Grab the attention of a recruiter and hiring manager with a strong professional summary at the top of your resume.
Why a professional summary?
Your professional summary gets you noticed.
A busy hiring manager quickly scans your resume. You want your most relevant skills and experience to be obvious. A strong resume summary at the top of your resume helps them understand what you have to offer immediately.
As a career changer, you absolutely need a resume summary. A resume summary adds additional information or context. It connects the dots from your previous experience to your next job. Help the recruiter or hiring manager understand what you bring to the table; don’t leave them guessing.
Recruiters and hiring managers are busy. They want to quickly know who you are and what you bring to the table. Your professional summary goes a long way in providing this.
Where it goes
Your summary appears right after your name (and your contact info if it is under your name) at the top of your resume.
What to include
Start with the position you are applying for and the years of experience you bring, then share a quick summary of your background. This quick summary can include the industry(ies) you’ve worked in and specific projects you’ve worked on.
The secret of making your summary stand out is including the impact your work has made. We’ll cover this below.
Caution
If you are a career changer, do not mention ‘pivot’ or ‘career changer’ or ‘transition’. These words carry connotations that say ‘no relevant experience’. Avoid using these words.
Instead, emphasize the transferable skills you bring to the table.
Breaking it down
Start with
Below is the original version of the first sentence of one of my client’s summary.
Multi-disciplinary designer with 6 years of professional, transferable experience in the architecture industry.
This immediately says you are a career changer. That will send a red flag. Don’t do this.
Instead, consider yourself an experienced individual. You bring relevant experience to the table. Focus on that.
After reviewing my client’s resume with her, this is her updated version:
Multi-disciplinary designer with 6 years experience…
In this version, her experience is simply stated — without mentioning ‘transferable’.
Add what you bring to the table and the difference you can make
Expand on what you bring to the table. What skills do you have that are relevant to your next position?
Give them a quick idea of what you’ve done and how you’ve made a difference.
For example, adding to what we started with above:
Multi-disciplinary designer with 6 years experience delivering user-centered design solutions and achieving business objectives.
This person is applying for UX Designer positions without having ‘design’ experience. But, she is able to share her story from a UX Designer’s perspective.
Not only is it important to highlight the top 2–3 skills you bring to the table, but also to include the impact of your work. This helps the recruiter or hiring manager understand the difference you can make with their organization.
Finish with
Wrap your summary up with what you want to do next. You can do this and again highlight what you bring to the table.
Instead of saying this:
Eager to leverage my skills in UX and product design.
Get more specific and share specific skills you’ve used from your previous career:
Eager to leverage a strong foundation in collaboration and user empathy to create innovative design solutions.
Boom. The second version states exactly what this person brings to the table and what they want to do in the future.
Note: Change the specific skills mentioned in the summary to match the job posting and aligns with your experience.
Reiterate
Once you have written the first draft of your professional summary, re-iterate it.
Go back and re-read it. Out. Loud.
Does it sound good?
Does it set you apart from the other candidates? If it is something that any other candidate can say, it needs more work. Go back and focus on the unique experience/qualifications that you bring to the table.
A specific skill may not set you apart, but a specific skill that resulted in a significant increase in sales or customer satisfaction or… sets you apart—or using that specific skill in a specific industry. Bring in additional factors to make that skill unique from any other candidate.
Also, when you include metrics or results in your summary — your summary will stand out from over 90% of the other resumes.
Do
Your resume summary should only be 2–3 sentences.
Include skills or keywords from the job description in your summary. (Hint: this is one way to customize your resume for each job application.)
Don't
Don’t use personal pronouns (I, my, we).
Don’t use fluff words. Fluff words are often soft skills — team player, adaptable, hard-working, etc. These skills should be obvious from how you share your experience further down in your resume.
Don’t mention ‘career pivot’, ‘career changer’, ‘transferable’.