Using the “squint and distance test”, as outlined in the resume design handout, my initial reaction to your resume was that it contained a lot of white space. This could also be seen using the “quadrant test”, as there is significant negative space in the upper right and left corners. I would recommend listing a current address as well as a permanent address at the top of your resume to take up this empty space. The next thing that I immediately noticed was the blue text under your name. I wouldn’t recommend having your email linked in such a manner, as it stands out too much and looks a little unprofessional. Guidelines for getting rid of this are outlined in the resume design handout.
As far as the remaining formatting goes, I think you did a very good job of keeping everything clean cut and organized looking. I think the bulletins are well structured and really aid in properly aligning all of experiences, as well as your related course work. One thing that might be worth considering is moving the above bulletins to the left, so as to line them up with those below. Aside from this, you might consider listing your work experience dates in a more consistent manner, though this probably isn’t that big of an issue. I think the rest of your resume is pretty well constructed. The only last concern I had was related to the objective statement, or lack there of. As the instructor’s blog states, companies are still looking for these, so it might be worth considering. This would also solve much more of that white space issue.
Layout:
I don't want to repeat what nmhess said so I won't say too much about layout, though I did notice a lot of the same things he did. Here are just a couple suggestions:
I would suggest moving your name up and redistributing your contact information to be more horizontal so ballance out the white space issue. Since your resume does have a pull to the bottom left, I would reformat your subsection headings (job descriptions). Right now those headings are blocks of bold text - kindof intimidating anyway. I'd also just make sure your style is consistent from section to section, and I personally would avoid mixing center- and left-justification. It does help the section titles stand out, but I think it interrupts the flow too much. Then again, I've never been a fan of center-justification.
Content:
One thing I like about your resume is that you've kept it simple and left a lot of the extra filler off. You haven't burried your important information.
I have a couple suggestions for your experience bullet points. I'd limit yourself to three per list. I don't think readers will read much further than that, so pick the most impressive and most relevant ones and flesh them out. Remember from Instructor Blog 2, be specific about what you've done. If you try I think you can come up with more specific things so you can replace those "assisteds" and "responsible fors" with something exciting and impressive that you did. I looked at your position's job description and it had a lot of specific items they are looking for. You were off to a good start with saying you have traveled on your internship. Try to identify their needs in your accomplishments, and put them at the top of the list. I'd also consider organizing your experience by relevance instead of in cronological order.
One last thing I have for you: I don't agree with nmhess that you should include an objective statement. I've never written a good objective statement on any resume ever, and I think it's near impossible to do anyway because the nature of it leaves you thinking about yourself and not the company. Besides that, just like the instructor blog said, companies don't care about what you want, they just want to see if you are what they want. So why should they care about your objective? I think you are right for leaving it off. But...you might consider a career summary instead. A career summary will allow you to easily describe why you fit their objective. I stumbled on these great tips from ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers for the rest of you), and among them is a suggestion about career summary vs. objective. I thought it was great advice and I wanted to share, so another ME seemed like a good candidate. I hope it helps.
Resume Analysis
Using the “squint and distance test”, as outlined in the resume design handout, my initial reaction to your resume was that it contained a lot of white space. This could also be seen using the “quadrant test”, as there is significant negative space in the upper right and left corners. I would recommend listing a current address as well as a permanent address at the top of your resume to take up this empty space. The next thing that I immediately noticed was the blue text under your name. I wouldn’t recommend having your email linked in such a manner, as it stands out too much and looks a little unprofessional. Guidelines for getting rid of this are outlined in the resume design handout.
As far as the remaining formatting goes, I think you did a very good job of keeping everything clean cut and organized looking. I think the bulletins are well structured and really aid in properly aligning all of experiences, as well as your related course work. One thing that might be worth considering is moving the above bulletins to the left, so as to line them up with those below. Aside from this, you might consider listing your work experience dates in a more consistent manner, though this probably isn’t that big of an issue. I think the rest of your resume is pretty well constructed. The only last concern I had was related to the objective statement, or lack there of. As the instructor’s blog states, companies are still looking for these, so it might be worth considering. This would also solve much more of that white space issue.
Critique from a fellow ME
Layout:
I don't want to repeat what nmhess said so I won't say too much about layout, though I did notice a lot of the same things he did. Here are just a couple suggestions:
I would suggest moving your name up and redistributing your contact information to be more horizontal so ballance out the white space issue. Since your resume does have a pull to the bottom left, I would reformat your subsection headings (job descriptions). Right now those headings are blocks of bold text - kindof intimidating anyway. I'd also just make sure your style is consistent from section to section, and I personally would avoid mixing center- and left-justification. It does help the section titles stand out, but I think it interrupts the flow too much. Then again, I've never been a fan of center-justification.
Content:
One thing I like about your resume is that you've kept it simple and left a lot of the extra filler off. You haven't burried your important information.
I have a couple suggestions for your experience bullet points. I'd limit yourself to three per list. I don't think readers will read much further than that, so pick the most impressive and most relevant ones and flesh them out. Remember from Instructor Blog 2, be specific about what you've done. If you try I think you can come up with more specific things so you can replace those "assisteds" and "responsible fors" with something exciting and impressive that you did. I looked at your position's job description and it had a lot of specific items they are looking for. You were off to a good start with saying you have traveled on your internship. Try to identify their needs in your accomplishments, and put them at the top of the list. I'd also consider organizing your experience by relevance instead of in cronological order.
One last thing I have for you: I don't agree with nmhess that you should include an objective statement. I've never written a good objective statement on any resume ever, and I think it's near impossible to do anyway because the nature of it leaves you thinking about yourself and not the company. Besides that, just like the instructor blog said, companies don't care about what you want, they just want to see if you are what they want. So why should they care about your objective? I think you are right for leaving it off. But...you might consider a career summary instead. A career summary will allow you to easily describe why you fit their objective. I stumbled on these great tips from ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers for the rest of you), and among them is a suggestion about career summary vs. objective. I thought it was great advice and I wanted to share, so another ME seemed like a good candidate. I hope it helps.