Construction is an exciting career filled with lifelong relationships, incredible people, challenging projects, and experiences you will not soon forget. The industry in general is made up of a diverse group of people and is the life blood of the United States economy. Just think about it, without construction, there would be no bridges connecting populations, no roads to travel the country and visit family and friends, no office buildings to help create income, and no homes to create memories with your family.
The construction industry has more than 745,000 employers with over 7.6 million employees and creates nearly $1.4 trillion worth of structures each year. This makes it a lucrative career for anyone thinking about getting a job out of college, changing careers, or trying something new. If this is you, then you are in luck!
There are many people that want to join the ranks of large general contractors, subcontractors, real estate companies, and more but how do you set yourself apart when a company see’s 1000’s of resumes every year?
Here are a few basic steps you can follow when creating your resume that will make any company want to interview you.
Tip #1: Be clear, concise, and purposeful.
Having too many words simply because you want your resume to “look” like you have accomplished a lot is actually a turn off for employers. As someone who regularly recruits students at career fairs, if I have to read a paragraph to get to the point then I will stop reading.
You want to be exact in your writing. This means putting thought into what you have to say, your formatting, and your description of what you did for work.
Keep sentences short and to the point. Plain and simple.
Tip #2: Every statement you make about yourself, should have a “why”.
It is one thing to write what you did and how you did it but it is another thing to add the “why” to a description of work. This involves truly thinking about the reasons behind why you were doing something even if it wasn’t the most glamorous job. Giving a potential employer the “why” behind something shows them that you truly learned something in your past experiences and are better able to apply that knowledge no matter what position you held.
Example:
- Evaluated shop drawings to ensure they matched the drawings and specifications so the project could progress according to deadlines
- Cataloged submittals, request for information (RFI’s), and shop drawings to keep the jobsite documents organized and easily accessible.
Notice how each statement ends with “why” you did something. I evaluated shop drawings -> WHY? So, the project could progress according to deadlines.
Tip #3: Only list relevant experience and if you do not have any, make your experience relate to construction.
Use any experience related to the position you are seeking. If you were a laborer in college but want to go into Project Management then show that but use it to your advantage. You have seen the construction industry and have a good idea of what it’s like. This is a positive for future employers.
If you have zero construction experience but still want to be in the industry, that’s ok. But, you need to show how your time working at a job enabled you to learn lessons that you can apply to the construction field.
Be creative but do not fake it. If you learned from your experience, that is great! If you didn’t then I would be careful with what you put because you will most likely be asked about it in an interview.
Tip #4: Make sure there are absolutely NO mistakes.
Employers are going to judge you (right or wrong) on how your resume looks and reads. If there are any mistakes in it they WILL notice. You have all the time in the world to spend on your resume, so you better make sure you checked every letter, criticized your formatting, and reread your resume multiple times.
If there are grammatical mistakes or something happened when you formatted it to a PDF then this shows an employer that you are not detailed enough and do not care enough to thoroughly check over your resume. After all —your work is your signature.
Tip #5: Turn your document into a PDF
Word documents, pages, google docs, and more are all great tools to use to create your resume but they are terrible at sharing via email. One helpful way to avoid any formatting errors or costly mistakes is to turn your resume into a PDF. Once you do so, double and triple-check your work to ensure nothing happened when creating the PDF. Getting it professionally printed is another great way to put your best foot forward.
