How to Read an IT Resume Like a Tech Recruiter

Being able to read your IT resume like a tech recruiter is one of the most useful tools for ensuring your resume is appealing. Recruiters know what makes resumes stand out or become lost, and you need to know too. These tips show you what you need to do to read your IT resume like a recruiter.

Look for Simplicity

Tech recruiters have tons of IT resumes to read for many different positions, so when they come across one that is too complicated, they toss it. Examine your resume and make sure it is no more than two pages long, with one page being best. Also make sure it uses a traditional font and layout and is easy enough for a high school senior to understand. If it looks simple, recruiters are more likely to actually read your IT resume completely.

Can You Scan It?

Your resume needs to be easy to scan, because many recruiters first scan resumes to weed the good from the bad. Avoid long blocks of text by breaking them in to a few bullet points. Don’t worry about using complete sentences. Just get the most important information on the page. Keywords also make your IT resume easy to scan. Keywords are words that stand out to prove you have the skills necessary to get the job done right.

Skip the Objectives Section

Many job seekers continue to add an objective section to their resume, but this is just a waste of space. Objectives are fluff and only tell recruiters what you want. They don’t care what you want. They care about what they want, and in many cases, they do not even read your objective. Ditch it and use the space to provide more specific information about why you fit their needs.

Ignore Irrelevant Job History

Job history that has nothing to do with the job for which you are applying is useless, so ask yourself what work experience is and is not relevant. Unless the job provided the skills and experience needed to do this job, recruiters don’t want to hear about it, so you are just wasting space. If you do want to include some irrelevant jobs because you don’t have much work history, make sure you highlight the skills you learned and how that moved you forward to your next position.

Capture Attention

Recruiters make fast decisions as they read your resume. Within just the first few words, they decide if they want to keep reading or move on to the next candidate, so start off with a bang. Get right into the biggest achievements and successes. This captures their attention and makes them want to keep reading to see what other factors make you a great choice.

Now that you know how recruiters read resumes, it’s time to take action. Get out your IT resume and read it with these tips in mind. With a few changes, your resume becomes a real tool to generate more interviews and job offers.

(Photo courtesy of David Castillo Dominici / freedigitalphotos.net)