Tips on Resume writing

Dear All..

I have received few resumes today to my AMIGOS.GSG@gmail.com Id. Out of them, I found 3 interesting. 2 of them constitute of non-IT background engineers and 1 guy seems to be from MSC background.

All the three have the same ambition to lead a life as a software engineer and willing to get a good IT job. We all know of the software down time due to the Financial Crisis, but I am sure no one is HUNCHBACK’ed to apply brakes to their career.

Let me PORTRAY SOME OF THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTORS TO BE ADDED INTO A RESUME SO THAT IT CAN BE A GENERAL WORD OF MOUTH FOR YOU ALL GUYZ WHO ARE COOKING DELECTABLE RESUMES:

1) CAREER OBJECTIVE
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GENERALLY, People have random thoughts for this section. They post some lines picked up from random resumes, as and when they like. Due to the same reason, MAJORITY OF HR’s & TECHNICAL PEOPLE TRY TO GET AWAY WITH THIS SECTION.

AS A MATTER OF FACT, I WAS CLEARLY TOLD BY MOST OF MY HR & TECHNICAL FRIENDS FROM MICROSOFT, ADP, AMAZON, GOOGLE & MANY OTHER TOP-NOTCH FIRMS, WHOM I ENQUIRED PERSONALLY ABOUT THIS, THAT THEY HARDLY SEE A RESUME WITH PROPER CAREER OBJECTIVE (ESPECIALLY FROM FRESHERS).

PLEASE TRY TO WRITE IT AS CONCISE AS POSSIBLE AND GIVE NOT JUST WHAT TYPE OF FIRM YOU ARE LOOKING AT, BUT ALSO A BRIEF ABOUT YOU LIKE WHO YOU ARE – A FRESHER / X yrs EXPERIENCED GUY IN ‘ABC’ TECHNOLOGY etc…

ALSO, I HAVE NOTICED LOT OF GRAMMATICAL MISTAKES. IT’S VERY BAD TO WRITE LONG SENTENCES & FINALLY NOT ABLE TO ATTACH THEM TOGETHER WELL.
GO FOR SIMPLE SENTENCES & SIMPLY GIVE THE GIST. BUT, DON’T FORGET TO PUT THE GIST VERY CLEARLY.

IT SHOULD SOUND LIKE.. I AM ABC & WANT XYZ FROM YOUR FIRM.

Find a list of YES & NO’s marked career Objective for SOFTWARE PROFESSIONAL GIVEN BELOW:

NO - “TO SEEK A JOB IN AN ESTEEMED ORGANIZATION WHICH UTILIZES MY SKILLS & KNOWLEDGE …………”

YES - “3 yrs experienced guy in .NET technologies looking for A TEAM LEAD ROLE IN AN ESTEEMED ORGANIZATION.”

CAN YOU NOTICE THE DIFFERENCE ?????

SO, LET’S WRITE IT FOR A FRESHER.. & LET US SEE SOME SAMPLES IN THAT TOO..

YES / NO - “A FRESHER LOOKING OUT FOR IT CAREER OPENINGS IN NETWORKING DOMAIN”

The above statement can both be termed as CORRECT & FALSE. Correct with an understanding that you are open to work in any firm irrespective of its type.

But, you didn’t mention some of these things – START UP / MNC. Also, if it has to be an (OPEN-CULTURED FIRM / OPEN-DOOR POLICIED FIRM) / A FIRM THAT MEETS EMPLOYEES TECHNICAL PASSION / A FIRM WHICH LISTENS TO EMPLOYEES IDEAS & HIS PERSONAL GROWTH PLANS etc.

I mentioned all these because, its very important that an employee gets satisfied to give his best to his /her employer. Now, if we want to mention all of these in our OBJECTIVE, then we may frame it as follows:

“A FRESH ENGINEERING GRADUATE WILLING TO WORK IN AN OPEN-CULTURED ORGANIZATION WHICH ENCOURAGES INDIVIDUAL THOUGHTS & POSITIVE TEAM WORK ATTITUDE.”

The difference which this statement makes in your career is not just that you are clear of what you want from the organization, but also what you have studied / known about the firm.

During interviews, some organizations ask questions like – “WHY ONLY TCS/MICROSOFT/SATYAM/WIPRO” etc.

The basic intentions behind asking any of the questions should be answered ALREADY BY YOUR RESUME.
YOu must do your homework of what exactly is the organization Expecting from a FRESH GRAD.

AND then, YOU CHANGE YOUR RESUME ACCORDINGLY (while appearing for organizations that expect things differently from you). But, if you are OK with any type of firm, then let it be generic as the intial one.

TO KNOW WHAT THE ORGANIZATION IS EXPEcTING, YOU CAN CALL UP ANY HR PERSONS OF THE ORGANIZATION BEFORE YOUR INTERVIEW. THEY WILL BE MORE THAN GLAD TO EXPLAIN YOUR ABOUT THEIR ORGANIZATION & PROCESSES. EVEN YOUR SENIORS WORKING IN THE FIRM MUST BE WELL AWARE OF IT.

INFACT, THEY WILL LOOK AT YOUR ENTHUSIASM AS A POSITIVE ATTRIBUTE AS YOU TRIED TO KNOW ABOUT THEM BEFORE APPLYING FOR A JOB & HENCE, WILL HELP YOU WELL.

Lets take for example that YOU MENTIONED CLEARLY IN YOUR OBJECTIVE, POST ASKING THE FIRMS EMPLOYEES & HR, some thing like this -”TO WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS WHICH ENCOURAGE ITS EMPLOYEES TO GROW TECHNICALLY”. Then surely the firm will get a positive idea about you.
Because, what ever you are expecting from the firm can clearly be satisfied by the firm. If you vaguely specify the Career objective, then they wouldn’t be sure why you are joining the job and what might make you happy.

CREATE THAT IMPRESSION IN THE VERY FIRST STEP.

2) ALWAYS MENTION “EDUCATION BACKGROUND” / ACADS section immediately after the CAREER OBJECTIVE.

KINDLY NOTE THAT THE TOP 3 THINGS THAT ANY RESUME IS LOOK FOR A FRESHER BEFORE SHORT LISTING BY HR PROFESSIONALS ARE:

a) Education Profile
b) CAREER OBJEcTIVE
c) CONTACT NUMBER TO REACH YOU

DURING TECHNICAL INTERVIEWS, CAREER OBJECTIVE leaves its place to “PROJECTS” ETC REAL WORK EXPOSURE AREAS.

3) YOu need not include Sections like STRENGTHS & WEAKNESSES ETC.

4) It’s always interesting to include Extra Curricular Activities section for Freshers and add your hobbies there.
This gives a fair enough chance for both HR & TECHNICAL people to know more about you and make you talk in various areas of your strengths.
As you would have already worked on your hobbies for quite some time, you will be very confident to speak on the same.
5) In the Project Details section, kindly mention the follwing sections:
TITLE, DURATION, PROJECT DESCRIPTION, YOUR ROLE, TECHNOLOGIES USED.

DESCRIPTION SHOULD CLEARLY EXPLAINED FROM A LAYMAN’S PERSPECTIVE MAKING CLEAR ABOUT THE FUNCTIONAL ASPECTS.
YOU JUST MENTION THE NAMES OF TECHNICAL TOOLS etc IN TECHNOLOGIES SECTION.

6) Make sure that yOu write about various core subjects of your strength in resume. This gets really handy for IT people. For example, Expertise in DATABASE / NETWORKING etc. will make the interview panel to ask a couple of questions on the same.

Remember that as long as your resume looks handy enough to ask some questions, you will get questions from your resume. Other wise, you will get some random questions from interviewer, which you really might feel uneasy to answer.

So, start making the interviewer to Fiddle around the Resume itself and ask various questions to make him use up the time on RESUME.

BUT, don’t make your resume more than 2/3 pages for this sake. It looks really nasty in such cases and makes interviewer to totally skip your resume from his mind.

7) MAKE SURE THAT YOU MENTION YOUR CONTACT deTAILS IN THE VERY TOP, 1st page of your Resume.
It is the most used section of resume as people keep opening it to contact you frequently and if you mention it at the end / middle of the resume, people will simply THROW IT AWAY not finding any time to go through it again and again.

REMEMBER, EVERY HR GETS MORE THAN 100 resumes a day in all less rated IT FIRMS. If it is an MNC, then needless to say about the job applicants count. To just screen off the unwanted, they see if you have the full data mentioned rightly. So, try doing something useful.
ANY WAYS, AFTER SEEING THE RESUMES, I FELT I NEED TO POST A SAMPLE RESUME FORMAT FOR FRESHERS TO SAVE THEIR LIVES, WHCIH I WILL DO TOMORROW SOON AFTER I WAKE UP.

GUYZ KEEP POSTING YOUR INPUTS  / mail me.

GOOD LUCK ALL.
hashsmiles