What is the purpose of a resume?

A resume is a document people create when they’re actively looking for a job. This document's core purpose isn’t to help you land a job, but an interview that will lead to a job. However, a resume offers multiple purposes throughout the job search both for the job seeker and the hiring manager or recruiter. In this article, we’ll break down the purpose of a resume separately depending on the audience: job seeker or hiring manager and recruiter.

Purpose of a resume for job seekers

1. To help you land an interview

The purpose of a resume is to help you secure an interview at a company you want to work for. A resume alone won’t be able to help ensure you get the job. The interview process will determine your fit based on work experience, skills, and also personality or culture fit. A resume’s purpose is to help you get that foot in the door so you can potentially land that interview that does lead to a signed offer. Your resume is a compilation of everything you are at work, as it highlights the best of you. A hiring manager will see what makes you great from your resume and will determine if those amazing skills and qualifications you have are what they’re looking for at this time. If there’s a match, you’ll be well on your way to a phone interview or screening interview.

2. To give insight into your skills

The purpose of a resume is to help a hiring manager see all the incredible skills you’ve developed throughout your career. Your resume will likely include skills in your work experience section and also in a skills section. In your work experience section, you’ll describe skills in relation to an accomplishment you’ve had. So, your resume skills will stand out more as it’s highlighted with something big you’ve achieved in a previous role. In the skills section, you’ll simply be adding keywords. The skills section might include and mention the skills you have but come along with no context. The benefit of the skills section is to help you pass ATS filters for a role you’ve applied to. However, there’s limited explanation about your skills in this section. Yet, if you work in an industry with various skills, it’s helpful for a hiring manager who’s quickly scanning your resume to see this list of skills to help determine whether or not your skills match the role you’re applying for.

3. To showcase your work ethic

The purpose of a resume is to showcase your work ethic. We’ve all seen the cliches of people writing that they’re a hard worker on their resume. However, you don’t have to say you have a good work ethic. You need to show it. Your resume’s work experience section is a great place to show your work ethic without using buzzwords like hard worker. When you list big accomplishments you’ve achieved in a previous role, you showcase how much effort you put in to your success. Are you hitting high revenue targets in your sales role? Did you ship multiple projects as an engineer? Did you bring tons of traffic and leads as a writer? Did you surpass product quotas in your factory job? These are all things you can tell your potential new employer about on your resume. Your resume can be the document you use to sell you as a productive and talented worker.

4. To show your career progression

The purpose of a resume is to show your career progression. Are your accomplishments getting bigger with time? Are you developing a wider net of skills? Are you improving your job titles with the passing of time? A hiring manager will look at your resume to quickly see how you’ve progressed in your career. If you keep achieving big things with every job you land, you’ll secure that interview with ease. That’s why it’s so important to work at a company for at least three years, if you can. Most people can accomplish a lot in a year. However, in three years a lot of your resume accomplishments will compound on top of each other because you get better at that role. If you’re staying at a company for a few years, you’ll have more impressive accomplishments to list on your resume just because you had time to do more. Your first year at a company is all about laying down the foundation but by years three or four you’ve likely shipped more advanced tasks that allow you to stand out in the job market.

5. To help align yourself to a job

The purpose of a resume is to help draw the connection between you and a job. A resume tailor is a tool you can use to make your resume better match the job you’re applying for. Your resume will be the deciding factor on whether or not you could potentially work at a specific company. So, it’s necessary to ensure your skills, qualifications, and work experience match the job description of the job posting you’re applying for. Keep in mind, you don’t want a 100% match. If it was a 100% match, you’d have basically copied and pasted the entire job description. The goal is to match 70-80%, so you include the right keywords and skills you’ve developed to help showcase your credentials.

6. To act as an ad for job seekers

The purpose of a resume is to act as an advertisement for job seekers. It’s basically an ad selling you as a job seeker to a hiring manager or recruiter. This promotional document is a tool to help you land interviews so you can get a job and earn money. Businesses also run ads to earn money. So, it’s almost like a marketing document for the job search. You’re meant to showcase yourself in the best light. After all, this document only gets scanned in about five seconds. So, you’ve got to make that first impression quite fast.

7. To introduce yourself to hiring managers

A hiring manager can find job seekers on LinkedIn. But that doesn’t mean your profile will necessarily pop up for them when they’re searching for people to hire for a specific role. The purpose of a resume is to introduce yourself to hiring managers to let them know you exist, you’re interested in the role, and you’re qualified too. This introduction helps set you up for success too if you’re the right fit. Without applying to a job with your resume, a hiring manager might not know about you. Maybe finding you organically is hard for them. But once they see your resume, you’re an easy yes to them. And the doors open right up for you leading you to your next big corporate adventure.

8. To convey interest in a role

Without a resume, a hiring manager doesn’t know you’re interested in their new job opportunity. The purpose of a resume is to help showcase your level of interest and enthusiasm for a role. A person who is open to work might not seem interested in a specific job if the job title doesn’t completely align. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t interested. Sometimes, people are interested in lateral moves to different roles that they do have the required skill set in. A resume tells a hiring manager that you saw the opportunity and thought it was worthwhile enough for you to apply to.

Purpose of a resume for hiring managers or recruiters

1. To determine job-candidate fit

The purpose of a resume for hiring managers is to determine job-candidate fit. A hiring manager and recruiter knows exactly what kind of person they’re looking for to fill a role. It’s not just what’s listed in the job description but also what will fit in culturally on the team or the company as a whole. A hiring manager has insight into the stresses and pressure the business is currently facing and how urgent or necessary this person is to the company mission and overall targets. A job seeker sees a job description and thinks that’s all a hiring manager is looking for. But there really is so much more to whether or not you get hired in the decision making process. It’s about finding someone who can help solve their burning problems, quickly so that the company can thrive.

2. To learn more about a candidate

The purpose of a resume is to learn more about a candidate. Sometimes, headhunters will reach out to job seekers via LinkedIn regarding a role. And even though all of your job experience is listed on LinkedIn, they’ll still go ahead and ask you to send them your resume. Your resume is a one-page document that helps them assess your skills, work experience, and make your contact information more accessible. Since your resume is typically tailored for a job, they want to see you draw that connection for them since they already have a good hunch about you.

3. To analyze job trends

The purpose of a resume from a hiring manager or recruiter can be used to analyze job trends. Let’s look at the tech industry for example. Five years ago, the AI hype was virtually non-existent. Most writers didn’t have to use AI, engineering teams weren’t using AI, and tech as a whole wasn’t using it. However, in 2024, everyone is using AI to help supplement their work or to help them elevate their brands higher and faster than ever before. New tools and technologies are getting added constantly. One day a data scientist is using a popular analytics tool and the next day something better is now on the market. Things change fast in the business world. And as a job seeker, you’ll need to adapt. That’s why hiring managers will use resumes to help them look at job trends. The details you include on your resume will give them pointers in what kind of tech people are actively using right now.

4. To assess the job market status

The purpose of a resume is to assess the job market status. If a company is getting tons of high caliber candidates the job market is working in the employer’s favor. However, if there’s not a ton of high quality resumes, it’s likely a sign that a company isn’t being competitive enough or that companies in the industry are hiring at a higher rate. For example, around 2020 tech companies were hiring faster and more people than ever before. Some tech companies were making claims of hiring 2,000 engineers alone in a single year. Yet, when investor money dried up, these companies were doing mass layoffs. When layoffs are happening industry wide, a company will likely get more high quality candidates than when companies are doing well. As a job seeker you could be the perfect candidate but depending on the market that could be what leads to your next role or what makes your job search last longer than you’d like.

5. To improve job descriptions

The purpose of a resume is to help hiring managers improve job descriptions. The more resumes you see as a hiring manager or recruiter, the more trends you pick up on. You’ll start to see shifts in how people apply their skill set for a job. As a result, you’ll naturally start making tweaks to improve job descriptions. You might add additional skills or qualifications based on what previous candidates have shown you they can do. With time, you continue to raise the bar in what you’re looking for in your ideal candidate.

6. To better identify relevant keywords and skills

The purpose of a resume is to help hiring managers and recruiters better identify the right keywords and skills they’re looking for in a job. For example, if you notice all of your candidates are applying for your job with a specific tool they use but your company doesn’t use, you might start introducing that product to your team. A resume can act as a tool to help you stay on top of industry skills, tools, keywords, and trends that help you elevate your brand to the latest skills trends to ensure your company’s staying power.

Conclusion

The purpose of a resume varies depending on whether it’s a job seeker or hiring manager. Either way, it’s clear that this document does a lot to help job seekers find meaningful work and sell themselves in a way that allows them to attract great jobs. And it helps employers stay on top of trends and hire the absolute best candidates during their search. If you’re currently thinking about building your resume, sign up for Huntr to start using the innovative resume builder today.