Careers & Employment Information

Crafting A Stellar Career Summary For Your Resume


Are you a career changer?  Or, are you satisfied with your stable career but interested in updating your resume?  Are you a professional who has tried different things but are still searching for the kind of work that best suits you?  Whatever your career situation, what your resume most needs is a stellar career summary.

What difference can a career summary make for you?  Here are  4 reasons why you need one in your resume:

1.) A career summary communicates more about you and does so more powerfully than an objective statement.


2.) Employers love career summaries and use them to preview your resume.  If they like your summary, they're more likely to read your whole resume.


3.) A summary does a superlative job of masking weaknesses in your work history (too much experience, too little, too many different kinds of jobs, gaps in employment, ineffectual titles, and everything else you can think of)


4.) A career summary tells the employer what you most want them to know, up front.  It therefore sells you well and sets you up to be asked the kinds of interview questions you really want to be asked.

All right, so a career summary is a good thing.  What does it look like?  A summary can be a short paragraph of 2-4 sentences or a brief phrase or sentence introducing a series of 4-8 bullets, depending on the communications style you prefer.  It can be preceded by a job title or list of specialty areas that you wish to highlight.  The summary always goes at the top of the resume immediately following your name and contact information.

Generally a good career summary will profile some mixture of the following kinds of critical details:

  • A brief overview of the breadth and scope of your experience
  • Academic credentials, if relevant
  • 3-5 skillsets that set you apart from the competition
  • 3-5 personality characteristics that describe the workplace you
  • Hints about your most important work-related values. 

Okay, so all that sounds good, but what does a career summary look like?  Here are two different versions of a summary that you can play with and make your own:

Career and Workforce Development Administrator

Coaching ? Training & Development ? Program Design


Seasoned, articulate and visionary professional with over 19 years' experience in all facets of career and workforce development in both corporate and social service settings.  Possess outstanding verbal, written and interpersonal communications skills and an inherent ability to build effective and cohesive teams.  Deeply value creativity and lifelong learning.


Seasoned, articulate and visionary professional with over 19 years' proven experience in:

  • Career Development
  • Workforce Development
  • Corporate Consulting
  • Social Service Delivery
  • Team Building
  • Program Design
  • Lifelong Learning
  • Communications 


The key is to begin by brainstorming solid content.  Choose your descriptive language carefully.  Make every word count.  Create content first; write a draft second.  Then share your draft with others you trust before finalizing it for your resume. 

Cheryl Lynch Simpson is a Spiritual Director and Solutions Coach who helps women discover and create the life they've always wanted to live.  Cheryl is the author of over 30 print/Internet articles and the founder of Coaching Solutions For Women, a coaching website that produces and showcases career, business, and life solutions that improve the life balance of today's busy women.  For a complimentary copy of her latest e-book, Ten-Minute Stress Zappers for Women Service Business Owners, visit http://www.coachingsolutionsforwomen.com.


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Amid ugly job picture, tech related employment holds up
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The US economy lost 62000 jobs in June for the sixth straight month of employment losses with an unemployment rate of 5.5 percent, but underneath the ...
Little doubt that US is in recession; rest of the world can't ... The Age
Fragile economy takes toll on jobs Los Angeles Times
Jobs continue to fade Chicago Tribune
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Reuters

Why tech jobs are beating the employment odds
ZDNet - Jul 3, 2008
... impressively choreographed fireworks displays, we?re capping off one of the most depressing weeks for employment reports in the better half of a decade. ...
Treasurys rise ahead of employment report The Associated Press
US employment slump 'may continue into 2009' Vedior
Treasurys advance after ADP jobs report MarketWatch
International Business Times - Forbes
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Earthtimes (press release)

Trouble for Small-Business Employment
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Last month, I declared small-business employment "not too shabby" after looking at May's survey from Automatic Data Processing and the consulting firm ...
ADP National Employment Report Shows US Employment Decreased by ... CNNMoney.com
ECONOMY: Little to Cheer on US Independence Day Inter Press Service (subscription)
DJ: ADP Sees June US Private Sector Jobs Down 79000 Onet.pl
New York Times - TheStreet.com
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US stocks advance as employment report comes as expected
MarketWatch - Jul 3, 2008
By MarketWatch NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- US stocks end mostly higher, offering a benign reaction to the government's report on employment, which fell only ...
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Dollar loses ground after weak jobs report MarketWatch
US stocks mostly higher in the wake of jobs data MarketWatch
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Survey shows biggest decline in employment for six years
Financial Times, UK - 21 hours ago
By Daniel Pimlott in New York The US suffered its largest drop in employment in nearly six years in June in a sign of the deteriorating economic environment ...


Outlook Darker as Jobs Are Lost
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Responding quickly to the government employment report, issued Thursday, the presidential candidates called for action, beyond the recent stimulus package, ...
Jobs Continue to Be Lost ToTheCenter.com
Employers Cut Workers for a Sixth Month New York Times
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(CEP News) - Despite a relatively slow start to the week, the economic action in the Asia-Pacific really picks up on Wednesday with Australian employment ...


June is sixth straight month of job losses
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Since December, payroll employment has fallen by 438000 jobs. Another indicator, also reported Thursday, suggested further upward revisions in jobless ...
Job market: No bottom until '09 CNN
Why Lousy Jobs Numbers Might Be OK U.S. News & World Report
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CEO confidence drops again in June
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Employment - Google News

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