Putting Your Best Foot Forward
Whether you’re planning a job search, heading back to grad school, or just want to make sure you’ve got up-to-date information, this guide will help you update your resume.
The Basics
While resumes for each career stage and across industries tend to be unique, there are some basic approaches that can help anyone with updating their resume. Here are some basic resources to get started.
Resume Basics
Start with this brief video for a basic overview to help you think about resume writing. And you can also download the slides.
Example Resumes
To help you get started on building your own resume, you can review two example resumes, one for an early career professional and another for someone with more extensive professional experience. Scroll to the bottom of the page to find the alumni resume examples.
Alumni Career Services Tools
Temple offers tools to help you further refine and optimize your resume.
Jobscan
Use Jobscan to compare your application documents (resume, cover letter, even LinkedIn) to specific job descriptions to ensure you’re using the right keywords and highlighting the best skills. See how easy it is to optimize your resume using Jobscan. Fill out this form to request your premium account provided by Temple, so that you can use the power edit feature to easily update your resume.
Networking Tools
Resumes differ by industry and sometimes specific companies even have desired styles. Talking with industry or company insiders can help you have the most relevant resume advice. Use the tools listed below to find Temple alumni at your target companies.
LinkedIn
Leverage the find alumni tool to quickly identify Owls who can help. As you get more specific, you can use LinkedIn’s advanced search features to narrow in on exactly who can be helpful.
CareerShift
You can use this platform to find the emails of thousands of Temple Owls, allowing you to obtain key insider perspective.
Additional Help Topics
Resume Length
Is it ever okay to go more than one page?
While industries and companies may differ on their preferences, generally you can be guided by relevancy, not just by a page count.
Learn more about how to decide what’s relevant.
Recent Graduates: Internships
How to decide when to let go of college experiences?
How long do you keep your internships on your resume? What about extracurriculars, clubs, athletics? Relevancy is key—check out this brief presentation to learn more.
Resume Evaluation Activity
Beyond using your resume to apply for jobs, what can you learn from it?
Add every possible job to your resume, and every possible bullet. Then analyze each bullet—do you want more of that kind of work or less? What bullets brought out your best skills or challenged you in fulfilling ways? What bullets represent work you’re no longer excited by?
This self-analysis activity can help you think more intentionally about your next career move.