Why No One is Reading Your Resume
Share
You see an exciting job posting and email your resume, hoping to get a response from the employer, but unfortunately you are left feeling frustrated, thinking days later, “How come they did not phone me about the position after I sent them my resume?” Here are four possible reasons why, no one is reading your resume.

Your resume is not optimized for computer scanning software: With the growth of the Internet, the way we find and apply for available positions has dramatically changed over the past decade. With just a few clicks of a button, a job seeker can upload or email their qualifications to an online job board or HR personnel. With the increased ability to apply for more jobs in a shorter amount of time, hiring managers and recruiters have to deal with a lot more applications per open position. To cope, they have turned to recruiting software and applicant tracking systems to help them screen out resumes that do not seem like a good fit. Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) and recruiting software operates by linking keywords found in resumes to qualifications required to perform jobs. The computer software, after scanning resumes, recommends to hiring managers which resumes have been deemed worthy to be viewed by human eyes, potentially saving them valuable time. Job seekers who do not know how the job hiring process works, but whom are potentially qualified to perform the job, unfortunately get the electronic boot.

You do not have a core competency or key qualifications section: Incorporate a section called “Core Competencies” or “Key Qualifications” near the top of your resume. Keep this section to approximately 12 keywords, which will illustrate that you have the qualifications required to do the job. This will also allow the recruiting software to find the keywords it is looking for early on in the resume scanning process.

You are not customizing your resume for each position you are applying for: Pay close attention to the key qualifications or mandatory skills section of job postings. Insert the required skills that are listed in the job posting that you are applying for inside of your core competencies or key qualifications section and throughout the rest of your resume.

Your resume does not incorporate a diverse set of industry terminology: Read numerous job postings for not only the positions that you want to apply for but for also jobs that are similar to the roles you desire. By reading a lot of job postings within your career set, you will get a good understanding of the industry terms used to describe the skill sets of the candidates organizations are looking for. These terms also tend to be the words recruitment software programs are looking for. For example, if you are looking for a great sales position, solution selling, business development and account management might be great keywords to use throughout your resume. If you are looking for a management position, leadership, team and supervise might be keywords you should consider for your resume.