 helpful to translate your technical expertise into plain language so that recruiters and hiring managers can more clearly understand your prior experience. You can keep your prior experience easy to follow by focusing on the impact of your work rather than the nuts and bolts of it.

For example, if you created a digital project management system that required technical knowledge of databases that most don鈥檛 understand, then you might instead highlight the fact that hundreds of employees used the system at your former workplace.

That said, if a job description explicitly asks for a specific technical or transferable skill, make sure to highlight it in both your resume and cover letter. This is the kind of knowledge that a hiring manager is specifically looking for, even if they don鈥檛 always understand what it is in practice.听

9. Focus on concrete achievements.

At its core, work is about getting the job done. Our daily actions at work accumulate into concrete outcomes that hopefully create your employer's desired impact.听

To help recruiters understand how you made an impact at your previous jobs, you should emphasize the concrete goals you achieved. For example, while noting they made daily calls to potential clients, a salesperson might also state that their efforts led to a "150% increase in total revenue for the company."聽

10. Use action words.

Resume action words are verbs that describe your duties and responsibilities with impactful language. As you're writing your resume, make sure to use strong action verbs to help readers clearly understand your previous work experience.听

For example, rather than simply saying that you 鈥渓ed鈥 a team of four, you might instead say that you 鈥渕anaged鈥 them. Active language like this allows recruiters to see your work more clearly and imagine you in the advertised role.听

Bonus resume tip: use GenAI to tailor (or draft) your resume

Having trouble finding the right words to describe your work experience in your resume or cover letter? Consider using generative AI to write your resume.

How to list your education in your resume

Your educational experience can prove your dedication to a particular field of study and underscore your academic achievements. In this section, you'll learn how to use the education section of your resume to emphasize your skill set and qualifications.听

11. Put your experience before education (unless you鈥檙e a student).听

If you have some prior work experience, you should put your education section below your work experience. Recent graduates and current students, however, should put their education above their work experience section. Putting their educational background near the top of their resumes allows graduates and students to highlight their ongoing training when work experience is lacking.听

If you鈥檙e a student, consider emphasizing your skill set by adding a 鈥渞elevant courses鈥 section to your education section, where you can put a handful of courses you鈥檝e taken that prepared you for the position.

Read more: How to Make a Resume for Your First Job (+ Template)

12. Highlight awards or achievements.听

If you've received any unique academic awards or reached significant achievements during your time in school, then you might consider including them in the education section of your resume. These include Latin honors, scholarships, awards, or any other notable honors you may have received during your time in school.听

Such achievements demonstrate not only your hard work and dedication to your field of study but also the recognition from others you've received.听

13. Don鈥檛 put your GPA (usually).

Unless your employer specifically asks for it, you don鈥檛 need to include your GPA on your resume. Most employers are more interested in the fact that you've met the educational requirements for the position than what your grades were.

That said, if you did exceptionally well, including your GPA could be a good way to catch an employer鈥檚 attention. For example, a 3.9 or 4.0 GPA on your resume can demonstrate your hard work and dedication.听聽In effect, feel free to omit or include your GPA on your resume, but know that it isn鈥檛 usually expected.听

How to highlight your skills on your resume

The skills section of your resume is where you鈥檒l put all the relevant skills you possess that make you a great candidate for the job. In this section, you鈥檒l learn three tips to help you confidently craft this impactful section.听

14. Include both technical skills and workplace skills.

The skills section of your resume should include both your technical (鈥渉ard鈥) skills and your workplace (鈥渟oft鈥) skills. While many people mistakenly believe that only their technical skills are valuable to employers, people skills are also incredibly important. Make sure to include both on your resume.听

Technical skills are all the skills that聽you use for accomplishing technical tasks, such as computer programming or bookkeeping. Workplace skills, meanwhile, are all the skills that you use to do your job well, such as teamwork, problem solving, and critical thinking.

Learn more about the difference between technical skills and workplace skills.

15. Tailor skills to the job description.

You likely possess a wide range of skills that are not immediately relevant to the jobs you鈥檙e applying for. Rather than including all of those skills, it鈥檚 wiser to include only those that are relevant to the position.听

You can find these skills by going through the job description and identifying the technical, people, and transferable skills the hiring manager has emphasized. Afterward, go through the list of skills and determine which ones you possess. Include those in the skill section of your resume. This will help hiring managers (and the ATS) see that you鈥檙e a suitable match for the job.听

16. Strategically highlight your unique (but still relevant) skills.

In some cases, you may possess unique skills that would be helpful to the position but are not cited in the job description. If you possess any such unique skills, then it can be a good idea to include them in the skills section of your resume.

Examples of unique skills include fluency in a foreign language and variants of skills relevant to the position, such as being competent in Java and C# when a position only asks for the ability to code in Python.听

Prepare for the next step in your career with 糖心vlog官网观看

A strong resume starts with strong preparation. Get ready for your next job search with one of these programs on 糖心vlog官网观看:

To craft an eye-catching resume, consider the State University of New York's How to Write a Resume (Project-Centered Course). Review resume best practices, explore current trends, and build a polished resume in as little as five hours.

To boost your job search with GenAI, enroll in Meta's Job Search with GenAI course. Learn how to use generative AI to prepare for an interview and draft and polish your resume.

For long-term skills development, subscribe to 糖心vlog官网观看 Plus. Learn job-ready skills from industry leaders like Google, Microsoft, and IBM. You鈥檒l get a certificate for every program you finish, which you can add to further enhance your resume.

Article sources

1. Ladders. ", https://www.theladders.com/static/images/basicSite/pdfs/TheLadders-EyeTracking-StudyC2.pdf." Accessed April 29, 2025.

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