The resume: content

In my opinion, people really could be optimising their resumes a lot more than they currently do.

For designers specifically, there are two facets to this: the content itself, and the design. I would bet that there are improvements that you can make to both right now.

1. Document anything relevant that you've done

Create a Google Doc of everything and anything that's potentially relevant to the role that you want.

Treat this kind of like a diary, being very specific about each period of time and each project:

• Why and how did you get involved with this experience?

• What did you actually specifically do?

• How did what you do change over the course of the experience?

• How many other people were involved?

• Was there anything notable that happened? Was there drama?

• Would you change anything about it? If so, what?

• Are there any numbers that you think are important (e.g. people involved, if money was part of it, or if there were percentages)?

An experience could be anything: a club in college, a side project, past internships/working experience.

Again, be as incredibly specific as you can.

2. Find people who have the job you want and look at their resumes

Work backwards from someone who's already made it.

This is so key to pretty much all aspects of the job search. You are conducting market research.

Go on LinkedIn, type in "role company" and try to find their resume on their portfolio website.

Find at least 7 or 8 resumes.

Your mileage may vary depending on how recently they joined the company and what their role is. I learned the most from people who were mid-level: their resumes have lots of relevant experience so you can study how they format and phrase their bullet points.

You'll notice that the best are very concise yet specific: that's the magic combo that we're trying to go for.

I'd suggest downloading the best resumes that you come across and keeping them in a folder somewhere.

If there's any particular wording or phrasing that you find particularly effective, paste it into a different section of that Google Doc above for inspiration.

3. Look at jobs you'd want but aren't qualified for

Work backwards from where you want to be.

Again, market research but from a different angle.

If a company I really like has an an opening at a company that I'm definitely not qualified for yet, it's still worth taking a look at what they've written in the listing bullet points.

Paste those into another section of the Google Doc.

Getting a sense of the jargon, phrasing, and values from the company side is really important.

Your resume should reflect something similar, or the potential to grow into that position you're not yet qualified for. This is a helpful goals list: you're going to be working towards fitting those requirements in your career, so it's good to know early.

4. Start writing your resume

Now that you have specific examples from your own experiences and an understanding of the industry language, start writing bullet points for your resume in your Google Doc.

For now, pretend that there is no word or space limit.

Avoid being generic as much as possible.

Any sentence that sounds like "I worked with people, in places, to do things" is too vague and also boring. Who did you work with? What specifically were you doing? Why were you doing it?

Rephrasing it into "Worked with x role and y role to execute a and b for key business need 3" helps a lot already.

Something like

I worked alongside the live team, creating and deploying live services content within game X.

is far too vague, and sounds like "I worked with people in places to do things."

This creates questions and ambiguity:

• Who was the live team? How many people were in the live team? Is it just one engineer?

• Did you work specifically with someone in the live team? Did you work with everyone? Were you an intern on the live team overall?

• What kind of live services content did you create and deploy? Is it something I'd know? (is it skins, DLC, currency, multiplayer?)

• What is the difference between creating and deploying?

• Why should we care about live services content in game X? Is it a well-known game? How many people play it?

Let's apply the rephrasing to the example:

Worked alongside two lead engineers in the live team to create and deploy FY25 live services content within game X for an audience of over 1 million.

Start your sentences with good action verbs.

Things like Generated, Led, Created, Built, and so on do much more for you than Helped, Provided, etc.

Help the recruiter see:

• What impact you made (if any)

• Why you did what you did

• How you worked with others (if any) to accomplish it.