News Item
"Tribune Content Agency" featured Pace University’s Lubin School of Business marketing professor Larry Chiagouris in "How to best start a resume"
DEAR READERS: It is the time of year when college seniors are starting to think about post-college life and working on resumes they hope will land them their first real job. This question is one I know many soon-to-be grads and their parents have: Is a summary statement or career objective the best way to go? And if so, what are some ways to phrase it?
A summary statement is the way to go, according to two experts I reached out to.
In fact, Larry Chiagouris, Ph.D., professor of marketing at Pace University’s Lubin School of Business and author of “The Secret to Getting a Job After College,” says a summary statement is mandatory for these young job seekers.
Why? According to Chiagouris, it has a lot to do with the amount of time the average recruiter spends reviewing the average resume. That, he says, is only about six seconds.
“How many words are in the average resume of someone with zero to two years of experience? Four hundred. And how many words do people read per minute? Two hundred and fifty,” Chiagouris says. “So, how many of the words on your resume get read by the average recruiter for jobs which have many applicants? Twenty-five — that includes your name and address at the top, leaving little time for the rest of your resume. Therefore, a summary statement, if carefully constructed, greatly increases the time a recruiter or HR person will read your resume.”
When crafting a summary statement, Chiagouris suggests starting with something like “one of the few graduating seniors who…” or “a graduating senior with a unique combination of…”, plus and anything else that separates you from other seniors who might be competing for the same job.
“The right summary statement will increase the time a recruiter spends on the rest of your resume!” he says.
Frank Grossman of Resumes that Shine Professional Career Services, concurs.
“I recommend that all my clients use summary statements,” Grossman says. “A summary tells the reader what you bring to the table as a prospective employee.”
Perhaps surprisingly, Grossman, who has written about the topic on the resumesthatshine.com blog, recommends making the summary the last thing you write — even though it will be the first thing recruiters see.
“This summary is something like the executive summary or cover summary on a business report. It is a brief synopsis of the rest of the document,” Grossman says. “That means you probably will not know what to write until you develop the rest of your resume content, so consider writing the summary after you write the rest of the resume.”
Read the article.
