With the economy on a definite upswing, many people who have been out of the job market for some time are finding their way back into the hunt for better employment. Some of these people have had success in the past but have also seen their resume authoring skills deteriorate to one degree or another.

The good news is it is becoming easier and easier to craft an effective resume. Numerous resources exist both online and offline to study the hiring process and the tools available today are simply beyond the imaginations of job seekers even ten years ago. If you are putting together a new resume for the next step in your career, here are some things to consider.

One Page

If possible, you should limit the length of your resume to one page. This does several beneficial things for you. First, it forces you to focus your message and tailor your experience and skills to the job at hand. Secondly, it dramatically reduces the potential for confusion on the part of your hiring manager. All resume authors should remind themselves their hiring manager has nothing but the document to go on until the interview. The less effort they have to expend in order to grasp it, the better.

Don’t Compete With Yourself

Always remember as the author of your resume you get to decide what is included. Never put anything on a resume that could be interpreted as an inadequacy on your part. Everything you include should be portrayed as a major accomplishment, and if it can’t, it should be omitted. Job searches are difficult enough without giving the hiring manager a built-in justification for setting your application aside. The resume is the one chance you have in society to make yourself the hero of the story. Take full advantage.

Keep It Simple

Concurrent with your efforts to condense your information, you should make conveying that information as simply and as efficiently as possible your top priority. Fancy fonts, sidebars, photos and other gimmicks might provide you some satisfaction on your favorite social media platform, but they can be frustrating for hiring managers, especially if they are looking for a key piece of information like a phone number, but can’t find it.

Resumes are like radio distress calls. There is no reason to include superfluous or confusing information. In fact, the more information you transmit, the higher the danger your message won’t get through at all. Keep it simple, positive and on one page.