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Resume Making
Posted by itheabsolute on August 21, 2005
Most of the b-schools ask for a resume. Amongst the plethora of activities that need to be done for b-school admissions, resume making usually takes a back seat. Because many think it is not that important and most think it is easy to make one. Resume making, believe me, is as tough as essay writing. Here are some tips for resume making
1. The resume can go into the second page only if you are the president of the United States 🙂
I remember of the days when I used to send four pager resumes to prospective employers. It is pain to read those many pages, if at all one can get the employer to read. The resume has to be one page. Period.
2. If you have put in some years of workex, start with experience and that in the reverse chronological order. Education can come next. Activities and Personal interests in the last.
3. Cover profile and achievements in your work. Always give numbers to quantify achievements.
4. Use active verbs which catch attention. Try not to repeat the same verbs in a resume.
5. Edit resume every two days over 15 days to one month.
6. Let someone else read your resume.
7. Spell check. Don’t rely on MS word to do it. Do this manually. Let someone else also do this.
8. Read resume aloud. See if you have written something that ‘sounds’ odd.
9. DO NOT write in the resume what cannot be properly explained or substantiated.
10. Do include undergrad grades if they are good.
11. There can be one or two hobbies. Don’t list too many. Please be sure to update yourself on what is happening related to your hobby. For instance, if reading books interests you, then be ready with an answer on what the recent book you read was and what the learning from that book was. what types of books u read, etc.
12. If you have any volunteer activity, do include. Be ready with answers on this.
13. Personal details such as married, Indian national, male, age/DOB, father’s name, religion, et al are better avoided.
14. Ensure proper formatting.
15. Try to convert it into acrobat before e-mailing (adobe allows five free trials). If a hard copy is going, ensure the paper it is printed on has quality. Try not to fold it.
16. Finally, be prepared to answer ‘any’ question that relates to the resume.
Post Scriptum:
I write topics related to MBA admission because I think these may help some prospective applicants for their applications, which they must be working on now.
Have had two interesting Leadership Development Program sessions. Am not able to find time to get my thoughts together and put them to paper.
This weekend was a nightmare with four assignments, all of which were difficult. End term exams are a week away:-(
I, The Absolute 
itheabsolute said
anonymous
education will come before work experience if one has less than 1 r 2 years of workex and does not have much to speak about. Or if one is making a resume at a b-school. my resume now starts with education. but once i go into corporate world, it has to start with work ex.
one need not mention personal stuff. but if one has done something, it makes sense to, to give a holistic perspective of the candidate. that the interview may ignore it completely is his discretion.
cheers
cheers
itheabsolute said
ketan
thanks.
at a b-school i will first put education first on my resume, then experience, then personal/activities. except for this, there should not be any change in both the resumes.
cheers
Ketan said
Hey Anonymous… I think you did not read the post clearly… he talked about B-school admission resume and not for some tech-job application… During admission procedure.. the adcom requests a resume from you and what this post tells are some tips about that…
Regarding your points…
1) I think any b-school will give more weightage to your work-ex than your educational qualification… hence the work-ex should come prior to qualifications.. you should talk not about specific projects (as is usually done for a job resume) but about your achievements….thats when the post says that you should use numbers to express the achievements… for example…in a software company if you successfully completed one project and it generated “x” million $$$ for the compnay.. then you can mention it…or if the product you made helped your company to garner say “y” design wins then you should mention that… This would automatically mention how important your work was for the company….
2) i believe that personal interest too says a lot about you… a resume is a part of the application pacakge which is used to depict a decent picture of yourself to the adcom so that they consider you worth for calling an interview…you should be able to generate that kind of interest in adcom….
Anonymous said
Your resume tips are very useful but I would like to add couple of comments
1) Educational back ground should come before work ex coz work ex runs into a para or 2 wheread edu bkgrnd will be only 4 line(bachelors’ and master’s)
2) personal interests need not be mentioned unless there is some value addition to what you are applying – like you play ping pong when you are applying for some tech job would be totatlly unnecessary.
Another point I would like to make is dont list achievements that the reviewer would not understand the context.
Ketan said
That was a good post. I entirely agree that since B=schools asks for a resume, so it definitely has got certain weightage and to improve your chances of admission the applicant should not be careless in any part of the application package including resume. Thanks for the tip….
I just wonder how this admission resume different from the one you would prepare for campus interviews [post ISB MBA]? Ofcourse the ultimate aim of both resumes is different and hence they would vary in the depiction of “you” as a person and your achievements….But please provide some tips on that too….