Open Spots - Writing Resume From A to Z

Writing a Resume from A to Z

A: Accuracy Don’t assume that resumes are not getting checked. Just a little white lie can be detrimental.

B: Bullet Points You have been in med school for four years. A lot of things have happened and many things are worth mentioning. But the question is what should you write about and what should you leave out. Sometimes it is much better using bullet points to make your point rather than wasting a paragraph. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t get into detail but rather use your space wisely. If the point you would like to make is specific to the position in question - go ahead and explain in detail. If it is not important that keep is short and sweet.

C: Cover Letter Don’t forget the cover letter, better known as the personal statement. Writing an effective cover letter is not that simple as you want to stand out. So this is why we decided to give you more information about how to write a cover letter/Personal Statement.

D: Design You don’t have to write your resume on fancy paper or add a little doc cartoon into the corner to fill that white space. If you stick with plain white paper you will be better off. It doesn’t hurt to use the more expensive white paper that feels a little thicker but don’t splurge too much.

E: Envelope This might sound like a no-brainer. But I have heard so many stories about people who are sending their resumes in small envelops so that there are creases all over the place. Or people reuse a big brown envelope to save a few cents. Making a good first impression is much more important than saving money. Keep in mind that this position will bring in good money.

F: Fonts Please don’t try to be fancy with your resume. Make it easy on the reader by using standard typefaces such as Times New Roman or Arial. They are use to these font types and can read them faster. They might not see you as the creative guy you would like to be but rather as the guy that slowed them down. It might be tempting to go a little bit smaller to avoid the last three words on the top of page three but don’t make the size too small. Try to stick to 11 or 12.

G: Goals Let the future employer know where you would like to go in life. If they think that this is just a small unimportant aspect for you than they will be less willing to work with you. If they see that your goals fit the goals of the position in question you will have a nice jumpstart and get a higher spot in the pile of applications.

H: Help Sometimes a little help can’t hurt. If you have written resumes in the past and didn’t get good feedback from them you might be having some problems. You might have to spend a few bucks but if you can land the position you are looking for than it was money well spend. We are here to help you if you don’t think you can do it on your own.

I: Important Facts Think about this for a moment. What are you looking for when you are buying a new product? Do you want to know that the packaging comes from Wisconsin or that it was built to the highest industry standards? State your most important facts first. Or else the reader will think you have nothing else to offer. If you apply for a fellowship position you don’t want mention were you went to med school in the first. This is a fact you might want to mention - especially when you went to a great school - but it is more important to know where your last residency was etc.

J: Jargon Try to explain your thoughts in terms people can understand. If you try to be too technical you might be losing the reader’s interest.

K: Keywords Have you ever thought about why you are supposed to send in your resumes via email in many cases? No? Here is a thought. Once they have your resume in a file format they can read they can integrate those documents into a database and look for information that pertains to them. Meaning, they only look for resumes that have certain main keywords included which are essential for the position in question. So do your homework and see what counts in your specialty.

L: Length Try to keep your resume short. It would be great if you can keep the resume under two pages. We know that there is a lot of information that you would like to include but that is not essential to get you the interview. You can always add that more information is available per request. This way the reader knows that there is more to you than what you mentioned in writing.

M: Meaningful Details Details are important but as you only have limited space you want to stick with the details that are meaningful to the position you are applying for.

N: No No’s There are some major no no’s you should keep in mind 1. Use a professional sounding email address rather than doodleoffun@yahoo.com 2. Grammatical errors that your word spell-check didn’t recognize 3. Email attachment file name doesn’t include your name instead it was sent as resume_final_version.doc 4. Outdated telephone number. If you are no longer at hospital X, take that number out.

O: Organize Organize your thoughts in a way that makes sense to the reader. Make your resume logical. Don’t jump from the past to the future and back to the past. Get a format and stick with it.

P: Proofread This is the moment to show that you are the best applicant. The tiniest mistake can make your whole resume look bad and make your application disappear. We suggest that you proofread your resume at least twice on your own. Read it out loud. Many mistakes can be caught by reading it out loud. Ask for help. Let a friend or professional read over your resume. It is often difficult to catch your own mistakes while others will catch them immediately. But don’t let that “other” be the intended reader of your application.

Purpose Always keep in mind what the purpose of your resume is. Only if you keep this in mind will you be able to match the resume to the position in question. Don’t use the resume you used to apply for med school as things have changed and you have much more insight that you can use to show new purpose. Remember, everybody knows that you always wanted to become a doctor. But you were already four years in med school. If you didn’t want to become a doctor you wouldn’t apply for a residency/fellowship position.

Q: Qualities This is your time to shine. Make your resume stand out from the hundreds of resumes piling up on the desk of the reader. Rather than just mentioning all your qualities it is essential to back up those qualities so that the reader can easily see how these qualities would fit into the department in question.

R: Resume Templates Stay away from those templates. They won’t do you any favors as they look like just what they are -- templates. Your resume should be unique so see if you can manage to make it look different without being too hard to read, etc. You will be better off.

S: Spacing Spacing will help the reader to go from section to section. Sometimes they scan through the resume to see the part that they are most interested in. Try to keep the spacing consistent throughout your paper. If you have different spacing, you don’t appear as a person who looks out for the details in life. And it is essential for a doctor to look for the details.

T: Titles Titles can make your resume shine or drop into the recycling bin. Due to the fact that there are so many resumes some institutions are known to scan through them. Look at the headings and see whether they could be a good fit. Try to make those headings effective so that the reader will know before reading the section what to expect.

U: Underlining If you would like to make your headings stand out via underlining than this is an option. But don’t use underlining to make words or sentences stand out in your resume.

V: Verbs Don’t waste your valuable space with verbs that don’t mean anything. Instead use action verbs to clearly show the point you would like to get across.

W: Work Experience Everybody knows that it takes a long time to apply for a fellowship or residency position. You will have accumulated plenty of work experience. But in order to keep your resume short and effective you should edit and select ones that will pertain to the specific specialty. If you are applying both for Emergency Medicine and Urology you need two separate resumes in order to fit either position perfectly.

X: X-ray X-ray your resume before sending. Analyze it the same way you would analyze lab results or MRIs.

Y: You The resume is all about you. This is the place for you to share the person you know the best. Finding a way to sell yourself in less than two pages is not easy. Share the good parts of you and forget about aspects of your life you rather not want to make public. The time you spend thinking about who and what you are will help you to land the position you are looking for.

Z: Zen Don’t get into the Zen mode when writing your resume. It is nice to be relaxed and keep your mind as calm as possible. But in order to make the best resume, you need to work hard on it. After you send out your application package you can get into the Zen mode while you wait for good news.

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