1.3 Tailored Resumes and Cover Letters

Targeted

Resumes and cover letters should be targeted to your specific goals and each specific job application. Before applying to any job site or heading to a career fair, it would be a good idea to update your resume. Your current resume may only list part-time and summer jobs in reverse chronological order, so it’s not an accurate reflection of your career goals. Moving into your career job search is an important time to review your resume and consider how to make it relevant for your career goals and targeted for each application. Note that in Canada, it’s not appropriate to include a photo or information about age or gender on your resume.

The first step to drafting a targeted application is to closely read the job ad. While this may sound obvious, the key is to identify and highlight the specific skills the potential employer is seeking, and then list the skills you already have that meet those requirements, as well as supporting evidence that you have those skills.

Chronological Resume

Although chronological resumes are the most commonly used, and most likely what you currently have, they may not serve recent graduates to best advantage.

Often, chronological resumes focus more on education, rather than the job experience employers are looking for. Offering work experience before education helps; however, your previous jobs may not relate to your career choice or the job you’re applying for. Although you may still feel proud of your high school accomplishments, at some point these should fall off your resume as you gain more adult experience.

What’s missing from the chronological resume is an accurate reflection of the various skills and experiences you have that may not be reflected in either formal education or previous work experience. These skills and experiences are often very relevant to the job for which you’re applying, but they’re invisible on this type of resume.

Functional Resume

Functional resumes focus on your skills and experience, rather than previous work experience that may be in short supply if you’re just graduating. In this way, they highlight transferable skills that may be more appropriate to your new career.

Accomplishment statements showcase your specific transferable skills, making a convincing case that you’re a strong candidate for the job. For instance, if the posting says they’re looking for someone with strong communication skills, but you’ve only worked in retail, you might draft an accomplishment statement building on your transferable communication skills:

Listened [action verb] to customers actively during shifts [task] at Divine’s Clothing [situation] to improve repeat business and increase sales [result].

Note that while having a quantitative result is convincing, don’t make it up if you don’t know; qualitative statements are also valuable. The beauty of a functional resume is that you can expand your accomplishments into school work, volunteering, or your own start-up. For example, if a job requires teamwork skills, and you successfully completed a group project in school, your accomplishment statement might read:

Developed [action verb] strong teamwork and organizational skills for a year-end project [task] with a student group at TMU [situation] resulting in an A+ grade and mention in the school’s newsletter [result].

This shows that you have the skill and can practice it with good success. Even if it wasn’t in a work context, showing that you have this transferable skill indicates that you could have similar success at work.

After providing your contact information, the functional resume starts with a brief objective statement that can be tailored to each job application, using key words you’ve identified from the job posting. Why are you applying for this position? What type of job are you looking for? What do you bring to the position?

Following this, most of the resume should showcase your skills, using your accomplishment statements. Consider grouping these into subsections. For example, Communication Skills could combine digital, written, and verbal skills. This can be followed by Work Experience, and finally, Education, although these sections might be reversed. The key is to focus on your transferable skills, rather than previous work experience if it’s not relevant, or education, the details of which may be less important for your new career.

Hybrid or Alternative Resumes

Sometimes people create hybrid or combined resumes, with elements of both chronological and functional resumes. You don’t need to stick firmly to a given option. Choose what works best to showcase your skills for the career you’re applying to, and recognize that the format you choose may evolve over time as you gain further work experience.

While it’s also permissible to create alternative resume designs, recognize that potential employers may not respond well to something out of the ordinary. If you’re moving into a design career, then maybe a resume showcasing your design skills would be beneficial; however, if you’re applying for a business career, an alternative resume may not be appropriate.

Resume Design 

When designing your resume, always think about the reader and how you can improve the accessibility of your resume. Also recognize that most corporations use Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) and/or Artificial Intelligence to do the initial scan of incoming resumes. Successful resumes must be designed to ensure they can pass successfully through this first level of sorting. Spending more time crafting your content to the needs of these systems will improve the likelihood of success much more than spending hours making your resume look pretty. Important tips to successful resume design include:

Cover Letters

People often struggle with the best way to start a cover letter. Avoid beginning your letter with statements like, “I’m applying for the position of…” or “My name is…and I’m a recent graduate.” These are not compelling openings and are unlikely to engage the reader. While it’s appropriate to say these things, maybe they can come later in the letter.

It helps to think in journalistic terms of having a “hook” to engage the reader. Are you applying for a social media communication position? Did you increase your student union’s social media presence by 17%? Great! Maybe you could open your cover letter by asking, “How would you like to increase your company’s social media presence by 17%?” Because this result is relevant to the job, the person to whom you’re applying is likely to keep reading. Also consider showing that you’ve researched the company by providing a few details about what they do or recent successes or challenges.

While there may be some overlap between the cover letter and the resume, the cover letter is your opportunity to showcase specific aspects of your skills and experience that best fit with the requirements of the job. Again, consider whether you can use some of your accomplishment statements. The cover letter underscores key highlights of the resume, but should not just copy the resume. The body of the letter should clearly showcase how your skills are relevant to the posted position. Although you’re talking about yourself, avoid having too many I-statements. Focus on the reader and how you can fill their needs.

Remember that the purpose of your application is to get an interview. The closing should offer follow-up and make it easy for the potential employer to contact you. Suggest your availability for an interview and provide your phone or email address in the closing paragraph.

Proofread everything before sending! Nothing undermines your chances as quickly as typos and grammatical errors.  Good luck!

Audio transcript for Module 1.3 Tailored Resumes and Cover Letters

Post-secondary schools usually have a career office. You might not have known about it, or perhaps you forgot about it. After all, you focused on finishing school! Career offices usually remain available to recent graduates, so you might still be able to access their services. They can help optimize your resume and advise you on career opportunities. They might also provide guidance on places to post your resume for potential employers to see.

Although you were aware of a few career websites, the more you research, the more you find. Postings sometimes overlap, but different sites often have unique opportunities. You learn the value of checking career sites regularly before they close postings or remove them, and before the best opportunities are gone.

Career fairs are something you might not have considered before. These sound like a great opportunity to meet potential employers, but they also require a level of confidence and preparation that maybe you’re still working on. All the advice you’ve read or heard suggests that you should attend job fairs ready with questions, and that sometimes job interviews happen on the spot!

It also seems important to have resumes in hand, but the only resume you have is the one with your part-time or seasonal jobs. While that was fine when you were just looking for work, now you’re looking for a career. But all resumes are pretty much the same, aren’t they?