Most resumes don’t fail because the person isn’t qualified. They fail because they bury the very evidence that proves it.
Take Alex, a marketing manager I coached. His resume was three pages of task lists: “Responsible for campaigns,” “Managed social media.” Nowhere did it say that his work grew inbound leads 45% year-over-year. Once we rebuilt it around results, he landed three interviews within two weeks.
Mistake #1: Treating your resume like a biography.
A resume is not a diary; it’s a pitch deck. Strip out irrelevant jobs from 10+ years ago unless they serve today’s narrative.
Mistake #2: Burying the headline.
One client, Nina, had “Administrative Assistant” at the top—but her recent work was essentially Operations Manager. Hiring managers skim; make your current identity clear in the first third of the page.
Mistake #3: Lazy bullet points.
Swap “Responsible for onboarding” with “Redesigned onboarding flow, reducing new-hire time-to-productivity by 30%.” That shift alone transforms perception.
Mistake #4: Ignoring the ATS.
Sophie applied to 200 jobs with zero calls. Why? Her resume used “client engagement” while every job description said “customer success.” We aligned the language—her phone started ringing.
Mistake #5: Forgetting the reader’s perspective.
Think of a recruiter skimming 200 resumes. Would yours pass the 30-second test?
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