Resume Format for Freshers & Writing guide

Introduction

While opening up to the world, whether for an internship, job recruitment, or any other experience opportunity, your resume becomes your first impression and the first way people can assess what kind of person you are. The way your qualifications, skills, and work experience are put up on your resume can make a significant impact on your chances of recruitment or getting selected by your hiring person. 

The resume or CV screening has been the first and foremost step towards your job application, internship proposal, or future admission to an institute. They can play a good role and can turn your chance of getting selected or being rejected. For making a good and strong impression on the first go, make sure to build an amazing and eye-catching resume for your recruiter. But first of all, what actually is a resume?

What is a Resume, and why is it important?

A resume, often known as a CV (Curriculum Vitae), is a document with your educational qualifications, skills, achievements, background, previous work, or experience writing. It can be considered as a summary of your education, professional life, and your expertise.  

The role your resume can play in putting up your good first impression with a higher chance of getting selected is actually great. Your resume can help you to

• Highlight your extraordinary skills.
• Show your achievements
• Stand out from the rest of the candidates and grab the attention of the recruiter.
• Prove how you are so fit for particular job positions

So, a good resume is a must for a good beginning into the professional world. For freshers who have just graduated from high school or just freshly graduated from your college, a functional resume is more of use than a usual resume. Since freshers have limited or no actual work experience, this functional resume focuses on highlighting your skills acquired and your technical qualifications. 

These kinds of resumes are generally used by those who want to change their career path and therefore have no significant work experience in that realm or graduated freshly from the University, or have a significant gap in their professional work history. In any of these cases, you can use a functional resume to focus on your skills rather than experience. 

Here are a few features which are a very important part of your freshers’ resume:

Important Features of Freshers Resume

• Contact Information: Make sure to provide your correct and updated contact information for recruiters to approach you in case you get selected.
• Objective: You can even include a section on your career objective and about your future plans.
• Educational Qualification, which needs to be written providing your institute name, and you can even mention your scored CGPA or percentage.
• Achievements: You can make it a subsection under education or make a separate section to mention your awards, certifications, or any other achievements.
• Skills: Make sure to flaunt your skills to make you stand out from the rest of the candidates and show how you are perfect for this job.
• Experience: Whether it is through an internship, part-time job, or any volunteer work, make sure to mention all your experiences as they’ll let your recruiter know that you have worked before in a professional setup.

Types of Resume and Format Brief

Based on the format and order of content in your resume, they can be classified into three types; Chronological Resume, Functional Resume, and Combination Resume.

Chronological Resume: In these resumes, you need to write your experience in reverse chronological order, which means that you should write your current job first followed by previous ones in order.

• Name and contact information.
• Career Objective 
• Work Experience 
• Skills 
• Educational Qualification (other certifications)

Functional Resume: This type of format emphasizes more on technical skills rather than work experience. Fresher simple resume format would be like

• Name and Contact information.
• Objective
• Skills
• Experience
• Education (other certifications)

Combination Resume: This is a combination of both Functional and Combination resumes in which you can focus on both skills and work experience. You can put your skills or your work experience first as per your choice.

• Name and contact information. 
• Objective
• Work experience 
• Skills 
• Education (other certifications)

How to write a Resume for Freshers

Tip for writing a good fresher resume for job

After all the essential information about resumes, you must be wondering how to write a resume for freshers. There are commonly made mistakes that can ruin your first impression, and there are also fantastic pointers that can put forward a strong impression if you include these details in your resume. Such tips can enhance your chances of acceptance as this is the first point of contact. 

Here are some writing tips to write a resume for freshers:

1. Make sure to read the job description properly so as to include the necessary qualifications and skills to excel in this job opportunity. Also, make sure to take note of the keywords in job postings so that you can include those while writing your resumes.

Use active language and eliminate unnecessary words like “achieved” or “accomplished.”

Write things directly so that you can make the resume easier to read.

For example;

“During my time at Freedom Private Limited, I ran multiple team-based projects and helped each team member with various tasks associated with each project.”

This example could be shortened and strengthened in the following way:

“Led multiple team-based projects and effectively coordinated group tasks.”

2. Include only important and necessary headings and sub-headings that are relevant to the job opportunity. Avoid making resumes more than two pages and avoid including unnecessary facts and information. Make sure to keep all the sections brief and up to a point only with the most relevant information.

Example 

The following statements can be rewritten to make them short and crisp.

“Performed inventory audits on a monthly basis and discovered issues with over-ordering—executed an organisation solution across all teams which resulted in a 10 percent increase in revenue over the next two quarters.”

This statement can be shortened as;

“Performed regular inventory audits, identified and solved over-ordering problem to achieve 10 percent revenue increase.”

3. Use a clear, easily readable, and professional font only in your resumes to make it easier to read. Fonts like Arial, Times New Roman, Cambria, Calibri, Didot are considered best for resumes with an ideal font size of about 10-12. The section headings can be made one font size larger.
4. Make use of bullet points for writing your skills or educational qualifications rather than writing them in paragraph form.

For example:

• _Consistently operated overhead cranes, hoists, power tools and other project equipment in a safe manner.
• Anticipated needs of 11 on-site workers and delivered parts to 23 field technicians.
• Completed weekly service reports, time cards and other related project equipment paperwork._

5. Make sure to include a robust and well-written career objective line. Since there is not much work experience for freshers, this section of your resume will make the recruiter aware of your career goals and what you want to accomplish. This section could also give the recruiter insight into why this job will be helpful for your career path and how it matches something you are passionate about.

An example as to how this can be written is

 Recent college graduate with a major in business administration and a minor in accounting seeking entry-level position as a Junior Accountant with a medium- to large-sized accounting firm that I can grow to senior level positions within. Highly motivated professional who earned high honors throughout college and contributed to year-end audits and forecasting with special recognition from the senior accounting team during my internship.

6. Properly include all relevant skills which can be useful for your future job. You can also match it to the skills required by the recruiter in the job description. 

An example of this will be 

Computer skills: Advanced
Mathematical skills: Advanced
Communication skills: Expert
Customer service skills: Expert
Critical thinking and problem-solving skills: Advanced

7. Also include your enthusiasm to learn more and more through this job opportunity. That will make you also above candidates of similar skills. 
8. Always make sure to proofread so as to avoid any grammatical mistakes or any other errors in your resume. You can also send it or read it aloud among your family members or friends to check for any other errors and get an honest opinion.
9. Choose appropriate margin lines with about 1-inch space left on all four sides. Also, take care of the spacing between the lines, as it can be challenging to read.
10. Before submitting the same resume for different job applications, make sure to check if your skills, objectives, and qualifications match a particular job application. Also, you can highlight the points which you especially want the recruiter to take special note of.

 Fresher Resume Format for Job

Though there is no particular or specific format for resumes, there is a certain way in which you have to put up things. You need to make sure to include in writing tips to write a resume for freshers that were mentioned above. You can also look up for a fresher resume format in Word, in which you can simply just fill in your details. Fresher resume format download in MS word can provide you with many attractive designer templates to make your CV more eye-catching.

The format in which you can design your resume actually depends on you, so just make sure to include all the features and important sections. We will cover the various resume samples for freshers. An example for one of such resumes is given below:

Now we have seen three types of resumes that can be used for different job purposes and personal conditions. These three have nearly the sections and subheadings; the only difference lies in which section you feel more confident to show and which part of your resume you want the recruiter to pay special attention to. An example as a sample for each of the three types is mentioned below. You can build your resume along the same lines. Any of these sample formats for a fresher resume will suit your purpose.

Here is the resume sample for freshers for each type:

1. Chronological Resume Sample

2. Functional Resume Sample 

3. Combination Resume Sample

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS 

1. What is the most appropriate length for resumes?

Again, there is no particular length specified that your resume should be restricted to. Still, it is also advised to keep it between 1-2 pages, and all the information must be easily scannable with only relevant information being there and no unnecessary inclusion of data.

2. How to make a resume attractive if I have no work experience?

If you have just graduated or anyone with no working skills, make sure to highlight your skills and gain expertise correctly with your willingness to learn through all new opportunities. Make sure to write a vital career objective so as to put up yourself as a strong contender for the post. Also, your volunteer work, internships, and project work are undertaken can be part of your experience.

3. What type of format must I choose to write your resume- Chronological or functional?

It depends from person to person. If you are someone who already has an established career and wants to continue in the same field of work as you are, then you should prefer a chronological resume format over a functional one. Also, make sure to include your positions and achievements. A functional resume format would be good for someone with no prior work experience or someone who wants to start a new career, as you can highlight your skills and abilities in that format. However, you can also include your work experience in this format, but it will not be the highlight of the resume.

4. Can I make use of ‘I’ in my resume?

Making use of ‘I’ in the resume is not wrong, but writing whole sentences with I can make resumes unnecessarily long and difficult to read, so you must ensure not making awkward points using first pronouns.

5.What should be the ending of the resume?

Technically the ending of your resume should be the most irrelevant and unimportant information for the job. It should be your educational qualification for the recruiters, as with your job experiences, the educational information becomes less important or irrelevant. However, for a functional resume, your educational qualification can be an essential and highlighted factor. You can end it with sections like interests, volunteering experience, or extracurricular activities for such resumes.

6. What looks bad on a resume and can give a negative impression?

 Following things should not be included in your resume and can give a negative impression to the recruiter.

• Including too much information that is irrelevant to the position or job also makes it look less interesting.
• Grammatical or spelling errors can look bad on a resume 
• Too much share of personal information can look bad on your resume 
• Much detailed section of your hobbies and interest can also act negatively on your resume
• Too small or too large font size with fancy and difficult to read font style.
• Use of passive language in your resume.

7. Should I upload my resume in pdf or Word format?

You should always upload your resume in pdf format to avoid any unnecessary distortion of alignment that can occur in the world from one system to another that can even ruin the entire work you have put in making it. Many fresher resume formats in Word can be used to make an attractive resume, but you can convert it into pdf format before sending it. To big companies, you can even send both formats.

8. What things especially stand out in a resume?

Following things stand out in your resume and can gain the necessary attention in your resume:

a.  Career Accomplishments and achievements

b. Education from any prestigious and well-known institution

c. An outstanding work experience section

d. Customize your resume including keywords from the job description or which are industry related 

e.Clean, concise, and up-to-point writing with essential things in highlight

f. A vital and well-written job objective.

 

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