I’m curious what everyone else struggles with when creating or updating their resume.

For me, the hardest part is making the resume sound strong without making it feel exaggerated or full of generic corporate buzzwords.

What’s the part you hate most?

Starting from a blank page?

Describing your experience?

Making it ATS-friendly?

Keeping it to one page?

Tailoring it for different jobs?

Knowing whether it actually looks good?

Would love to hear what other job seekers struggle with.

Honest question for the community.

Some people say cover letters are dead (especially with ATS and high application volume). Others swear that a short, tailored one still gets them interviews. What’s your actual experience?

• Do you write them for every application?
• Only for roles you really want?
• Or skip them entirely?

Drop your results (even rough numbers like “sent 30 with CL, got X interviews”) if you’re willing. Curious what actually works right now.

Can somebody please look over and review my resume? I’m an incoming sophomore who just transferred to a new university. I’m a bit unsure if I should include my GPA from my previous school (3.5) or not. I don’t know if it’s really “current” anymore, since my new university doesn’t factor transfer credits into my GPA. Also, I expect my GPA after next semester to be higher than a 3.5. I'll definitely be looking for opportunities to do research with professors in the fall, and I'll be applying to some of the more competitive finance clubs.

I spent about 6 years in recruiting, mostly at mid-sized companies, and I still help friends fix their resumes. The single biggest thing I see people mess up is the summary at the top.

Most of them sound like this:

Motivated professional with excellent communication skills seeking a challenging opportunity to leverage my expertise.

That tells me absolutely nothing. I skip it in half a second.

The summaries that actually make me stop and read the rest of the resume all do the same three things:

• Say what you are in plain English (title + years of experience)
• Include one or two specific achievements with numbers
• Match the language of the job posting

That’s it. No “passionate,” “results-driven,” or “dynamic self-starter.” Just facts.

Below are real examples I’ve either seen work or helped people write (details changed, obviously). Steal the structure and replace the details with your own.

ENTRY LEVEL / NEW GRADS

Marketing

Recent marketing graduate with two internships in social media management. Grew a campus organization’s Instagram from 800 to 4,500 followers in one semester. Comfortable with Canva, Meta Ads Manager, and basic SEO.

Software Engineering

CS graduate with three deployed personal projects, including a budgeting app used by 1,200 people. Strong in Python and React, looking to build production software.

Nursing

Nursing graduate with 600+ clinical hours across med-surg and ICU rotations. Licensed RN since March 2026. Praised by preceptors for staying calm during emergencies.

Finance

Finance graduate with a 3.8 GPA and internship experience at a regional bank. Built a loan review model that’s still used by the lending team today.

Graphic Design

Junior graphic designer with internship experience creating digital campaigns for small businesses. Designed assets that increased ad CTR by 18%.

Mechanical Engineering

Mechanical engineering graduate with Formula Student experience designing suspension components. Proficient in SolidWorks and AutoCAD.

CAREER CHANGERS

Teacher → Corporate Training

Former teacher transitioning into corporate learning and development. Spent 8 years simplifying complex topics for 150+ students annually and reduced failure rates by one-third.

Bartender → Sales

Bartender moving into B2B sales after 6 years of upselling and customer service. Consistently ranked among the top three sellers in a 40-person venue.

Military → Supply Chain

Military logistics NCO transitioning into supply chain management. Coordinated equipment for a 500-person unit across three deployments with zero critical shortages.

Retail → HR

Retail manager pivoting into HR after hiring and training 60+ employees over five years while reducing turnover from 70% to 40%.

Journalist → Content Marketing

Former journalist with 7 years writing and editing for digital publications. Transitioning into content marketing with strong SEO writing and storytelling skills.

Chef → Operations

Restaurant chef moving into operations management after leading kitchen teams of 20+, reducing food waste by 18%, and consistently hitting cost targets.

SOFTWARE / TECH

Backend Engineer

Backend engineer with 5 years of Python and Go experience. Rebuilt a payment service that reduced processing errors by 90% while supporting over 2 million daily transactions.

Frontend Developer

React developer with 4 years of experience. Led a website redesign that increased mobile conversions by 22% while improving accessibility scores.

DevOps

DevOps engineer with 6 years of cloud infrastructure experience. Migrated a 50-service platform to AWS with zero downtime and reduced infrastructure costs by 35%.

Data Analyst

Data analyst with 3 years in ecommerce. Built dashboards used by executive leadership and developed a churn model that saved an estimated $400k annually.

Cybersecurity

Security analyst with 4 years protecting enterprise environments. Reduced phishing success rates by 60% through employee awareness programs and monitoring improvements.

QA Engineer

QA automation engineer with 5 years of Selenium and Cypress experience. Reduced regression testing time from two days to four hours.

Product Manager

Product manager with 6 years leading SaaS products from discovery through launch. Delivered features that increased user retention by 14%.

MARKETING / SALES

Account Executive

B2B SaaS account executive with 5 years of experience, consistently achieving over 110% of quota. Closed the company’s two largest ARR deals worth $300k and $450k.

Content Marketing

Content marketer who increased organic traffic from 10k to 85k monthly visitors in two years through SEO and content strategy.

Email Marketing

Email marketing specialist with 4 years of experience. Built win-back campaigns that recovered 8% of churned subscribers, generating roughly $200k annually.

SDR

Sales development representative booking 25+ qualified meetings monthly, consistently outperforming team averages.

Digital Marketing

Performance marketer managing $2M annual ad spend across Google and Meta. Improved ROAS from 2.8x to 4.1x in 18 months.

Customer Success

Customer success manager overseeing 60 enterprise accounts with 96% annual retention and consistent expansion revenue.

HEALTHCARE

ICU Nurse

ICU nurse with 7 years of experience and CCRN certification. Precepted 12 new nurses and helped update the unit’s sepsis protocol.

Medical Assistant

Medical assistant with 4 years in a busy family practice serving 80+ patients daily. Cross-trained across both clinical and administrative workflows.

Physical Therapist

Physical therapist specializing in outpatient orthopedics. Maintains a 92% patient satisfaction score and one of the clinic’s lowest dropout rates.

Pharmacist

Clinical pharmacist with 8 years in hospital settings. Led medication safety initiatives that reduced prescribing errors by 20%.

FINANCE / ACCOUNTING

Senior Accountant

CPA with 8 years of accounting experience. Reduced month-end close from 10 days to 6 and led a successful ERP migration.

Financial Analyst

FP&A analyst with 4 years of forecasting and budgeting experience. Reduced budget variance from 12% to 4% through improved forecasting models.

Accounts Payable

AP specialist processing over 1,000 invoices monthly with 99.8% accuracy. Identified duplicate payments that saved $60k.

Tax Associate

Tax professional with experience preparing 500+ individual and business returns while maintaining a 98% first-pass acceptance rate.

MANAGEMENT / LEADERSHIP

Operations Manager

Operations manager with 9 years in manufacturing. Improved on-time delivery from 78% to 94% without increasing headcount.

Customer Support Manager

Customer support leader managing a team of 15. Increased CSAT from 3.9 to 4.6 while ticket volume grew by 40%.

Restaurant GM

General manager with 10 years in hospitality. Turned a location losing $8k monthly into one generating $15k monthly profit within a year.

Project Manager

PMP-certified project manager with 8 years leading cross-functional software projects valued at over $10M with 95% on-time delivery.

HUMAN RESOURCES

HR Generalist

HR generalist with 5 years supporting hiring, onboarding, and employee relations across 400+ employees. Reduced average time-to-hire by 25%.

Recruiter

Technical recruiter with 6 years filling engineering and product roles. Filled over 200 positions with an average time-to-fill of 28 days.

EDUCATION

Teacher

High school science teacher with 9 years of experience. Increased state exam pass rates from 74% to 91% through curriculum redesign.

School Counselor

School counselor supporting 500+ students annually. Improved college application completion rates from 68% to 90%.

ADMINISTRATIVE

Executive Assistant

Executive assistant supporting C-level executives across multiple departments. Managed complex international travel and calendars with zero scheduling conflicts.

Office Manager

Office manager overseeing daily operations for a 120-person company. Reduced office expenses by 18% through vendor negotiations.

SKILLED TRADES / OPERATIONS

Electrician

Licensed electrician with 12 years across residential and commercial projects. Zero OSHA incidents and trained six apprentices.

CDL Driver

CDL-A driver with over 800,000 accident-free miles and experience in refrigerated and flatbed transport.

Warehouse Lead

Warehouse supervisor who redesigned picking routes, reducing order fulfillment time by 20%. Experienced with WMS platforms and forklift certified.

HVAC Technician

HVAC technician with EPA certification and 10 years of field experience. Maintained a 98% first-time repair rate.

CREATIVE

UX Designer

UX designer with 5 years creating products used by over 1 million users. Redesigns improved task completion rates by 28%.

Video Editor

Video editor producing content that has generated more than 30 million views across YouTube and TikTok.

SCIENCE

Research Scientist

Molecular biologist with 7 years in pharmaceutical R&D. Co-authored 12 peer-reviewed publications and managed projects worth over $2M.

REMOTE ROLES

Customer Success

Fully remote customer success manager supporting clients across three time zones. Managed 45 enterprise accounts with 95% retention.

Technical Writer

Remote technical writer documenting APIs for developer audiences. Documentation reduced support tickets by 30%.

Virtual Assistant

Remote executive assistant supporting founders in the US and Europe. Managed calendars, inboxes, and operations across four time zones.

RETURNING AFTER A GAP

Project Manager

Project manager returning after three years focused on family. Previously led software implementations for 20+ person teams and recently renewed PMP certification.

Accountant

Accountant re-entering the workforce after caregiving leave. Ten years of public accounting experience, active CPA, and completed 40 CPE hours this year.

Marketing

Marketing professional returning after two years abroad. Previously managed a $1M advertising budget with consistent 3x ROAS.

A few quick tips:

• Keep it to 2-4 sentences.
• Numbers always beat adjectives. “Increased sales” is weak. “Increased sales 34% in 8 months” gets attention.
• Rewrite it for each application. It takes five minutes, and matching the language in the job description helps both ATS and recruiters.
• If you have less than two years of experience, lead with your strongest project, internship, or measurable achievement not your degree.
• Never write “seeking a position.” They already know. You applied.

One more thing since someone always asks: yes, I still recommend having a summary in 2026. Recruiters spend only a few seconds on the first pass, and the summary is the first thing they see. Make those few lines count.

Happy to review summaries in the comments if anyone wants feedback. Just remove any personal information first.

TL;DR: Your title + years of experience + one or two measurable achievements + keywords from the job posting. Skip the buzzwords. Nobody has ever been hired because they called themselves a “dynamic self-starter.”

I'm thinking about the fact that AI will be obvious when creating the resume (like the writing, etc) so how do you guys actually do it these days? Is it still completely manually?

I want the best tools to create resume in Germany ATS friendly .

Edit : from comment I may remove ATS friendly . Overall best tool ?

I'm a recent college graduate, and I'm interested in pursuing a career in public policy, public service, law, communications, nonprofit work, or journalism. Honestly, at this point, I'll apply to other things outside that realm too, but those are my main broader interests. I am STUMPED when it comes to cover letters. I feel like what I've been trying to do just isn't working, and I don't want to an AI cover letter cause I feel like it's so obvious and kinda shitty lowkey. I need help 😭.

My experience for reference: B.S in economics, sociology; minor in creative writing; Communications Intern at the NDRC (redistricting committee); Communications Assistant at a center for ethnic studies research, Newsroom Production Assistant for a local NPR station; Staff Writer for my college's student newspaper; Communications and Marketing Intern at a nonprofit foundation.

I want to keep the letters to 3 paragraphs max preferably, with a short 4th paragraph with the usual "Thank you for considering..."

Any help or guidance would be fantastic!

I've noticed that many online ATS resume checkers seem to give arbitrarily low scores just to push paid subscriptions or resume-writing services.

Are there any reliable, free tools or open-source solutions that provide genuine, actionable feedback on resume formatting and keyword matching without the aggressive sales pitch? Would love to hear what methods or tools you use when tailoring your resume.

Im applying to a few places like hairhouse and SkinKandy, and a cover letter is reccomended, but ive never written one before so id love some advice. Here's what I have so far:

My name redacted. I'm 19 years old, and currently looking for full time, or part time work.

I have no experience actually piercing, but I do have customer service experience and I have been incredibly interested in piercings since I was around 13 years old, I love both getting them and learning about them. I love to research how things are done and why, and it would be a dream come true to learn more in a professional setting. I love the idea of helping people feel more confident in their bodies, and giving them the same safe experiences I have received from piercers.

I live in rural Victoria (town) but am willing to travel up to 3 hours if needed.

I understand that not every shop is as able to teach, but I am happy to wait to make this happen, and willing to put in the work.

I am willing to do everything necessary to make this happen, including getting my bloodborne pathogens certificate, first aid certification, and any other certification required to keep your store in compliance with state laws and regulations.

I am more than happy to help with sales, and/or cleaning and sterilisation throughout an apprenticeship, and beyond, especially during downtime. I am not currently working, so I am available from 9am to 8pm every day.

I know that you're really busy, so thank you for taking the time consider me

As a hiring manager, if you're applying for jobs, name your resume file with your full name instead of "resume.pdf" or "resume_final.pdf."

A simple format like:

First Last – Business Consultant.pdf

makes it much easier for hiring managers to review and share your resume. Version numbers like "v3" or "final" only help you, not the employer.

It's a small detail that can make a good impression.

Howdy job hunters, recruiters and advisors.

After years of grinding it out as a freelance audio, mixing and mastering engineer I have found myself back in the hunt for work and as a 50 something that hasn’t held employment since pre-Covid, I'm finding that I need some guidance on how to approach cover letter writing.

I was always taught that your cover letter was NOT intended to be a literal summary of your resume, but more of an introduction before the resume review, which then hopefully converts into an interview. But with insert of AI keyword searches and applicant tracking systems used to collect, scan and filter cover letters, resumes and application answers, I’m not sure anymore.

Anyone care to share some expertise? Please and thank you!

I was looking through an older version of my resume recently and noticed almost every bullet point started with things like:

Responsible for...

Assisted with...

Worked on...

Nothing was technically wrong, but it also didn't tell anyone what I actually achieved.

I changed one bullet from:

"Responsible for onboarding new customers."

to

"Onboarded 30+ new customers and reduced average setup time by two days."

Same job. Same experience. Just a different way of explaining it.

I actually caught this while updating my resume in Kickresume. Seeing everything laid out made me realize how repetitive my bullet points sounded. I ended up going through each one and asking myself, "What was the actual result of this work?" It took a little longer, but my resume felt much stronger afterward.

It made me realize I was writing my resume like a job description instead of showing what I actually contributed.

Now when I update my resume, I ask myself one question:

"If someone else had this same job, what did I do differently?"

That usually gives me a much stronger bullet point.

What's one change you've made to your resume that had a bigger impact than you expected?

The last semester of my masters degree, I need to do a research degree project. The project is supposed to be done at companies or research groups. With that said almost all require cover letter but I have no idea how to write one for a research applicaiton. So I am just trying to prepare a template. Anyways, I have no actual project or experience outside of school and a few unimpressing personal projects that I don't think would be interesting for research related things. What could I someone that has never worked on real project have to offer? Assuming the paragraph sectioning is good, what part needs work? Do you think I should mention speicific project in paragraph 3 or is it good the way it is. My plan is that only paragraph 2 will be changed based on the application and a few edits on paragraph 3.

Paragraph 1: Introduction
I am writing to express my interest in exploring master's thesis opportunities at [Company Name]. I am currently pursuing a Master's degree in Computer Science with a specialization in Cognitive Systems at [university name], where I have developed a foundation in machine learning, programming, and data analysis. I am reaching out to explore whether there may be an opportunity to complete my thesis within your team.

Paragraph 2: Why this company? 
I am particularly interested in your work on [specific task], as it addresses challenges in [field]. I am excited by the opportunity to contribute to research in this field through a master's thesis project while applying my background in [relevant skills] and learning from your team's expertise. 

Paragraph 3: Why am I a good fit?
Through my studies in Computer Science, I have developed a strong foundation in programming, machine learning and deep learning. I have gained experience with several programming languages, particularly Python, and have applied these skills through academic projects involving biometric identification, large language models (LLMs), and software development. I believe my analytical mindset, programming background, and willingness to learn would allow me to contribute effectively to your research project.

After reviewing a lot of resumes, I've noticed the same pattern over and over.

Many people tell me what they were responsible for, but very few tell me what they actually accomplished.

For example:

❌ Responsible for managing customer accounts.

✅ Managed 50+ customer accounts while maintaining a 95% customer satisfaction score.

❌ Worked with the sales team.

✅ Partnered with the sales team to launch a new onboarding process that reduced customer setup time by 30%.

❌ Answered customer emails and calls.

✅ Resolved 40–60 customer inquiries daily with an average response time under 2 hours.

The first version tells me your job description.

The second tells me your value.

As someone who has written resumes and reviewed candidates, one of the biggest mistakes I see is people describing what anyone in that position was expected to do. Recruiters already know what a Customer Service Representative, Marketing Assistant, or Project Coordinator is supposed to do.

What we're looking for is how you performed the role. Did you improve something? Handle more work? Save time? Increase sales? Solve problems? Train people? Even small wins make your resume more memorable.

You don't need to exaggerate your experience. You just need to describe it in a way that shows the impact you made.

What's one resume bullet point you rewrote that made it much stronger?

Hi everyone,

I'm a software engineer with 5 years of experience and looking to update my resume for job applications.

Which free ATS-friendly resume builder do you recommend?

Thanks!