6 tips for editing your resume

It's always a great feeling when you have the opportunity to update your resume. Maybe you just completed an internship or received a promotion at your job - either way, you're likely excited to document your accomplishment.

However, after each addition or alteration to these important documents, it is crucial that you carefully edit the changes. After all, many potential employers may toss your resume aside if they spot a spelling mistake or grammatical error.

Here are six ways that you can edit your resume thoroughly to ensure the document is immaculate.

1. Start by fact checking
After you've updated the text on your resume, the next logical step is to make sure all the information is correct. Start at the top of the page and work your way down item by item. Is your phone number accurate? Is your email up-to-date? Did you write the proper apartment number?

As you work through your resume, double-check each employer's address and the spelling of any managers' names. You should also take a few moments to review any hard statistics that you've included. There's a big difference between overseeing 10 workers and overseeing 100 - it's a little typo that can dramatically affect your job search.

2. Focus on consistency
After you're confident that there are no inaccurate facts on your resume, go through the page again and look for any consistency issues. Some important areas to focus on are any bullet points, dates and titles that you may have included. Make sure everything is formatted the same way - don't switch back and forth between MM/DD/YYYY and MM/YY when writing dates. You should also keep the grammatical structure of your sentences similar. Look for tense issues, like switching between present and past tense verbs, and point of view problems, such as varying your use of first- and third -person.

3. Look for formatting issues
Computer-generated documents can be tricky to format, especially if you're going back at a later date and adding more information. Each time you alter your resume, it's beneficial to check for any style issues that may make the document look unprofessional. You should look at consistency of line spacing, indents, font type, word size, use of bold and italics, headers, footers and document colors. This big-picture review will help ensure that your resume makes a positive first impression on any potential employers.

4. Read it out loud
You've likely proofread your resume, but many times people miss mistakes in their own writing because their brains fill in the gaps for them. You can often spot errors that you may have skimmed over by taking the time to read through the document out loud. This practice forces you to read the words that are actually on the paper, as opposed to the words you intended to write. A quick read through can help you spot missing words, awkward phrases and grammatical blunders.

5. Research grammar and spelling issues
The spell-check function in most word processing systems will catch any major problems in your writing. However, there are certain issues that computers aren't smart enough to find. For example, the difference between "affect" and "effect" or "there" and "they're." As you're editing your resume, it's a good idea to identify and research grammar and spelling problems that you're not certain about. There are many grammar websites thatprovide guidance on tricky phrases, so bookmark helpful sites to use as you update your experience.

6. Find a second pair of eyes
Once you've double- and triple-checked your resume for all of the areas listed above, your final step should be to have someone else review the document. Even the best writers miss mistakes, so it is often beneficial to have a fresh pair of eyes go over your work. You can ask a friend, relative, teacher or a staffing consultant to review your resume before you finalize the document and send it out to employers.

This content brought to you by the Marketing Team at Beacon Hill Staffing Group.