Spell check your document! Candidates can be eliminated from consideration based on one spelling error. MAKE SURE your spelling is correct and that you have utilized appropriate and consistent use of periods, commas, and semi-colons.
First-person pronouns: Do not use first-person pronouns (I or we) in your resume. The reader knows it’s about you.
Shifts in tense: Make sure you are using the correct tense when describing your responsibilities. Use the present tense for a job you are currently in and the past tense for jobs you have left.
Abbreviations: Do not use abbreviations in your resume, they are informal and are not universal.
Complex sentences: Use simple, straight to the point sentences instead of run on, hard to understand sentences. Try to eliminate extraneous details and divide ideas into separate sentences.
Use of apostrophes: Make sure you are using apostrophes correctly. A common misuse of apostrophes happens when trying to make words plural for example “managed employee’s.” The apostrophe is not needed in the word “employees” in this case because it is a plural and not a possessive word.
Possessives vs. contractions: A common grammar mistakes is the confusion between possessive words and words that are contractions of two other words. An example of this is your which is possessive and you’re which is a contraction of you and are.
Fragments: A fragment is an incomplete sentence that is punctuated as though it is a complete sentence. Instead of saying “Which I had worked on” try “I worked on the project” to eliminate the fragment sentence.
Start with action verbs: When discussing what you have accomplished or what your responsibilities were start the sentence with an action verb. For example try “Provided office support” instead of “was responsible for maintaining the flow of an office setting”