Resume is the first step towards a golden career and bagging a coveted job so having an impressive resume is of utmost importance if you are hunting in the job market. Here are sonme points which all job seekers should keep in mind to “craft” an impressive resume.

Customise
The resume, if customized as per the job requirement, would always stand good chances to be short listed for Interview.

Non verbal element
Be particular about the use of stationary as this speaks a lot about you.
An A4 size white paper with commonly used fonts and Arial or Times New Roman with 12 as font size made in MSWORD or PDF file is the norm. However colored sheet is suggested only if the CV in current form has not been able to garner enough views and it is used to gain the attention of recruiter.

Language
An Initial Covering letter can be useful to explain a thing two about you.
A good research about the company while making a covering letter and a mention of why you are interested in a particular job with the prospective employer would always be taken positively.
Check doubly in case of language used, incorrect spellings, grammatical errors because this can reduce your chances to sit across the interview table.
Do not use high – powered vocabulary so that one needs to open a dictionary to comprehend the resume.

Qualification focus
Irrelevant qualification only spells your non – focus.
Mentioning qualifications just for the heck of it or to impress the recruiter about various degrees acquired won’t come handy as it will reveal only that you are directionless and dabbling into various streams that might not make sense with your job experience.

Avoid pics
Photo is distracting and unnecessary especially while E-mailing, it can make the file heavy and might not reach the desired destination as files above certain size are rejected. Also the fixing of photograph might result into alignment of CV getting disturbed.
Photographs could be useful in context of hospitality or jobs at front desk where looks or visible appearance is an important criterion.

Short and crisp
Very exhaustive resumes will make the recruiter lose interest in your credentials and CV will find place only in junk box.
The approach of being specific and concise always works. Just making a CV lengthy and copying the same set of responsibilities in one role to another role and from one organization to another will dilute recruiter’s interest. In fact, the responsibilities change from being an executioner at junior management to operational at middle management whereas it becomes strategic in nature at senior management.

Selected references
Too many references or even including a reference can mar your chances.
References are generally required at the last stage of the evaluation process so as such these are not required at the initial interface.
Remember that mentioning too many references may go against you as one out of the multiple ones may not find favour with the interviewer because of his past experience.
Reference should be provided only after being asked for and persons should be informed beforehand that their name has been given for reference check.

Steer clear of clichés
Stereotyped adjectives like dynamic, versatile and repetitive use of words like result-oriented, self motivated, high energy levels should be avoided.
Often employees go overboard in a bid to impress their recruiters by using impressive adjectives. Words such as innovative, motivated and dynamic have been used so often that they’ve lost their impact. Steer clear of these words whenever possible and focus on quantifying your contributions.

Include impact factors
Responsibilities in place of accomplishments will greatly reduce the impact of your resume.
It has been researched that recruiters often wish to understand how an Employee’s role made a difference in the company. One often tends to mention the part of responsibilities as accomplishment, few responsibilities are such that it is always expected as part of your job whereas accomplishment is something exceptional that probably would have resulted in cost cutting, savings or profits.

Hobbies
Irrelevant hobbies could make you appear strange rather than well-rounded.
Mention of hobbies/Interests than can translate into your usefulness for a job applied can always be a bonus, else hobby or passion should exhibit versatility and adaptability on part of your character. If you believe you haven’t any specific hobbies, than it will be better to avoid the hobbies/interest heading.

Proper mail ID
Using an improper email address is immature and childish.
It has been noticed that mentioning humorous email addresses using words like queen, princess, bond007 etc might be fine for your personal correspondence, but not for a job application. For a professional email address, just use your name and numeric.

Talk strategic than generic
At senior levels the candidate should talk about the strategic nature of their job rather than whole lot of responsibilities they are performing. One page “Snapshot” is sufficient at very senior levels, it should talk only about accomplishments at the organizations that they have served.

Caution on sites
Be cautious while putting information on networking sites.
Linked in or other professionally networking sites are very commonly referred by recruiters these days and is used in tandem with CV and not matching with profile on networking site will make it unpleasant for the candidate if asked to explain.

Be different
Avoid constructing CVs that follow the standard pattern.
Notably, the CVs that are being made by some professional organizations use specific sequence, fonts and language that make it easy to comprehend the work of a professional resume maker. It will be assumed by interviewer that certain things are exaggerated and don’t truly speak about candidate’s potential.