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This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at UCD chapter.

Resumes can be tricky. Often times, your resume is the first impression an employer or organization will receive of you. On average, an employer will spend only a few seconds scanning your resume. Because of this, the pressure is real.

After reading dozens of Pinterest and LinkedIn articles (and consulting my own father) I’ve compiled a list of failsafe resume tips to use to make a good first impression:

  1. Distinguish your name and work experience titles from the rest of your information on the resume. You can do this by using large, bold, or underlined fonts. Your name should be significantly larger than the rest of your resume because … well … it’s your name!
  2. Never use the word, “participate.” Highlight your leadership positions and areas where you have taken charge.
  3. Begin your sentences or phrases with action verbs. This eliminates fluff that can often appear at the beginning of sentences, allowing for more space to elaborate on your experiences. It also shows that you took action and actually did stuff. Employers want to see that you’ve gained valuable knowledge and skills from your past experiences.
  4. Place your most important and/or most recent experiences toward the top. That way, those are the first ones the employer will read! 
  5. Underneath each header, be sure to put a couple bullet points to elaborate on the experience. Give them information that wouldn’t be known by the title of your work experience.
  6. But … make sure that you are being as concise as possible. Try to keep these elaborations under a line’s length to avoid wordiness. Employers want to see that you can convey a great deal of information in as little words possible. 
  7. If you want to hyperlink online profiles, your LinkedIn account, blogs, etc., you can! Here’s how:
    1. Click “save-as RTF” which will convert your resume into a Rich Text Format
    2. Open the RTF version of your resume.
    3. Click “save-as” and save the RTF as a PDF.

I hope some of these tips will be useful for you as you snag that last-minute fall quarter internship or a new job on or off campus!

Caitlyn is a third-year student at UC Davis. She is studying Information & Communication Technology and English, with a minor in Computer Science. You can find her conducting Picnic Day board meetings as Vice Chair, working on code for research projects, downing an iced black tea and enjoying a good book.
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