Resume Writing - The Biggest Mistakes

What are the biggest mistakes candidates make when they write their own resume? 

If you do a search on the keywords “resume mistakes” you will get about 800,000 matches on Google. And, after I read about 25 articles on the subject, it was clear that there is not much creativity on this subject. Most of the articles cautioned about the same mistakes – some articles listing the “Top 5”, others listing the “Top 10”. 

My attitude about this is somewhat different. After all, the subject of resume mistakes is not nuclear physics. Rather, it is mostly common sense. For example, we all know that your resume should be free of grammar and spelling errors. So why fill up an article by listing that as one of the “biggest resume mistakes?” It just takes up space on the page.

Having read thousands of resumes as an Executive Recruiter, though, I do have a point of view about what are the biggest resume mistakes. And I will discuss that momentarily. But, first, I want you to know how I define the word “mistake”. To me, a mistake is an error or fault resulting from defective judgment, deficient knowledge, or carelessness. I cannot help someone who is careless, and no number of articles about mistakes will likely change that person from being careless to being careful. 

But, helping someone overcome defective judgment or deficient knowledge is another matter altogether. And, that is where I believe the two biggest resume mistakes occur. And, what are those two biggest resume mistakes?

In my opinion, the #1 biggest resume mistake occurs when the candidate comes to the conclusion (forms the defective judgment) that he or she is well qualified to write their own resume. The fact is, most of us find it difficult to create a good resume, much less a great resume. Keep in mind that the purpose of a resume is to “sell” you so that you get the interview. But we find it difficult to write about our knowledge, our skills, and our ability (our KSAs). More importantly, we find it almost embarrassing to talk about what we have made, saved and achieved (our MSAs) during our career. The reason why is simple – we grow up in a society that does not look favorably on people who promote themselves or their own accomplishments. People who do that are considered arrogant, or smug, or overly proud. So, generally we either rely on other people to do the “selling” for us, we “sell” ourselves at the risk of criticism, or we do not “sell” ourselves at all. Therefore, most of us have no basis for concluding that we are well qualified at all to write our own resume. 

As an aside to this #1 biggest resume mistake, or perhaps more like a punctuation point, I always marvel at the candidate who has their spouse, sibling or some other close family member or friend read their resume. Usually that person is not in the same profession, and has no more experience at writing resumes than the candidate has. But, whatever critique is offered will be evaluated almost as if the person making the critique was a scholar on the subject. Scary! 

The #2 biggest resume mistake comes from the deficient or non-existent knowledge about applicant tracking systems and how they use keywords. The effective use of keywords is crucial to your resume getting past the filtering software in most applicant tracking systems. This filtering software is not written to screen you in, it is written to screen you out. And the only way to deal with this is to modify your resume for every position for which you apply. It is that simple. If the posting indicates a CPA is required, you can be assured that if your resume does not have the term CPA somewhere in it, you will be screened out. If the posting indicates you must have a specific software expertise, absent seeing that software in your resume you will be screened out. 

I also believe that this #2 biggest resume mistake becomes compounded when candidates are careless about determining the keywords in a job posting. This is not difficult, but it takes practice and it takes time, and it can be easily learned. However, if the candidate is careless, as I noted above, that is a mistake that no article is going to change. 

So, let’s wrap up this discussion. If you want to see thousands of articles talking about the same resume mistakes over and over, just do the Google search and read until you cannot stand it. But, if you want to have an Impact Resume that gets you interviews that other candidates do not get, then click the link below and let’s get started. 

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