Myth Buster Monday: Employers Read Resumes in 6 Seconds

Myth:  Employers only spend a few seconds reading applicant resumes.

Six seconds is not a whole lot of time. In fact, it’s pretty darn short. I may just be in a slump today, but it’s been difficult for me to think of things that it takes 6 seconds to do. So using the Career Services desk, I made up a few things to help get the point across. In 6 seconds, I am able to:

•  Squeeze a stress ball (Full, manly squeezes that require the occasional slight grunt) 13 times
•  Staple a piece of paper 15 times
•  Remove 3 of those staples Drink a 1 ½ cups of water from our office water cooler
• Write my last name (Willingham) backwards in cursive

Get the point?

So what if someone told you that you only had six seconds to get the job you were hoping for? Well, unfortunately, that may be all you get. In a research done by TheLadders, 30 professional recruiters were asked to demonstrate how they would go through a resume. Using eye-following technology (the future is so cool), the researchers were able to determine not only where the recruiters’ eyes were on a resume, but how long they spent looking at actual material. The results? As it turns out, that resume that you spent days (weeks? months?) sweating over got a solid 6 seconds of useful observations before the recruiter determined whether or not it was worthy of advancing.

So what can we learn from this?  Before you go shredding your professional resume in order to develop your new and improved single sentence resume, it’s worth noting what those precious six seconds were used for on the recruiters’ side of things. According to the study, the area that mattered the most to the recruiters (where their eyes paused the longest) was the most recent experience you had (or currently have). As a college student, this doesn’t necessarily have to be a job, but rather a sorority, an academic club, or some other non-paid position.  Whatever it may be, make it count. By using good bullet points that are concise, and that have great action verbs, you can help catch the attention of that impatient reader and possibly claw for that extra second. Because at the end of the day, that extra second could mean the difference between a yes and a no!

Need help with your resume? Swing by our Peer Career Advisor Undergraduate Resume Walk-in hours on Monday- Thursday: 3PM- 5PM.