Your resume is an essential part of your marketing campaign. It's the promotional piece that advertises your product - YOU. Your resume is a powerful selling tool that not only details your background and experience, it reflects your career accomplishments in a manner that will persuade the reader to contact you. An effectively written and thoughtfully composed resume will undoubtedly translate into interviews.

Components of a professional resume

1. Contact information

Make it easy to contact you either by phone, mail or e-mail. Note: make sure your voicemail message is professional. You don't want a prospective employer to get the wrong impression from a silly message on the recording. Do not include personal information, such as marital status, here or anywhere else on your resume.

2. Objective / Title

Some experts believe that including an objective may limit your chances of obtaining an interview; if your objective doesn't match the employers needs at the time, you may miss out on a golden opportunity. On the flip side, a career objective is useful in communicating that you are proactively managing your career. You know what you want, why not say it? We suggest taking a broad approach: Instead of writing a sentence like "Seeking a career opportunity as a Marketing Executive…," try a simple title after your contact info, simply "Marketing Executive."

3. Summary Statement

First, include your title and years of experience. Second, list special skills. Third, talk about your character traits or work style. Remember that this is a summary; it should only be 2-3 sentences long. Example: "Financial Accountant with over 10 years' experience with two Fortune 500 companies. Technical skills include P & L, budgeting, forecasting and variance reporting. Bilingual in Spanish and English. Self-starter who approaches every project in a detailed, analytical manner."

4. Professional Experience

List each position held in reverse chronological order, going back at least ten years. If you held multiple positions within the same company, be sure to list all of them - you want the employer to see how you've progressed. Concentrate on the description of the position - that's the meat & potatoes.

The body of the position description has two parts:

A description of your responsibilities Your accomplishments

Feature-Accomplishment-Benefit

Use the F-A-B format to organize your skills and sell your accomplishments to a prospective employer. Example: Manufacturing Engineer

Feature: the actual responsibilities. Create and Implement a Certified Inspector program. Accomplishment: the performing of responsibilities. Reduced the number of parts inspected upon final assembly. Benefit: how your performance affected your employer. Decreased inspection costs by 45%. FAB Statement: Created and implemented a Certified Inspector program that reduced the number of parts inspected upon final assembly. Inspection costs were reduced by 45%.

Situation-Solution-Outcome

Consider the S-S-O format to demonstrate your problem-solving capabilities. Example: VP of Business Development

Situation: What situation was your company facing? Company wanted to grow non-government business. Solution: What did you do to solve the problem? Created and implemented commercial market penetration strategy. Outcome: What was the outcome? Increased revenues in excess of $100 million. SSO Statement: Company wanted to grow non-government sector business. Developed business that resulted in the capture of commercial sales with increased revenue in excess of $100 million.

Top 12 accomplishments that most interest employers

Increased revenues Saved money Increased efficiencies Cut overhead Increased sales Improved workplace safety Purchasing accomplishments New products/new lines Improved record keeping process Increased productivity Successful advertising campaign Effective budgeting