How To Write a Professional Summary on a CV

How do you write a summary for a resume or CV? What makes a compelling resume summary that will get you more job interviews? Can you give me any resume summary examples? How long should resume summaries be?

We'll explain what a resume summary statement is and why there is some confusion between this and a personal profile. Then, we'll go through how to write a high impact resume summary to improve your chances of the hiring manager offering you an interview.

Is a professional summary the same as a personal profile?

There has been some conjecture amongst Recruiters regarding the merits of a Personal Profile on a CV / resume. This conjecture stems from the fact that many job seekers fill their personal profiles with irrelevant and mostly clichéd information.

We see hundreds of CVs per week and I recently reviewed 5 CVs back-to-back and was interested to find that all 5 people considered themselves to be dynamic and innovative with excellent communication skills.

Having spoken to all the individuals, it confused me as to why 5 people, who didn’t know each other, could include almost word for word, the exact same phrase in their CV / resume. I would guess that they all had found these skills on job specs and felt the need to include these words.

The problem with this theory is twofold

Everyone does it and Hiring Managers are not stupid. They realise job seekers copy info from a job description regardless of whether they really have these skills or not
The CV is not the vehicle for pushing behavioural competencies - that is what the interview is for!

Perhaps the confusion stems from the phrase ‘Personal Profile’ which alludes to information about one’s personality.

What should be on an effective resume summary statement?

We recommend that job seekers have a Professional Summary which outlines the profession in which one works, followed by 4 or 5 key areas of expertise which are aligned with the job title being applied for.

The Professional Summary (or Executive Summary if you are more senior) should be the first thing that a Hiring Manager reads. It is designed to give a brief description about you and highlight the key areas that your future employers are looking for.

After reading your professional resume summary, the recruiter should find your application relevant and feel motivated to read the rest of your CV.

How to write a killer resume summary

We see so many people searching for the best professional resume summary examples online so they can make sure their professional summary is better than average.

At The CV & Interview Advisors, we do things properly. We won't overwhelm you with multiple resume summary examples that you can try and pick from to insert your own resume summary statement.

To write a resume summary, you need to follow the below steps, regardless of the job description.

The professional summary has three key components.

What are you?
What is your value proposition / USP?
What are your most important 4 skills?

What should I avoid in a resume summary statement?

When you're writing your resume summary statement, you should avoid clichéd behavioural competencies such as the following.

“working well in a team”
"great leadership skills:
“proven ability of working under pressure”
“strong communication skills”.
"excellent problem solving skills"

Professional resume summary example

Here’s what to do! Let’s see an example of a good resume summary statement.

An experienced Finance Director with extensive Board-level experience and a track record of embedding robust financial governance across an organisation to protect cashflow and profitability.

Key strengths include:

assembling & managing finance teams of 20+ people across disparate international locations
leading major capital appraisals / commercial feasibility analysis for M&A activity, NPD initiatives & diversification strategies
embedding financial ownership across management teams to drive superior budgetary performance
track record of leading major cost rationalisation programmes to remove costs from a business & drive profitability.

Let’s now break this up into its component parts.

1. Define yourself

The idea is to start with a simple description of your professional background e.g. ‘An experienced Finance Director’ or ‘An IT Infrastructure Manager’ or ‘A Highly Qualified Mechanical Engineer’.

Getting the reader’s attention is all about explaining that you are an appropriate candidate for their role. If they are looking for an experienced Managing Director from a telecoms background then you need to tell them that this is what you are – if you do this successfully, they will be motivated to read on.

2. Add your value proposition

The next part of the resume summary statement is the value proposition. This is a little trickier to get right but think of it as your’ over-arching offering - the one thing that you consistently walk into an organisation and do.

For example, my value proposition as CEO of The CV & Interview Advisors is enhancing my client’s ability to find a job and develop their career.

Our Marketing Manager’s value proposition is developing low cost marketing strategies that deliver superior return on investment from marketing budgets. The example above uses the following: a track record of embedding robust financial governance across an organisation to protect cash flow and profitability.

Add your Key Strengths to your resume summary statement

The next part of the professional summary is to communicate what you are particularly good at – this should be your key strengths that feed into the over-arching value proposition that we mentioned earlier to have a profound impact on the hiring managers.

Key strengths include:

Assembling and managing finance teams of 20+ people across disparate international locations
Leading major capital appraisals / commercial feasibility analysis for M&A activity, NPD initiatives and diversification strategies
Embedding financial ownership across management teams to drive superior budgetary performance
Leading major cost rationalisation programmes to remove costs from a business and drive profitability

Notice how the last 2 entries under key strengths are written in a features and benefits style where we describe the skill and then explain how this will benefit the organisation they are working for.

In other words, describe what the skill does for the business. This isn’t always necessary or appropriate but where it works, it adds significant ‘power’ to your CV.

Professional summary examples for key strengths

Here are some further examples of phrases that could be used in Key Strengths:

Streamlining financial processes to improve accuracy, speed and service delivery
Re-engineering financial processes and developing financial management capability through superior system functionality
Professionalising finance functions to facilitate the achievement of business objectives
Analysing process flows and re-engineering financial processes to drive accuracy and efficiency
Transforming and developing financial management capability across a business to improve accuracy, transparency and budgetary oversight
Delivering financial system enhancements that drive efficiency, reporting capability and business decision-making capability
Performing detailed financial and commercial analysis to facilitate rigorous cost management
Streamlining business processes and implementing risk-based controls to ensure robust financial and operational governance
Leading business transformation to rescue companies from significant financial distress
Driving profit through cost rationalisation, procurement best practice and operational efficiency

Notice how these are higher level skills, or in other words, things that you are really good at. That's what you need to keep in mind, regardless of your job title.

So, whether you are a project manager, digital marketing manager, data entry clerk, the key with your resume summary is to push the skills that you think your future employers will be most interested in, aligned with the challenges that companies and organisations might be facing in the current climate.

You need to position yourself as the answer to all their problems rather than being overly introspective. The idea is to provide a resume summary statement which is powerful yet authentic, and reasonably aligns with the job description.

Should you use the same resume summary?

No, you need to tailor your resume summary statement for the job position you're going for, whether that's project management, human resources, finance or another sector. Clearly demonstrate your professional title and successful track record in a way that puts no doubt in the recruiter's mind.

Do you need to include a resume objective?

No, the best resume objective is no resume objective. For more information, head to our blog: Should you write your career objective in your CV? We explain all there.

Need some help with your CV summary?

A well written resume summary should showcase your proven track record. It shouldn't be a half rushed CV summary, compiled of a few bullet points. Don't be half-hearted and mindlessly throw in some relevant skills and mention to the hiring manager you have "in depth knowledge and extensive experience".

Demonstrate exactly what impressive experience you've gained, and what benefits you will bring to the company you're applying for. That should help you write the best resume summary you can.

If you need some help, we have a world-class team of professional CV writers. They won't rush to pull together a resume summary just to meet the job description. Our accredited, industry-leading personal branding specialists will build you a high impact piece of marketing collateral.

Improve your chances of getting hired today with our package deals.

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Matt

Managing Director

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How to write a professional summary on a CV