No matter how great your credentials, your resume is going to be discarded if it has typos. BNET posted “5 Smart Ways to Eliminate Typos on Your Resume” with a synopsis of a longer article, by The Washington Post.
Here’s the short version:
- Review your edit later. You can’t confidently correct a resume while you’re writing it, because you see what you intended to write, not what’s really on the screen. Wait several hours or, even better, a day or two.
- Get someone else to edit it for you. Not a replacement for reviewing it yourself, but a second set of eyes is essential for seeing your words fresh and impartially.
- Print it out. It’s easier to see many kinds of errors on the printed page that you’d miss on a computer screen.
- Read it aloud. Just like printing a resume makes it look different than when it’s on the screen, reading it lets you hear the words, and it’s only then you can realize some things just don’t make sense.
- Read it from the bottom up. Reading it out of sequence can disrupt the logical flow that helps your brain make sense of things that are grammatically incorrect or have other language problems. Also, you’ll see the end with fresh eyes, whereas ordinarily you’ll be burnt out by the time you reach the end and more likely to miss errors.
Good tips to remember.