by Julie Desmond

If you are applying for positions and getting called for interviews, your resume is doing exactly what you want it to. On the other hand, if you send resumes regularly, on positions that make sense for you, and you never hear back from employers, your resume is either slacking off or completely out to lunch. Give your application a quick performance review and with some careful retooling you should see immediate improvement in the responses you get from employers.

Review your resume for typos. This seems obvious, doesn’t it? When job seeker Pam was invited by a friend to apply for an administrative position in his company, she thought the position was already hers. Instead, she didn’t even get an interview. “I couldn’t bring her in,” her exasperated friend said. “She had typos all over her resume.” Pam had updated her resume so many times, she hardly knew what was in it. She couldn’t see the obvious spelling and spacing errors that found their way onto the page because she had been looking at it for far too long.

Spell check is a good starting point and should be used every time you save a document. The most common errors on a resume, though, are the ones spell check does not catch. If you write their instead of there, or too instead of two, spell check assumes you know what you mean. If grammar is a challenge for you, turn on your grammar check function and heed any advice it gives you.

Another easy way to catch typos is to put your resume on ice – or on the icebox. Post your resume on your refrigerator for a day or two. Every time you walk by, misspelled words and awkward phrases will jump out at you. Jot notes about what you want to change and then go back and edit. Give family and friends permission to comment, as well, and consider their suggestions when deciding what to change.

Review your resume for visual descriptions of what you can do. Does your objective describe you as a “Hard working, effective communicator and team player?” Or does it advertise you as a “Nationally recognized sales leader who increased revenue by 110% over three years?” Which of these two would you hire? As the old saying goes, show, don’t tell. Don’t expect anyone to believe you when you say you are a talented multi-tasker. Instead, show your next employer your value by providing measurable, verifiable examples.

Finally, review your resume for white space. Yes, space. A resume is like the home page on a website: it is an introduction, a sample of what you bring to the table. Include the salient points that give employers a sense of who you are so they will then want to know more. Not every job, but every relevant job. Not every responsibility, but every critical responsibility. Not every accomplishment, but one or two big ones: the memorable achievements that relate to the needs of your next employer.

Make your resume work harder for you by making every word matter and then start planning for the inevitable: the interviews.

Julie Desmond leads 21st Century Job Search workshops for Help Wanted! Workshop in Minneapolis. Her background includes fifteen years recruiting and career counseling for candidates in accounting, finance and medical manufacturing at every career level. Write to julie@helpwantedworkshop.com.