Many companies run resumes through programs that are able to check for specific keywords. These programs loosely gauge how fit a possible employee is for a job by ranking resumes by the number and type of keywords that they contain.
Although the keywords that programs search for in resumes often vary by job, they frequently deal with the personal characteristics, college degree, training, and technological skills that relate to certain professions. The way in which companies use their search for keywords varies; some companies may weight keywords based on importance where other companies consider all keywords equal; some companies may strongly take into account how many of the keywords match the skills, education, and other words they are looking for while others may be more lenient.
You can take several steps to optimize the quality of keywords in your resume.
First, include both acronyms and their spelled-out forms. Although some companies have more refined programs that search for the synonyms of keywords in addition to a keyword itself, some programs only search for either an acronym or its spelled-out version as a keyword.
Second, use as many forms (noun, verb, adjective) of a word as possible. For example, for the noun “leader,” see if you can logically work in words such as lead, leadership and leading.
Finally, search job posts, job descriptions and company websites and brochures for recurring words and phrases before creating a resume. These recurring words and phrases are likely keywords that the company will look for in resumes. Some potential keywords can be found in job descriptions that list the qualifications for a specific job; for example, if a job description says “bachelor of science degree required,” “bachelor of science” will likely be a keyword.
Working keywords into a resume in a natural, truthful and logical way is a skill. If you are having problems, contact Robin’s Resumes®.