Wake Up and Smell the Flowers Spring Cleaning Your Resume

Wake Up and Smell the Flowers Spring Cleaning Your Resume This months Career Collective topic is Spring Cleaning Your Job Search. Please be sure to check out the advice of my esteemed colleagues at the end of this post.Its been a rough winter here in New York City. We cant wait to shed the coats, ditch the boots, and wake up and smell the flowers. (Yes we have flowers in New York City!) Currently there is an installation of flower sculptures along Park Avenue and while its lovely, Im looking forward to the live tulips that are planted there each spring. Those flowers represent renewal and new beginnings. For many, spring is a time of career renewal. Maybe its the weather; maybe its the fact that many people have just received their payout for last years bonus and they are now ready to make a move. Whatever the reason, many people decide to spring clean their resume in March and embark on a job search. Here are five tips for cleaning up your resume.Throw out those cliched personal attributes. Attention all you motivated, team-oriented chang e agents and dynamic, detail-oriented strong communicators. Pick up these overused expressions and get rid of them. Prove the value you can bring to an organization by describing strong quantifiable accomplishments. Let the garbage man take away the other meaningless fluff.Weed out those endless job tasks. A hiring manager doesnt want a job description. He wants an explanation of the unique value you brought to the execution of your job tasks and proof of how you do things smarter, faster, and more efficiently. A few sentences about your job tasks is fineten bullet points is not.Scrub statements about references. Take the statement references available upon request off your resume. Its dated, it wastes space, its unnecessary, and it isnt even true. References are available in plenty of places without asking directly for them (think Google and LinkedIn). Save the space in your resume for more compelling content.Clean out your resume closet. If youve been adding information about your most recent job on top of the old resume content, chances are the resume has lost its focus and become much too long. Take a good hard look at your resume and decide what content its time to let go of. Its doubtful that your next employer will need a lengthy explanation of the marketing coordinator role you held in 1982 if you are now a CMO.Freshen up the look. Consider redesigning the document to improve the formatting, make it easier to find key information, and give the resume a more modern look. Check out Happy About My Resume for some updated resume styles.Personal Branding to Fire Up Your Job Search, @DebraWheatmanSucceeding in a “Final Jeopardy!” World, @WalterAkana5 Steps to Retool Jumpstart Your Job Search, @erinkennedycprwYour Job Search: Lets Just Start Again Shall We? @GayleHowardChecklist for Spring Cleaning Your Job Search, @careersherpa5 Ways to Spring Clean Your Job Search, @heatherhuhmanTen Surefire Ways to Organize Your Job Search, @KatCareerGalPut Spring Int o Your Job Search, @EliteResumes @MartinBucklandToes in the Water, @ValueIntoWordsHow to Revitalize a Stale Job Search, @KCCareerCoachHow to re-think your job search, @Keppie_CareersWake Up and Smell the Flowers: Spring Cleaning Your Resume, @barbarasafaniSpring Cleaning and Your Personal Brand, @resumeserviceSpring clean your mind clutter first, @DawnBugniManaging Your Career 2.0: On Giving Something Up To Get It Right, @Chandlee