When it comes to landing an interview, getting a promotion, or moving up in your banking career, having a strong banking resume can make all the difference. One of the most effective ways to improve your banking resume is to make sure it accurately highlights your specific accomplishments and focuses on skills that are directly marketable. Emphasize recent job accomplishments while avoiding “filler” material like school activities and courses taken. It’s also crucial to format your work. Banking resumes should rarely be more than one page long, and they should be written in plain, simple text that is easy to read and skim.
The most important aspect of a bank resume, as with any other job resume, is the content. Start taking a close look at the experiences and accomplishments you’ve listed on your banking resume. If you have previous work experience in banking, that should be listed first, along with a description of the skills you used and the knowledge you gained. The goal is to make the resume reviewer aware of your potential right away. Keep the focus on yourself and your abilities in your position summaries.
If you have no prior banking experience, it will be more difficult, but not impossible, to improve your banking resume. Resume reviewers and hiring officers will be able to tell you lack experience pretty quickly, so don’t waste time trying to hide it with irrelevant information on your resume. The best thing to do is to condense your resume to just a few key activities and accomplishments, then use the remaining space to explain how those discrete experiences have helped you develop into a promising candidate with the desire to learn.
It’s also crucial to tailor the job descriptions you include in your resume to the position you’re applying for. Job hunting can be broad at times, especially when you’re first starting out. Don’t be afraid to have a few different resume versions. Investment banking resumes, for example, typically highlight different skills than bank teller resumes. Your experiences could probably be tailored to either, but rather than attempting to cover all of your bases in one document, create a bank teller resume that is distinct from an investment banker resume, a commercial banker resume, and so on.
Job resumes are usually accompanied transcripts and other application materials. Banking resumes are no different, which means you won’t have to spend a lot of time detailing the classes you’ve taken or the grades you’ve received in your resume. The banking resume is the place to highlight specific awards, accomplishments, and unique skills that make you the best candidate for the job. The majority of hiring managers and career counselors advise job seekers to avoid making a list of qualifications on their resumes. It’s usually preferable to turn your resume into a persuasive list of reasons why you’re special.
As you work to improve your banking resume, the last thing to consider is formatting. The majority of the time, writing a resume is a one-page art. With only one page to work with, space is limited, but it’s still important to use a standard font and maintain a professional layout. All too often, flashy graphics or features, dense text, and wordy summaries detract from an otherwise strong resume.