How to write an incredible resume in 2022
We have some news, and you may not be ready to hear it—especially if you’re job hunting. Impressing at an interview is no longer enough. In fact, if you want to get to the interview stage you need to impress the bots that sift through the hundreds of applications companies get for each job.
That’s right: bots. That hiring manager that you’re working so hard to impress is in fact an AI-enabled tool known as an Application Tracking System (ATS) that filters applications based on algorithms and keywords.
What does it mean for job seekers? Well, it means that not only do you need to tailor your resume to the job you’re hoping to nab, you also need to make it AI-friendly. This becomes even more important when you consider that a recent study from Harvard Business School showed that 88% of leading executives believe that AI recruitment software often results in qualified candidates being excluded from the hiring process.
While not all industries or companies use this software, but 98% of Fortune 500 companies do, writing an incredible resume that plays to the bots will give you an edge over the competition.
Here are three simple tactics to adopt that will put your resume at the top of the pile.
Format Correctly
Simply put, many AI programs don’t recognise PDFs, which means that by not submitting your resume in Word format you’re ruling yourself out of the process. Similarly, that Canva or professionally designed resume may mean you can display a lot of information across two pages, but anything that sits in borders or margins may not be picked up by recruiting software. This means something as important as your education history or awards you won may be ignored. In this case, simple really is best.
Match Exactly
What keywords are in the job description? Those are the key words you need to use on your resume, and use them exactly. For example, if the job requires software development experience but you describe your career history in terms of software development achievements, you’re going to be ruled out by the bots.
While some ATS systems have been upgraded to recognise synonyms, many exact-match systems are still used by companies, and without that sort of insider knowledge it’s best to err on the side of caution.
Stay Traditional
There are plenty of career experts and articles available that encourage resumes to highlight your achievements rather than responsibilities across roles and to focus on your career highs. While this plays to the theory that you have 30 seconds to grab a hiring manager’s attention, it doesn’t play to AI which pulls experience and information in a chronological format. This means that tweaking your resume to be a little old school, starting with a summary and listing your previous roles in chronological order, may help your selection.
Now that you’ve got the killer resume down, it’s time to put it to use. There are hundreds of available roles to check out, and we’ve selected three of the most interesting below.
Senior Software Engineer - Derivatives Team (FA - Financial Analytics), Bloomberg
The Role: The Senior Software Engineer - Derivatives Team will be a member of the Derivatives Engineering team, and will work with a variety of open source technologies including Blockchain, Apache Spark, Apache Kafka, Apache Cassandra, Redis, and more.
The Responsibilities: You'll gain hands-on experience in writing data analytics, distributed algorithms, and performance optimized code, all while gaining an advanced knowledge of the derivatives domain.
The Requirements: You’ll need a BA, BS, MS, PhD in computer science, engineering or relevant experience in a technology field as well as two years of programming experience in C++, Python, Javascript, Scala, or OCaml.
Apply for the Senior Software Engineer - Derivatives Team role or explore other US-based roles with Bloomberg.
Sales Operations Analyst, CrowdStrike
The Role: The Sales Operations Analyst will work with the wider team to ensure CrowdStrike’s market-leading cloud-native platform continues to offer unparalleled protection against the most sophisticated cyberattacks.
The Responsibilities: You will be responsible for analyzing data models; building new processes; developing, analyzing and delivering insights; as well as creating and supporting dashboards to help sales leaders drive their business.
The Requirements: You will have at least one to three years’ of relevant experience in sales operations, finance or strategy function while being detail-oriented and reliable with strong organizational skills.
Apply for the Sales Operations Analyst role or explore other remote opportunities with CrowdStrike.
Senior Software Developer, Personify
The Role: As Senior Software Developer you will be working with the product management team to understand requirements, suggest technical solutions, implement, and deploy new features across Personify’s networks.
The Responsibilities: You will work remotely across all stages of the software development lifecycle to build and enhance new features and modules for the company. You will code/configure, maintain, test, and debug existing or new systems, ensuring they deliver quality features and bug fixes that align with the existing development processes.
The Requirements: You have four years’ of software development, working across the software development life cycle and strong knowledge of computer science fundamentals as well as coding standards and design principles.
Apply for the Senior Software Developer role or explore other opportunities at Personify.
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