This is Why Your Resume Gets Rejected

Key Takeaways

most resume tips on youtube are not backed by any data it's usually someone giving their personal opinion on what a good resume looks like if you watch a few videos on the topic you'll quickly realize that there are so many conflicting opinions about resume writing and when you try to incorporate all these different opinions in your own resume you can easily find yourself in this rabbit hole of writing the perfect resume what if i told you that resume writing is very simple and we have clear data on what works and what does not today i will give you evidence-based tips on resume writing i will also tell you three mistakes that get a resume rejected immediately not only that i will also answer questions like what is the best time of the day to apply for your job believe it or not knowing the answer to this question can increase chances of getting your resume shortlisted by 89 let's do this before we begin there are a few myths people have about resumes and job applications in general i want to clear these misconceptions before moving on to the resume tips the first myth about resumes that many people believe in is that their resume has to be one page only in a study done by zeddy.com they found that the median length of a resume is 369 words which is roughly equal to one page but your chances of getting shortlisted increase if you have a two-page resume to be precise with a two-page resume your chances increase by 40 for entry level positions and 190 percent for a managerial position so a resume doesn't have to be a one-pager and should be as long as needed the second misconception people have about the job application process is that they underestimate how hard it is to get a job i know so many people who apply for 15 20 jobs don't get any offers and get disheartened then they start questioning their resume and start paying experts to write the perfect resume for them in reality it takes 30 to 50 applications on average to land a job because the success rate for job applications is around two to three percent and if you're applying for highly competitive jobs like software engineer or product manager the number of resumes you need to submit can be much more than 50. so if you're not finding any success after applying to 2030 jobs that you are qualified for know that it's perfectly normal and do not quit the last myth that people have about resumes is that they think they need to write a resume from scratch what they don't know is that there are so many resources available online that can help you make a good resume very easily and you don't need to pay anything for our beautiful templates if you watch this video till the end i will show you how to make a resume like this for free now that we have busted some myths let's move on to resume writing tips a study done by cultivated culture revealed that only 48 of the resumes contain the linkedin profile of the candidates the same study revealed that candidates who add a well-made linkedin profile to their resume have a 71 higher chance of getting an interview i know that making a linkedin profile is not the most interesting task in the world in fact i also delayed making my linkedin for a long time but making a profile on linkedin has been a game changer for my career linkedin helps me network with my peer in the tech industry and keeps me updated on what's going on in the job market the best part about being on linkedin however is that recruiters can reach out to me on linkedin this not only introduces me to new job opportunities it also gives me a clear signal if i'm developing skills that are valued in the job market i'll make a video on how to build a good linkedin profile shortly if that's something you're interested in you can subscribe to the channel so if you're among the 52 people who don't have a linkedin profile make a profile and add it to your resume and who knows you might not even need a resume and start getting interviews directly through linkedin another easy way to level up your resume is by knowing how to start your resume if you pause this video right now and go back and watch the first 30 seconds of the video you realize that the first 30 seconds are much more animated than the last 30 seconds you just watched and that's because it's important to hook the viewer with the first thing you show them the same thing is true about resumes hiring managers tend to make the judgments very quickly i don't know how true this is but some estimates indicate that hiring managers spend six to seven seconds for resume and that's due to a simple reason they have positive resumes to look at and they simply don't have enough time to look at every resume carefully in those few seconds that they actually look at your resume they might not get past the first few lines that you wrote so you want to make sure that those first few lines count but how do you do that think about what differentiates you from the rest of the candidates and write it at the top for most people it's going to be the skills they have so the best strategy would be to start with a skill section like this one but if you feel you have something unique that tiny managers would care about start with that so for example if you went to some prestigious college or worked as a company that people regard very highly or maybe you have an amazing project that will blow the higher manager's mind write that first and this tip works both ways if there's something that you're not very proud of maybe you didn't go to a good college or don't have a good gpa add it somewhere at the bottom once the hiring managers have made their mind that you're a good candidate after reading the first half of your resume they will be more likely to let these things slide another simple way you can use to instantly improve your resume is by using action verbs a study done by tlnt showed that using action verbs increases the chances of getting your resume shortlisted by 140 let me show you how to use action verbs through this example if you look at this resume you will see that each sentence in the project description starts with a verb like supported and created these words add impacts and purpose to whatever you accomplish in the project here are a few other action verbs you can use to make your resume stand out the next trick to make an impressive resume is adding quantifiable results let me explain this with an example in this resume we can see that each project has been explained very well with the help of action verbs as a first glance this resume might look impressive to the untrained eye but high-end managers like to ask a very simple question after reading every project and that question is so what in other words they want to see the impact of your work so if you created an usability tested wireframes and prototypes so what you need to add some measurable metric that the higher manager would care about to add impact at the end of every project use a sentence like this feature reduced the churn rate by 12 the study done by cultivated culture showed that 36 percent of resumes have no quantifiable results so adding metrics in your resume would give you an easy win the same study by cultivated culture also revealed that 51 of resumes contain buzzwords or cliches that hire managers hates if you're using words like highly motivated or team player in your resume you're doing nothing but making higher managers bang their head against the wall that's because they have come across these buzzwords all the time and they do nothing to differentiate the candidates from the ground i mean who doesn't think that they are self-motivated or great at time management if you ask for my opinion you should avoid writing the soft skills altogether here are some of the worst words to use according to forbes so steer clear of these words as much as you can now before i give you some free resources to make beautiful looking resumes we need to talk about some mistakes that will instantly get you rejected and how to apply for jobs to increase your chances of getting shortlisted we'll use the research done by zipia.com for this a quick way to get your resume rejected is by having a typo or bad grammar in there 77 of high-end managers would reject you immediately for that and 35 percent of managers would reject you for having an unprofessional email so a ninja coder gmail.com or cuteprogrammer at outlook.com will end your job search very quickly and 34 percent of hiring managers would reject you if you don't have quantifiable results for your projects now that we know what doesn't work let's discuss how to actually apply for jobs the same study also revealed that sending a resume between 6 and 10 am can increase your chances of getting shortlisted by 89 another trick that has personally worked for me is applying for a job within one to four days of job posting this can increase your chances of getting an interview call by 65 that's because most resumes are actually shortlisted within the first four days of job posting in order to track all the new job posts i have a cool trick that i use all the time on linkedin i search for jobs that i'm interested in after that i just set an alert on these jobs by doing this i get a daily notification from linkedin for jobs that were posted in the last 24 hours i set aside an hour daily preferably in the morning between 6 to 10 a.m to apply for these new jobs now that you know the core principles of how to write a good resume let me give you some free resources to make your resume look beautiful there is this website called flowcv.io that lets you input all your information and skills once that's done you can preview your resume using these different templates they have when you finalize your resume this website lets you download your first resume for free if you want more options for resume templates you can also use canva it's not as easy to use as full cv but will get the job done 39 of people who write resumes for career change do so for higher salary and the tech industry is one place you can find higher salaries if you want to know five tech jobs that pay more than a hundred thousand dollars without knowing any coding you can watch this video at the top i will see in the next one [Music]