AS thousands of students across tertiary institutions in Jamaica prepare to start the job hunt, Tiffany Lee Beckmann, talent acquisition manager in the People and Culture Department at The Jamaica National Group, is advising them to strategically structure their résumés to increase their chances of being hired.

She shared six tips to improve one’s résumé so as to increase the likelihood of it being picked up by a recruiter.

Prepare your résumé for an applicant tracking system

“The key to applying to a particular role is to ensure that you structure your résumé for the position that you are applying for, using keywords from the ad that you would have seen. Ensure that the structure of your résumé is formatted, that you use enough keywords, and you’re indicating skills that are aligned to the position because recruiters are using systems to assist with going through résumés,” she noted.

She said if a prospective employee wants his/her résumé to come out on top, it should be structured for the system to easily pick it up.

Use a well-branded headline

“You definitely need a well-branded headline. When you think about your résumé and putting that together, you want to ensure that it captures who you are at the core, how you want to position yourself, and how you want to position your career,” she explained. It has to be powerful so that a recruiter can know immediately what you are about and what you want, essentially.

She added that job seekers can use a strong objective or a professional profile in lieu of the headline, as these too will give the employer a clear idea of one’s goals and qualifications. However, a well-branded headline is becoming trendy as it readily indicates a professional’s specialty.

Lee Beckmann says that coming out of university, young professionals may not have enough experience to write a headline but it is up to them to use the objective or professional profile to position themselves in terms of where they want to go in the industry.

Highlight details about your past work experience

Pointing out that new graduates may be daunted by not having any prior work experience, she recommended that they include experiences that they had during university such as social engagements and professional affiliations outside of school.

“Include projects that you have worked on that you feel you made an impact in, and share those as a part of your qualifications and experience. If it is that you feel like you don’t have any experience at all, put your qualifications first,” she advised.

She said that prospective employees should include as much as possible the activities they participated in over the three- or four-year period.

Experience vs qualification

“In terms of which one comes first on the résumé, it depends on the position you are applying for and the qualification that you would have had aligned to that. Focus on what is most relevant to the job being applied for,” she said.

Share what makes you special

She is also encouraging graduates with limited work experience to share what makes them special so as to optimise their presence. She said that these could include blogs, vlogs, applications, gaming products and so on.

Be clear, concise and free of grammatical errors

“Read over your résumé several times before you submit. Ask one of your mentors, a colleague, or a friend to read it over for you. The ideal length for a résumé is one to two pages,” she said.

She explained that a recruiter may be going through at least 300 résumés per vacancy, and most times they do not go through everything on a three or four-page résumé unless they have specifically asked for a curriculum vitae for certain high-level roles or technical positions.

One way to know how long to make the résumé, she said, is by looking at the years of experience asked for. Ten years’ experience, for example, would automatically require a longer résumé, she said.

Finally, Lee Beckman is imploring applicants to use appropriate e-mail addresses and omit unnecessary information such as age, weight, height, marital status or political views, unless these are required. This way they can avoid recruiter bias.