One helpful resource I’ve come across is Federal Resume Guidebook 6th edition by Kathryn Troutman.

In this guidebook, Troutman recommends avoiding “big block” resumes which are lengthy and unorganized narratives and avoiding “bullet pointed” resumes.

I’ve asked a lot of other hiring managers what they prefer.  Not surprisingly, none of them preferred a big block of a narrative where it is not organized into a good flow for reading, and does not have proper paragraph breaks.

Some hiring managers prefer a “bullet point” style resume.  This does a slightly better job at making statements stand out.  However, as you gain more experience and responsibility in your job, you end up with a long laundry list of duties.  Again, this is overwhelming to anyone reading your resume and trying to determine if you are qualified.

With the number of resumes human resource specialists are screening, and the number of applicants the hiring managers are looking at, neither one of these styles will make your relevant skills, or your resume, stand out.  Instead, it will could get tossed out.

Troutman recommends an “outline” approach to resumes.  This is similar to the style I preferred when I screened resumes and also similar to how I prefer to write resumes.

My job is to highlight your skills, and make you stand out.  I have this and several other resources I have researched and refer to when writing resumes.  If you struggle with formatting, spelling/grammar, selling yourself, or do not have the time to do the work, let me do the hard work for you.

If you would like to check out this book for yourself, it can be found here on Amazon.