Resumes – what works and what doesn’t

Writing a good resume takes time and effort.  At 2Ascribe, a Toronto-based medical transcription company, we often receive unsolicited resumes for positions for medical transcriptionists and medical transcription editors.  When we do post job listings for medical transcription positions, we’re often surprised at how few good quality resumes we receive.  Here are some tips for writing resumes that work.

Although we may never know why we didn’t get chosen for a job interview, a recent study is shedding some light on recruiters’ decision-making behavior. According to TheLadders research, recruiters spend an average of “six seconds before they make the initial ‘fit or no fit’ decision” on candidates.

The study used a scientific technique called “eye tracking” on 30 professional recruiters and examined their eye movements during a 10-week period to “record and analyze where and how long someone focuses when digesting a piece of information or completing a task.”

In the short time that they spend with your resume, the study showed recruiters will look at your name, current title and company, current position start and end dates, previous title and company, previous position start and end dates, and education.

• Make your resume relevant to the position that you are applying for.  Here are some tips of things you don’t want to put on your resume.
• Get rid of the objective, if you applied, it’s already obvious you want the job
• Cut out all the irrelevant job information, get rid of the clutter.
• Don’t put in any personal information, such as marital status or religious preference.
• Don’t let your resume exceed one page.  Keep it relevant and to the point.
• Don’t list your interests or hobbies unless their directly related to the position you’re applying for.
• Don’t give them the chance to guess your age.  Leave out when your graduated from high school or university, unless you’re applying for your first job and have little or no job experience.
• Don’t write your resume in the third person; they know who wrote it.
• Don’t include references; they’ll ask when it’s time
• Don’t include a personalized email account (e.g. blondebombshell@hotmail.com).  Get a professional (e.g. gmail.com) email account and use it for your job search.
• There’s no need to identify phone numbers or email accounts, they’re obvious (e.g.Tel: or Email: )
• Don’t include your current business contact information; you don’t want to be contacted at your current employment position.

And a few tips relevant for applying for medical transcription positions.

• If you’re using your home number (because you work from home), consider getting a secondary number with a different ring tone to identify when a prospective employer is calling.  That way, your kids won’t answer and forget to give you the message.  And you’ll know to answer professionally.
• Include what specialties you have experience with (e.g. radiology or psychiatry).
• Check out the company’s website (e.g. www.2Ascribe.com) and get a sense of who they are before you make the call or send in your resume.  If the website has a place to submit resumes, use it.  Otherwise your resume may never get to the right person.

And probably the most important tip we can give you is to make sure there are no typos in your resume.  Given that accuracy is so important in medical transcription, even one error can result in you being passed over.  And don’t depend on spellcheck.  We get applications from people who have been ‘mangers’ (instead of managers).

Excerpted from an article in Business Insider.  For full details, go to http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-what-recruiters-look-at-during-the-6-seconds-they-spend-on-your-resume-2012-4?utm_source=twbutton&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=careers.

We hope this helps you to better structure your resume to have more success in finding a medical transcription position.  At 2Ascribe, we keep qualified resumes on file for up to six months.  And even though we are located in Toronto, Ontario Canada, we accept resumes from across Canada, as our medical transcription positions are all home-based positions.