5 Rules of Making an Irresistible Résumé

Whether it is a $200K Job or a startup fair, CV is still the go-to document for most people

Photo by George Bohunicky on Unsplash

1. The 10 Second Rule

A resume isn’t read. It is ‘glanced over’. A recruiter or an investor will typically spend only 10 seconds per CV. A rule of thumb is that less than 10 years of experience equals 1 page resume.

A resume is not an essay or a letter. It is neither a detailed report of what you did or a summary of your duties. A resume is a collection of peaks. Each peak is one of these four.

1. Impact — e.g. sold 100K disposable sanitary pads
2. Improvement — e.g. made the code run 10x faster or occupy 1/10th the space
3. Novelty — publishing a patent, paper or inventing something
4. Recognition — Winning a grant or a prize

Rule of thumb — Less than 10 years of experience equals 1 page resume

How can I squeeze all my work life into 1 page? Right, you can’t! And you also don’t need to. Nobody wants to know your autobiography. People want one-liners, highlights, titbits.

Don’t give me the lecture, give me the book. Don’t give me the book, give me…