My new series is about specific resumes types.  I like to write for all levels and industries.  It keeps me on my toes. However, each area Executive Résumé,  Senior Management, Management, Admin, Staff is written slightly differently.

 I’d like to make you aware of these differences, by writing about each one and giving you a snap shot version of each type.  In my 20-year history, if we averaged that I have written 200 resumes for each year – and that is a low estimate, I think you will understand that I know about what I speak.

So let’s began with the top – CEO, Board Member. This particular CV/Résumé  that I am demonstrating actually is 10 pages long. Senior level experience in its entirety must be told.  However, the first page with the Profile still contains the greatest impact

Beginning with the cover letter, carrying over to the résumé, and following with proof of experience, I am totally concentrating on developing your brand.  This is true at all levels.

Each one of you is unique and must define what differentiates you from the next candidate.  I will repeat this statement in many ways throughout this series, because at every level this is so.

 Let’s begin: Example: I

 RESUME

EXPERTISE   President, CEO, Chairman of the Board

PROFILE        

Chief executive leadership with a broad range of experience running large-cap corporate structures in excess of $3B. Develop overall strategies and planning to implement objectives of the board; oversee their implementation by operations and distribution across six (6) subsidiaries. Responsibility for P&L with intuitive skills in finding areas for revenue growth and cost reductions overseeing implementation of effective plant and corporate operations.

Advancement through the ranks of this Fortune 500 company that began as a management trainee, adds the extra perception necessary to discern and spearhead indisputable leadership.

 (This actual résumé has a longer Profile, but showing this much gives you an idea of what to do.  At the same time you have your résumé written, it would also be good time to write a bio that could easily be constructed from this Profile.

After the résumé is proof read, I develop this Profile into a Bio.  By that time, I know and understand what makes you tick, have put everything in your voice, and can add the extra ingredient of a bio. 

Other levels don’t usually need this, but the CEO does.

NEXT…_

EXPERIENCE

XXXXX                                                                                                                             Dec xx – Current

Strategy Committee Member

Group executive and principal officer in 10-member executive committee. Responsible for enterprise-wide and worldwide corporate planning, and govern directives of all companies within the corporation

Corporation, INC, City, State – (all spelled out please; not a zip abbreviation)            Dec xx – Current

President and CEO

Highlights: Manage P&L accountability across seven organizations to accomplish an integrated execution of core strategies, support business matrix based on stated objectives and goals, control costs, and identify leverage points and how quantifiable results will be accomplished by stakeholders.

Responsible for corporate operations and fifteen (30) manufacturing plants and facilities, encompassing xx corporate and salaried employees involved in operations, engineering, equipment maintenance, R&D and quality assurance.  This also includes 4000 union and non-union plant employees.

— Contributions of impacted areas include:

• Delivered $300MM in profitability on $1.6B in sales, $XXMM in operating cash flow and $XX free cash flow. 2007 was a record year in profitability for XXXXX
• International Executive Management includes:

—         London, England, and XX, Germany:  Trip encompassed ……

(Of course this is longer than what you are seeing here, but you can see how I develop the section. 

Keeps the reader’s eye going from text, to bulleted text to “M” lines or dashes.  This presents an interesting results oriented look and keeps back that dull flat look of paragraph that I see on older résumés. 

Remember the first reading is fast – keep the reader interested.  Even if you are well-known in your industry, you can still get boring on paper.  What happens?  The reader quits reading.

 The most important text is on the first two pages, after that very short paragraphs, but put them in –  because your underpinnings are very important.  Don’t cut yourself short.

 Next:  Finish the rest in a CV kind of look – by that I mean lists, very few facts:

BOARD APPOINTMENTS

Board of Directors /  Policy Committee                                                                                        Current

Executive Committee Member –Manufacturers Institute, Washington, D.C.                                    Jan 2009

PRESENTATIONS

Keynote speaker (re-invited) for the 2009 XXX Conference – Topic –. Rated the #1 presenter out of 43 presentations;

HONORS AND AWARDS

Recipient of the 2008 Memorial Award for outstanding civic leadership.                                        Aug 2008

RELATED ASSOCIATIONS & ACTIVITIES

National Alliance of XXX- Past Member

EDUCATION

Masters in Business Administration University, City Sate

Continuing Education

Continue on with everything you have taken since your degree. In list style.

(There are other things that could follow, or not. 

For instance, for a real family man, I might say Personal:  My wife and I have three children.  This is a nice touch given to me by a local news anchor and astute business man.

 And then there is the cover letter.  If you leave this out, you are foolish, because the résumé is a stiffer format and cannot express your gut feelings, what drives you, what has made you great.  I love cover letters – they are my passion.  Never, never leave one out.

 Mary Ann