Following are 10 tips to modernize your resume. Good news: you should be able to complete this in 15 minutes if you know your way around your resume software.          

✂️ #1: Cut back your margin

If you’re like me, you were taught early that you needed a one-inch margin around your page. But that’s not true when it comes to resumes. My recommendation? Change it to .6 or .7.

This will allow you to create more space between bullets and within the document.

Which leads me to…

🌬️ #2: Give your bullets breathing room

I usually set my spacing at 3 points between bullets (and single spacing between lines of the same bullet). The reader will appreciate this because your document will be easier to read.

🖋️ #3 Update your font

If you’re using Times New Roman as your default, it’s time for a refresh. Times New Roman has been around forever—and you can tell.

If you’re wondering which font to use instead, you can’t go wrong with Calibri. To add variety, you can use Cambria for headings (e.g., Professional Experience and Education).

Now, it’s not necessary to use more than one font—and definitely don’t use more than two. That’s a design no-no.

🌟 #4 Kick off your resume with a title that pops

Your title could be as fancy as Award-winning Biotechnology Sales Leader or Global Technical Sales Leader & Keynote Speaker.

Or it could be as simple as Director of Global Security or General Counsel.

The point is to communicate who you are and the job you want.

❌ #5 Remove irrelevant statements

Remove words and phrases like objective or references available upon request. Both are dated and take up valuable real estate.

Worse, an objective statement shouts me, me, me! Marketing is about addressing what the reader needs. Not what we want. Our resumes are marketing documents, so let’s treat them as such.    

Re: references, it’s a given that we’ll provide them if asked, so no need to mention them.

🔤 #6 Use font variety

Make it easy for the reader to distinguish between your job title, company name, dates of employment, and location.

I see a lot of resumes that have the title, company name, location, and date all scrunched together and in the same font style, making for a challenging read.

If your role’s the most important item—maybe you have an impressive career progression—and you want to showcase that, then bolding and all caps work great.

Your company name is the next priority. Maybe use bold (without all caps) to set it apart from location and dates while distinguishing it from the job title.

Your dates and location don’t need much attention, so visually separate them (off to the right is fine) and just stick with regular (un-bolded) font.

Sometimes the company name is more important than your role. You may want to draw more attention to the company names because you’ve worked for some top brands.

In this case, follow the same principle as I described for the prioritized job title, above.

🎨 #7 Use color and shading

Spiff up your resume by shading your section headings and then use that color for your name and title at the top. You could also use color for your job titles or company names.

📝 #8 List (if you must) older roles without dates

If you’ve been working for a while and you’re worried your resume might date you, here’s a tip: add a Prior Experience subsection, and then just list your roles and the names of your companies—sans dates.

Since this section is separate from the main Experience section, omitting dates won’t appear inconsistent.

I had a client who worked at Kraft early in her career and was looking for a role in CPG. Since Kraft is known as a leader in CPG, we wanted to keep Kraft on her resume, so we listed it under Prior Experience—with no dates.  

🔎 #9 Find and replace worthless words

If you know me, I’ve been saying this for years, but I still see it from time to time, so I’ll repeat it here:

Replace words like responsible for with action verbs and data points.

Action verbs give you more ownership, AND take up less space.

Here’s an example:

Rather than:

Responsible for launching…

Try:

Launched…

If you kick off your bullet with a verb like Oversaw or Spearheaded, you’ll get to the point a lot quicker than Responsible for...

Don’t forget to include data points (results) wherever possible to prove how fabulous you are.

Read my thoughts on other words we can cut here.

💻 #10 Update your email address

If you still have an AOL or even Yahoo address, consider opening a free Gmail account, even if you use it just for your job search.

Need examples and inspiration for your updates? Check out my samples.

Copyright © 2023 Words of Distinction, All rights reserved.

Last weekend, we celebrated Easter.

Whether we celebrate the holiday or not, many of us can appreciate the message of renewal.

As a resident of Northern California, I’m grateful for the signs of renewal and glimpses of spring, after a whooole lotta rain.

Personally, I’m fine with the rain. We needed to fill our reservoirs, and I’m convinced the bursts of extra-vibrant colors are, in part, a result of all those atmospheric rivers.

Speaking of renewal, I’m excited to see the new roles some of my clients have landed recently.

And speaking of new roles, if you have one…

Have you refreshed your LinkedIn profile to reflect your new position?

If we’ve worked together on your LinkedIn profile, I’ve already done the heavy lifting. So a quick refresh should be easy.

Just remember that your profile is a dynamic site. It’s meant to evolve just as you and your career are. So be careful not to set it and forget it.

Below are steps you can take now to refresh each LinkedIn profile section, assuming you updated them before you landed your latest job.

The best part? Unlike house spring cleaning, you should be able to do this in under an hour:

Headline (⏰ 5 minutes)

Are you now a VP rather than a director?

Did you expand the scope of your role, say from strictly sales to sales and marketing leadership?

Make sure your heading reflects what you’re doing in your current position, as opposed to what you did in your last job.

About (⏰ 15 minutes)

In this section, does it read as if your last role is still current?

If so, add a couple of sentences re: your current role, and change any references to your previous job to the past tense.

For your older roles, use words like “Previously…” or “Prior to leading global operations for…”

Make room for your current role by condensing any information from your earlier jobs.

If you list your top skills in this section, are they up to date?

Skills & Endorsement (⏰ 5 minutes)

Take a quick inventory: what skills are you applying in the new role? Are they listed in this section?

Experience Section (⏰ 15 minutes)

Be sure to add your new role in the Experience section.

Although you may not have had a chance to add measurable impact, you can include the scope of your role.

If you have made an impact, but you’re not ready to share publicly, that’s OK, too.

But at least keep an easy-access diary of your achievements so you won’t have to go searching for them later.

Recommendations (⏰ 10 minutes)

One of the best times to ask for recommendations? Right after you’ve left your previous job, while your fabulous contributions are still fresh in your colleagues’ minds!

Remember, it’s not just those you’ve worked for that you should ask. Endorsements from industry colleagues, clients, and peers from different business units also add credibility.

And nothing says leadership like a glowing recommendation from someone who considered you a mentor—even if they didn’t work directly for you.

Education, Courses, and Certifications (⏰ 5 minutes)

Have you gone through additional training at your new organization?

As part of onboarding, you may have benefitted from training for leadership or DEI. Go ahead and add that to your courses.

Education or certification that are in progress qualify, too. And will boost SEO.

Volunteering and Organizations (⏰ 5 minutes)

Check in on what you have listed in your Volunteering section.

Have you taken on new leadership roles? This is a great section for adding additional keywords—especially if the skills you use in your board or volunteer work is related to your profession.

So there you have it. Just one hour.

Just like spring, your profile should be growing and evolving.

Time passes. Seasons change. Keep your LinkedIn profile refreshed so you’re prepared for your next opportunity.

Happy spring! 🌸🌱

Copyright © 2023 Words of Distinction, All rights reserved.

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and that you’re off to a joyful, low-stress start to the holiday season.

Speaking of low stress, I recently had a refreshing conversation with Lynda McDonell from PiqueProsperity. A financial coach, Lynda has an unconventional approach to managing finances—specifically during a career transition.

Spoiler alert: You don’t have to give up everything in order to be fiscally responsible when the going is tough.

Some nuggets from our conversation:

Continue reading “How to Manage Finances During Your Job Transition”

For more than a year, there was a billboard near my home that read “BETTER LEFT UNREAD THAN DEAD.” It was a powerful ad that aimed to convince drivers that no risk was worth texting while driving.

The problem for my hyper-orderly mind was that grammatically, the subject of “dead” was the text, not a person—an incongruence that wreaked havoc on my grammarian sensibilities. In other words, the writer didn’t follow the rule of parallel structure.

Parallel Structure Defined

As a refresher, the rule of parallel structure calls for the repetition of a chosen grammatical form within a sentence or bulleted list. By following the same grammatical pattern for each listed or compared item, you ensure parallel construction.

So every time I drove by that sign, I’d get annoyed and try to think of a better way to say it that was grammatically acceptable. (Yes, I realize this puts me on some sort of OCD spectrum—hopefully I don’t scare up too many bad memories from high school English😅).

I’ll admit—I’m hard-pressed to come up with a grammatical alternative that’s just as powerful. No doubt (and hopefully!) the ad folks spent some time around a conference table debating alternatives, finally settling on poetic license to justify their form. And let’s face it: The meaning is clear.

Unfortunately, most of us can’t claim poetic license if we make grammatical mistakes in our resumes and other career docs. So we need to make sure our content is strong both in terms of storytelling AND grammar.

Continue reading “Your Resume Branding Section & Parallel Structure”

I remember a time during my corporate days when we’d sit around the conference room and discuss how we’d “leverage” things.

As in “leverage ad spend,” “leverage available retail floor space,” “leverage our high-demand product to get more retail ads.”

There was a LOT of leveraging going on!

During the pandemic, “pivot” emerged as the popular kid. My rebellious nature told me to avoid using this word at all costs. And most of the time, I’ve managed to do that, through replacement words and phrases like “change course,” “shift,” and “adjust.”

But honestly, there’s no word that quite conveys what we’ve all had to learn to do over the past couple of years, so I’ve settled on grudging respect for the term.

Case in point: When one of my clients returned for a resume refresh, I asked her if she’d like me to replace that word. But she liked “pivot” just as much as she did when I originally used it pre-pandemic. So we left it in.

The point is, no word is inherently bad. Not even “leverage.” We just need to be mindful of when and how we use them.

👉 Don’t confuse buzzwords with words that can bolster a bullet.

Buzzwords won’t necessarily add strength to your career profile. In fact, if used as filler or to amplify already-weak content, they’ll just slow down (and potentially annoy!) the reader.

Here’s an example of a phrase (in the resume’s top branding section) that I reworked for a client:

Skilled strategist maximizing workable solutions and performance for key marketing goals.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing here that tells a hiring manager what the candidate actually accomplished. Instead, the reader gets a hodgepodge of buzzwords that are thrown together with no apparent value.

During our intake meeting, I had a chance to uncover the actual meaning behind that sentence, and translated it as follows:

Strategic Product Leader known for introducing scalable solutions that help companies exceed ambitious revenue goals.

In the revised sentence, I combined “marketing” and “strategist” at the beginning to convey who the candidate is right from the get-go. And a record of exceeding revenue goals gives the recruiter a reason to follow up with the candidate.

Sure, “scalable solutions” might be considered a buzz phrase, but it was relevant to what the company was looking for, and it matched their language.

💪 Exercise:
Print out a copy of your resume, bio, or cover letter, and ask a friend to highlight any sentences that are confusing.

TIP: Tell them they don’t have to edit (and listen for the sigh of relief). Ask them to just identify anything that doesn’t make sense with a quick read. Nothing works better than a fresh pair of eyes to uncover what’s not working.

Once you get your feedback, play with the words, rearrange them, and see what you can cut. Hands down, the #1 reason resumes are a drag to read is that they’re bloated with words that don’t convey value. Have fun on the chopping block!

Nothing kicks off a good resume like a strong headline, but all too often, we settle for a mediocre one that sounds like the title of a job description.

✨But this is your chance to give a GREAT first impression, so use words that speak to your EXCEPTIONAL value as a candidate.

For example, what if you’re a Director of HR, but you aspire to a more prestigious leadership role—say, VP of People?

You definitely don’t want to misrepresent your experience by giving yourself the title of “VP of People” if you’ve never held that role.” However, if you think about what makes you unique compared to your competition, you can use that quality to elevate yourself in the eyes of the reader.

Here’s what I mean:

Do you have a record of contributing to the bottom line as an HR Director?

What about something like People Leader Committed to Profitable Growth?

If you’re a Digital Entertainment Director who is asked to speak at international industry events, how about:

Digital Entertainment Industry Leader Recognized for Pioneering Ideas

OR

Global Digital Entertainment Industry Leader & Keynote Speaker

See what I did there? It’s all accurate, but you’re no longer narrowly defined.

Of course, the reader will see your current leadership and achievements in your experience section, but if you capture your role and contributions succinctly yet powerfully in the header of both your resume and LinkedIn profile, you’ll have established your role in the reader’s mind before they even begin to scan the rest of your content.

💪 Exercise:
Think of ways to bulk up your headline using factual modifiers that can easily be backed up in the branding (summary) and experience section.

I’m known to avoid modifiers. But if used in this strategic way, you’ll notice that your resume and LinkedIn profile will stand out from the beginning.

Ever get frustrated because there’s an interesting post on LinkedIn, but you don’t have time to read it…and the next time you go looking for it, you can’t find it?

Did you know you can save a post to read later?

Here are the instructions:

To save the post…
Click the 3 dots just above the content you want to save.
Click “Save.”

To view your saved content later…
Click  “My items” on the left of your LinkedIn homepage.

Click “Saved posts” from the list under “My items.”

Happy reading!

You can say a lot with a little.

Sometimes, it’s just a matter of rearranging or cutting those tiny words that don’t add value.

✨To be clear, there’s nothing grammatically incorrect about these words. But consider your audience, who likely has a lot of other resumes to get through.

Anytime you can cut words or shorten sentences is a chance to gain favor from a busy reader.

Here are a few tiny words you can tinker with:

1. …of…

Instead of 
Improved standards of quality.

Try
Improved quality standards.

Instead of
Oversaw restructure of 3 organizations.

Try
Oversaw 3 restructures.
 

💪 Challenge: Do a quick word search for “of.” If you eliminate that word and rearrange the text as I’ve done, are you able to say the same thing?
 

2. …in order to…

A common phrase in business communication is “…in order to…” But your (bullet) point will be stronger if you just say “to.”

Here’s an example:

Instead of
Expanded to new platforms in order to increase subscriber base.

Try
Expanded to new platforms to increase subscriber base.


💪 Challenge: Scan for resume for “in order to” and replace the phrase with a simple “to.”
 

3. …related to…

Here’s another phrase you can cut and rearrange the text to keep things trim:

Instead of
Conducted due diligence related to M&As.

Try
Conducted M&A due diligence.
 

💪 Challenge: Do a search for “related to,” cut it, and rearrange the text. 
 

Don’t let those pesky little words creep into your resume and weigh it down.
 

✨ Bonus: cutting unnecessary words might also be the solution to that annoying orphan line (you know, the one that only has one lonesome word) that takes up valuable resume real estate.

Besides trimming and rearranging the little words, look for sentences where you can cut the extra fat (aka jargon).

✨ Don’t confuse buzzwords with words that actually bolster a phrase. Jargon won’t add the strength you need for a powerful profile. In fact, it’ll slow down the reader. 

Here’s an example of a phrase I worked on with a client: 

Original sentence:
Maximized workable solutions and performance for key market goals. 

Revised sentence:
Fueled 4X revenue growth and tripled active subscriptions by expanding to 3 new platforms.

See the difference we made by replacing buzzwords with specifics and substance?

As writing expert Roy Peter Clark reminds us in his book,  How to Write Short, word clutter hides a clear focus.

💪 Exercise: Print out a copy of your resume and other documents and ask a friend or relative to review them for clarity, highlighting sentences that are confusing.

HINT: Tell them they don’t have to edit (and listen for a sigh of relief). Ask them to just identify anything that doesn’t make sense with a quick read. Nothing works better than a fresh pair of eyes.

When you get the document back, play with the words, rearrange them, and see what you can cut.

A leading cause of recruiter frustration is when resumes are bloated with unnecessary and clunky words that confuse and slow the reader.

If your resume is easy to read, I guarantee you’ll be a step ahead of your competition and earn points with those who are doing the hiring!

I’m cheering for you!