As you grow older and the necessity for jobs, internships, and volunteer positions gets bigger, it becomes more important than ever to have a good resume. So what do you do if you have little to no professional experience? Not to worry. Here, we outline how to create a starter resume with little experience so that you can jumpstart your professional career and build it up!
What Should Go on a Resume?
A resume should include any professional experience, qualifications, certificates, or skills that you have that relate to the position you’re applying for. Additionally, it can include awards/achievements and interests. In essence, you want to give your employer a snapshot of your work history and why you would be an excellent fit for the position based off of this.
How Long Should a Resume Be?
A resume shouldn’t be longer than a page. Especially when you’re just doing your starter resume, it should NOT be that long. I’ve seen some people who fill their resumes with every tiny detail they can think of for the positions they’ve held. While I’m no HR expert, I sat in those interviews and watched the hiring committee roll their eyes at the length and the fact that the applicant essentially had no experience and had wasted the committee’s time. In this guide, I will help you to capitalize off of these good points without looking like you’re BS’ing them.
Where Should I Make My Starter Resume?
You have a few options for this one. There are some websites that have starter templates, and these can be very helpful:
- Canva is great for visually appealing, creative resumes
- Microsoft Word and Google Docs are great for traditional, easy-to-use templates
- Resume.com is an easy online option
If you want more options, this website has an article about the best paid and free resume templates online. Personally, I prefer sticking to either Microsoft Word or Google Docs. These two have been fairly reliable for me in the past, and they manage to look clean, simple, and professional, which are important for me. I have found that some online templates look nice, but they give you little space to write your qualifications or are distracting to the reader. Make sure to consider this when selecting the template that you want to use.
Or you can make your own! For my own starter resume, I didn’t use a template. I will also show you how to do this. If you want something that is very specifically tailored to you, this could be a great option. Again, I created mine on Microsoft Word.
Where Should I Pull Experience From?
This is the real question. In my experience, if you’re making your starter resume with little experience, you can generally pull from the following areas:
- Jobs (part-time or summer)
- Volunteer Opportunities
- Clubs or Extracurriculars
- Leadership Positions
- Personal Projects
I’m going to get into each one of these. However, if you’re thinking to yourself, Oh my goodness, I have absolutely nothing to put out there, you need to relax. Chances are pretty good that you don’t just sit in your room like a rock. If anything, your parents have probably made you get involved in something, whether that’s a club or a sport or a volunteer cleanup. These will all be very helpful to you as you go to list your experiences.
As I state in this article about master resumes, you should make sure to tailor your resume and experience toward the position itself. If you worked in a summer camp and are applying to be an aide in a second grade classroom, emphasize the teaching skills over the ability to clean up after kids. I will provide another example below, but this is just a good rule of thumb.
Jobs (Part-Time or Summer)
Maybe you’re one of the lucky people who knew someone and got a job with them that way–without the resume. Well, most of us need to make our resume sooner rather than later, and if that’s you, you’re at a nice advantage. You can place these at the top and go over the points most relevant to the position you’re applying for. I would advise not to go over four bullet points and to make sure to always use action words. For example, if you worked in your parents’ bookstore and are applying for a job as a cashier at a grocery store, you would focus more on your customer service skills than your ability to find a good book for people. Make sure everything translates correctly to that position.
Volunteer Opportunities
If you’re just getting started in the job force, you probably don’t have that job experience. However, chances are good that you’ve done some sort of volunteering in the past. Maybe you’ve done something with your church, a club at school, a family friend, or a local organization that gave you some experience. Something as simple as serving dinners to the homeless or preparing care packages can translate to useful skills! Like you would with a job, put the dates you held this position and the essential duties. Customer service, food preparation, organization, time management, and coordinating with others are some great skills that you can get out of volunteering. Treat as though it’s an unpaid job that you got experience from!
Clubs or Extracurriculars
Similar to volunteer opportunities, showing that you’re involved in a club or extracurricular can help to give you a boost. Maybe you’re part of a political club on campus. What do you do that could translate to a job? Do you create materials to advertise it? Organize events on campus? Record the minutes of every meeting? Hold a leadership position? Again, anything that translates to the current position will work. If you do sports or something through your church, consider what type of leadership you might display or what kinds of duties you hold.
Leadership Positions
Going off of that, expand your brainstorm list to any leadership positions you might hold. Similar to applying to college, this shows potential employers that you can hold responsibility and do well with it. This can be anything from working at a weeklong summer camp to tutoring to doing something in Girl Scouts. Whatever the case, it shows that you can take charge and get things done!
Personal Projects
Finally, if you have nothing else, you can put a personal project. Similar to leadership, this shows that you don’t just sit around and wait for things to come to you. Have you started a website? An Instagram storefront? A coding program? What has been enjoyable and fruitful to you that might showcase your personality to employers on a starter resume? Consider this as you round out your final activities for the experience section.
How Should I Order My Starter Resume?
Chances are that if you have a starter resume with little experience, it won’t be too long. That’s okay. As long as you put everything that’s relevant on there, that will be fine. The order of your resume should go like this:
- Header
- Name (largest font)
- Email, phone number, city and zip code
- School (only if you’re still in school and don’t have too much experience)
- School name, location, degree (majors and minors), expected graduation date
- Experience
- Position title, Company, dates you held the position
- Essential duties
- Achievements/Certificates/Awards
- What might set you apart from other applicants?
- Skills/Interests
- Make sure they’re relevant to the job!
How Can I Fill Up Space on My Resume?
In a couple of years, once you get so much experience that you’re struggling to fit it onto one page, you’re going to laugh at this question. However, in the beginning, this is a valid concern. You want your resume to look balanced and professional and not like you’ve never left your house. We have a few ways to resolve that:
Play with the Margins or Font Size
This isn’t your high school MLA Times New Roman 12-point font paper. You don’t necessarily need to have it all in one uniform shape. While the font shouldn’t be distractingly big or small (i.e., they need glasses to read it or it looks like you have no idea how to use a computer), it is okay to deviate from the standard 11 or 12-point font. Similarly, if you want to expand your margins, bring them in, create columns, or mess with the layout, that’s okay as well. White space is your friend. It helps your reader to not feel overwhelmed when looking at your resume. Just make sure that it still looks clean and professional.
Write an Objective
Objectives are something that are good when you’re starting out, but something of a mixed bag later on. I have heard that they don’t really add any value to your resume if you have the experience that can speak for you, and they can waste precious space. However, if it’s your starter resume, you might want to take advantage of the space! An objective goes under your header and is a great opportunity to introduce yourself, your skills, and what you are trying to achieve by sending in this resume. It’s a chance for the recruiter or whoever is reading the resume to get a feel for you, your authenticity, and your writing voice. This article goes over how to write an objective and objective examples if you’re interested.
Play with Your Bullet Points
Bullet points are great for resumes. They make it easy to skim through your experience, they organize your writing, and they help you to keep it even. However, they can also help you to lengthen or shorten your resume. Sometimes, changing a single word can cut down your resume length or add that little bit extra to create a new line. While you shouldn’t make this too obvious, it can be a great way to get your resume to one page without looking like you’re trying to do so.
Add a Column or Another Section
Maybe you’ve tried playing with the margins and it hasn’t worked. What if you tried adding a column? By adding a column (which many templates automatically do), you can put your achievements, skills, and/or interests in one category and keep your experience in another. Then, by widening the smaller column, you can give it a disproportionate amount of space. Again, you need to make sure it still looks good, but it helps to get the job done.
Make Your Header Fonts Bigger
Like I mentioned earlier with the body fonts, it helps to make your header fonts a little bigger. Similarly, you can bold things. This adds just the right amount of space to still make it look even and get your resume down to the bottom of the page.
Where Else Can I Find Helpful Information?
Many websites (or Google Images) have sample resumes for you to look at. What I have listed as the order/requirements are not all-inclusive or right for everyone. This is a great way to make your starter resume, but as you branch out, your needs might change. Additionally, it helps to look up resumes in your field. For example, when I was applying for teaching positions, I would search “secondary teacher resumes” quite often. If you’re a graphic designer, the expectations might be very different. For many minimum wage jobs and lower-level internships, the order and resume aren’t so important. It’s more that you show that you’re organized and have the qualifying characteristics without a messy or distracting resume.
Additionally, many colleges have very helpful career centers. At these centers, there are trained representatives who will go over your resume with you and bring it from good to great. These people have seen hundreds (if not thousands) of resumes, so they can be invaluable help.
Finally, just having people read over your starter resume (i.e., parents or older siblings) can also help, as they have been through it before and can share their advice with you. If only to weed out typos, it’s worth it!
A Final Word
Making your starter resume can be a daunting task, especially if you don’t have much experience. However, by following these steps and taking advantage of the experience that you do have with an aesthetically pleasing resume, you’re sure to start your career off on a great foot!
