These days, when you apply for a job, you are likely to be competing with hundreds of other candidates. Given the sheer number of resumes that companies receive sometimes, they are unable to keep up if they simply had someone review them all. That’s why companies are increasingly making use of something called the Applicant Tracking System, or ATS.
You can think of the ATS as a robot scanning your resume. This system was initially made for massive corporations who couldn't keep up manually reviewing the thousands of resumes they were receiving every week. Nowadays, practically every Fortune 500 company uses ATS software.
Extensive use of the ATS has led to 75% of all job applications getting rejected before a human ever even laid eyes upon it. That means that you could have been the right fit for a position but were rejected by a robot that didn't pick up on a few keywords it was scouring your application or resume for. This is why whenever you fill out an application or write a resume, it should be optimized to get past the bots.
These systems are the de facto gatekeepers for most employers who are not mom & pop businesses. What it does is parse your resume into separate categories. Next, it performs a scan to find specific keywords it was programmed to identify. If you have these keywords in your resume, then congratulations! You will probably see your resume moved up to the next round of the hiring process. This is why it is crucial to write and format your result with the ATS in mind. Otherwise, even if you are a highly qualified candidate, you will get passed over.
To answer this question correctly and thoroughly, we need to look at two major parts of what an ATS needs to assess a candidate: resume and answers [to questions]. To make the work of the ATS faster and more efficient, bots scan through the applicant's resume as well as their answers given to some "knockout" questions. Let's look at how to beat the bots on both levels.
Here are 4 tips to make sure your resume has the right ingredients to beat the ATS bots:
Unlike real humans with emotions and empathy, bots only understand one thing - algorithms. Algorithms are simply a set of rules given to the ATS bots by the employer to guide the applicant selection process. Thus, any applicant whose resume lacks or does not comply with the given rules gets rejected with no strings attached. Since these algorithms rely on particular keywords to run, applicants whose resumes have those keywords are likely to proceed to the next stage. The question then becomes, "how do I know the right keywords to use?".
Start by highlighting the key qualifications and skills required for the role you are considering. You can also utilize a resume scanner, where you’d paste several (usually up to 5) job descriptions from different employers for the position you're interested in. through your key word identification exercise, you’ll be able to compile a group of keywords for you out of the job descriptions you’re interested in. Your job as an applicant is to integrate these keywords correctly and evenly across your resume. In most cases, these are the exact keywords the bots are fed with. However, you don't want to overuse these keywords because your strategy could be noticeable once your resumes finally land on real human hands.
Depending on the job you are applying for, you may want to include every detail there is to it including charts, images, and a combination of graphics. As nice as this may make the resume appear, the bots may not be able to correctly read and interpret what they mean. This could be very detrimental to the selection of your resume. It is important to reduce any items on the resume that could be difficult to read or simply irrelevant to some point.
How to know this? Simply convert your PDF or Word (doc) resume to text (txt) format. You will likely see how unreadable some parts of your resume are. Where necessary, you may have to remove all unreadable parts, rearrange the text and probably rewrite the entire resume.
The general rule when it comes to formatting for bots is to completely avoid adding any important information such as contact details in the footer or header while using the right font and style. Fonts such as Times New Roman, Arial, and Calibri at a minimum size of 10.5, 0.5-inch margin, with proper alignment are usually okay.
Simple bullet points are the way to go when you need to add a bulleted list and always choose a clean design with a clear hierarchy.
To a large extent, the company is hiring you to solve problems. For this reason, you want to focus more on your skills and how they would benefit the company rather than your career goals in your resume. Present your resume in a way that seeks to add value to the company by emphasizing your experiences, achievements and key skills.
This is simply a no-brainer. Errors in your Facebook post can be pardoned by your friends but that may not be the case for your resume. It is very important to go over your resume a couple of times to ensure you have crossed all your T's and dotted all your I's so that both the ATS bots and the hiring manager can fully read and understand what your resume entails.
Now that you know just how important it is to craft a resume to get past the ATS, you can get started on tweaking it today. At CareerHD, we have resume experts who can optimize your resume and cover letter so that a real person gets to see your job application. We know exactly what employers and the ATS are looking for and will make sure you are in the best position to land that job you're after. Upload your resume today and get a free expert review!
