04 Apr Health IT Resumes: Your One Shot at a Great First Impression
Health IT experts are among the most sought after professionals in the workforce, but that alone isn’t enough to get you hired. In fact, while your education and experience are important, they mean nothing if you can’t quickly convince an employer you’re the person for the job? How quickly? Well, according to a study released today by The Ladders, recruiters often decide whether a candidate is a fit in just six seconds.
Six seconds. That’s all you have to capture, engage and keep a recruiter or hiring manager’s attention. But can anyone really do that in six seconds? Here are a few, quick tips to get your resume noticed–and ensure that you get called in–for an interview.
Create a clearly targeted health IT resume.
Sending the same resume to a half-dozen recruiters or hiring managers is a sure route to rejection. Take the time to research companies you’d be interested in working for or positions you’d like to have, and tailor your resume to showcase the skills or demonstrate past successes that are relevant to the job you seek.
Quantify successes.
Did you save your last employer time or money by implementing a new system? How much? Use concrete numbers and percentages, rather than blanket, empty statements, to illustrate achievements. For example, instead of saying, “attained mastery,” paint a picture for the reader by saying something like, “Learned to use company’s new operating system in just one week and successfully trained entire 30-person office staff on the same in three weeks.”
Use bullets, not paragraphs.
Most hiring authorities and HR personnel scan resumes for keywords or phrases that match certain criteria. To help your resume get noticed, pepper it with words and phrases used in the descriptions of jobs you’re applying for. But be careful: use them in a way that makes sense and sounds conversational. Otherwise, filtering software will label your resume as SPAM.
And, although it should go without saying, make sure you actually have experience with each of those skills, or you may get called out in an interview.
Speak English.
While health IT hiring managers and recruiters understand IT jargon, having to read a health IT resume full of it can be cumbersome. Use jargon when appropriate, but use plain, easy-to-understand, conversational English whenever possible.
Proofread.
Go beyond spellcheck. Review the resume and have others review it to catch typos, misspellings, punctuation errors and grammatical gaffes.
What About Health IT Resume Don’ts?
As recruiters, we’re always amazed that some people still don’t know what things should never be included in a resume. But, some things bear repeating. So, here are a list of items you absolutely never want to include on a resume:
- Photos or graphics. While these might be appropriate for individuals in creative professions, they do not belong on a health IT resume. Save the photos for your LinkedIn profile (and even then, make sure they look professional).
- Height, weight, race, ethnicity, or any other personal identifying information. Occasionally, employment applications will request this information, in order to ensure that the employer complies with federal anti-discrimination laws. However, this information should never be included on your resume.
- Lying about or fudging dates, titles, or education. These are all easily verifiable. If the hiring manager does a background check and discovers a lie, you won’t get the job. Be honest. Always.
- Listing the reasons why you left your last job. Why you left your last job or why you’re currently looking for work is a topic for your interview, not your resume. List only start and end dates for previous jobs, never the reason you left.
- Listing references or “references available on request.” The hiring manager will request these if they need them.
Remember, the goal of your resume is to land you an interview, not a job. While the above tips are by no means exhaustive, they will greatly increase your odds of getting a call back, rather than being sent to the “circular file.”