---
name: resume-quick-polish
description: |
  Fast resume optimization - format fixes, keyword injection for ATS systems, achievement quantification, and common mistakes to fix in 30 minutes or less.
  Use when the user asks about resume quick polish, related techniques, best practices, or needs guidance in this domain.
  Do NOT use when the request is outside the scope of resume quick polish or requires a different specialized skill.
license: Apache-2.0
metadata:
  author: foundry-skills
  version: "1.0.0"
  tags: "quickstart career budgeting checklist template python javascript analysis"
  category: "career-development"
  subcategory: "career-growth"
  depends: ""
  disclaimer: "none"
  difficulty: "advanced"
---
# Resume Quick Polish

## When to Use

**Use this skill when:**
- A user shares their resume and asks for fast, targeted improvements before submitting to a specific job posting
- A user has an interview or application deadline within 24-48 hours and needs immediate, prioritized fixes
- A user wants to understand why their resume is not generating callbacks despite applying to roles they qualify for
- A user is applying to their first corporate role and needs formatting, structure, and language brought up to professional standards
- A user wants ATS keyword optimization for a specific job description they have in hand
- A user has a resume that is content-complete but visually inconsistent, too long, or using weak language
- A user needs to convert a duties-focused resume into an achievement-focused one without a full rewrite

**Do NOT use when:**
- The user needs a resume written from scratch with no existing content -- use a resume-writing or career-narrative skill instead
- The user is asking about cover letter writing -- that is a separate skill domain with different conventions
- The user is a student with no work experience and needs a resume structure designed around academics, projects, and internships -- use a first-resume or student-resume skill
- The user is targeting executive or C-suite roles (VP and above) where a two-to-three page resume with an executive profile is standard -- format rules differ significantly
- The user needs a federal resume (USAJobs.gov format), which requires narrative paragraphs, KSA statements, and GS-level pay scale details -- those conventions contradict ATS best practices
- The user is a creative professional (graphic designer, art director) who intentionally uses a visual portfolio resume -- ATS-friendliness trades away in that context
- The user needs LinkedIn profile optimization -- while related, that is a separate channel with character limits, algorithms, and recruiter search conventions that differ from resume logic

---

## Process

### Step 1: Triage the Resume Against the Six Critical Failure Modes

Before touching a single word, diagnose which of the six failure modes applies. Each has a different repair priority.

- **Failure Mode 1 -- ATS Rejection:** Resume uses tables, text boxes, columns, headers/footers for content, or non-standard section names. The document never reaches a human. Fix formatting before everything else.
- **Failure Mode 2 -- Recruiter Skim Failure:** Resume passes ATS but a recruiter's 6-second scan finds no clear value signal in the top third of the first page. Fix the summary, top role title, and first three bullets before anything else.
- **Failure Mode 3 -- Duties Language:** Bullets describe responsibilities rather than results. Every line sounds like a job description copied verbatim. Fix using the STAR-lite formula (Situation implied, Task + Action + Result).
- **Failure Mode 4 -- Keyword Mismatch:** The resume is well-written but does not mirror the language of the target job description. ATS scores resumes by keyword density and proximity. Fix by extracting and injecting exact-match phrases.
- **Failure Mode 5 -- Length and Density Problems:** Resume is either too long (3+ pages for under 15 years of experience) or too dense (walls of text with no white space). Fix by cutting ruthlessly or reformatting line spacing.
- **Failure Mode 6 -- Credibility Killers:** Inconsistent date formats, typos, outdated conventions (objective statements, "References available upon request"), unexplained gaps, or mismatched titles between resume and LinkedIn. Fix last, after substance is correct.

Ask the user which job description they are targeting. If they do not have one, ask for their target role and industry. You cannot optimize keywords without a target.

### Step 2: Run the Full Audit Checklist

Check every item systematically. Mark each as Pass, Fix, or N/A. Do not skip items -- a failing item you do not catch will cost the user an interview.

**Format and Structure Audit:**
- File name follows convention: `FirstName-LastName-Resume.pdf` (never "My Resume Final v3.pdf")
- Page count: one page for under 10 years of experience, two pages maximum for 10+ years, never three pages unless the user is an academic with publications
- Margins: 0.5 to 0.75 inches on all sides -- tight enough to fit content, wide enough to be readable
- Font: one typeface throughout; acceptable choices are Arial, Calibri, Garamond, Georgia, or Helvetica; size 10 to 12pt for body, 14 to 16pt for name
- Section headers are standard English labels: Experience (or Work Experience), Education, Skills (or Technical Skills), Certifications -- not creative labels like "Where I Have Made an Impact"
- No tables, no multi-column layouts, no text boxes, no headers or footers containing contact information
- No images, icons, logos, horizontal rules as graphics (plain text horizontal dividers are acceptable)
- Contact block at top: full name, professional email (not a university email unless current student), phone number, LinkedIn URL (shortened), city and state (never full street address)
- Reverse chronological order in every section

**Content Audit:**
- Every bullet begins with a strong past-tense action verb (present tense only for current role)
- No bullet begins with "Responsible for," "Helped with," "Worked on," or "Was involved in"
- At least 60% of bullets contain a quantified result (number, percentage, dollar amount, time saved, scale)
- No personal pronouns anywhere in the document
- No objective statement -- replace with a professional summary if the user has 5+ years of experience
- No "References available upon request" -- remove it
- GPA included only if graduated within two years and GPA is above 3.5
- No internal company jargon, proprietary product names, or acronyms that would be opaque to an external recruiter
- Skills section contains tools, technologies, and methodologies -- not soft skills like "team player" or "hard worker"
- Employment history covers the last 10 to 15 years maximum; older roles can be condensed to a one-line entry or omitted

### Step 3: Extract Keywords from the Target Job Description

This is the highest-leverage ATS optimization action and takes under 10 minutes when done correctly.

- Copy the entire job description into a text document
- Identify three categories of keywords: **Required Skills** (explicitly listed as required or must-have), **Preferred Skills** (nice-to-have or preferred), and **Role Language** (job title variations, department names, methodology names)
- For technical roles, note exact tool and technology names -- "AWS" and "Amazon Web Services" are treated as separate tokens by many ATS systems; include both spellings if space allows
- For non-technical roles, extract competency phrases: "stakeholder management," "cross-functional collaboration," "P&L ownership," "go-to-market strategy"
- Identify the seniority language -- if the job description says "senior" and "lead" repeatedly, the resume must use those words to describe past scope
- Build a keyword checklist: 10 to 20 terms extracted from the posting
- Check each keyword against the current resume -- mark which are present, which are absent, which are present but in different phrasing
- Inject missing keywords into existing bullets where they are truthfully applicable -- never fabricate experience, but do adopt the employer's terminology when the underlying experience exists
- Place the highest-priority keywords in the top half of the first page -- ATS systems weight keyword proximity to the document start

### Step 4: Rewrite Weak Bullets Using the Achievement Formula

Every bullet should answer: "What did you do, how big was it, and what happened as a result?"

**The Formula:** `[Strong Action Verb] + [What You Did] + [Quantified Result] + [Scope/Context]`

Apply this formula to the five most visible bullets first (top role, top bullets). Then work down.

**Quantification sourcing -- when the user says "I don't have numbers":**
- Revenue: pull from CRM reports, commission statements, quarterly business reviews, deal announcements
- Cost savings: calculate as (hours saved per week) x (average hourly rate of people involved) x (weeks in the period)
- Volume: count tickets resolved, emails sent, reports produced, customers served, lines of code merged
- Speed: measure the before and after of a process (e.g., "Reduced onboarding from 3 weeks to 5 days")
- Scale: team size, budget owned, number of direct reports, number of markets served, user base size
- Quality: Net Promoter Score improvement, error rate reduction, uptime percentage, audit pass rate
- Growth: percentage change in any measurable metric over a defined period

If a user genuinely cannot find any numbers, use scope language: "across 12-person cross-functional team," "supporting Fortune 500 client base," "in a $50M business unit." Scope signals magnitude even without a precise metric.

**Verb selection by function:**
- Leadership roles: Led, Directed, Spearheaded, Orchestrated, Championed, Oversaw
- Technical / engineering: Architected, Engineered, Refactored, Deployed, Automated, Optimized, Migrated
- Analysis / research: Synthesized, Modeled, Forecasted, Benchmarked, Diagnosed, Evaluated, Identified
- Communication / content: Authored, Presented, Negotiated, Advised, Facilitated, Published, Trained
- Sales / business development: Closed, Generated, Prospected, Expanded, Secured, Converted, Grew
- Operations / process: Streamlined, Standardized, Consolidated, Reduced, Accelerated, Redesigned
- Finance / accounting: Reconciled, Audited, Forecasted, Allocated, Controlled, Reported

Never start two consecutive bullets with the same verb.

### Step 5: Fix Format Issues in Priority Order

Address formatting in this exact sequence -- each issue affects readability and ATS parsing differently.

1. **Remove ATS-breaking elements first:** Delete all tables (replace with plain-text, tab-spaced layouts), remove all text boxes (paste content into the document body), eliminate columns (reformat to single-column), move contact info out of headers/footers into the body
2. **Standardize fonts and sizes:** Select one font, set body text to 10.5 or 11pt, set section headers to 12 or 13pt bold, set name to 16pt bold -- apply these settings globally using paragraph styles if possible
3. **Standardize date format:** Choose one format and apply it everywhere -- "Jan 2020 -- Present" or "January 2020 -- Present" or "2020 -- Present" -- never mix formats
4. **Standardize bullet style:** Use a single bullet character (-- or •) throughout; ensure all bullets are flush to the same indent level; no sub-bullets (they compress poorly in ATS)
5. **Control white space:** Set consistent line spacing (1.0 or 1.15), add 6pt spacing after section headers, keep 2pt spacing between bullets -- the goal is readable density, not cramped text
6. **Verify section order:** Contact > Summary (if included) > Experience > Education > Skills > Certifications -- deviations are acceptable for specific cases (e.g., new graduates lead with Education)

### Step 6: Polish the Professional Summary

The summary sits directly below the contact block and is the first content a recruiter reads. It must earn its space in three to four sentences.

**Summary formula for experienced professionals:**
- Sentence 1: Role identity + years of experience + two to three core competency areas
- Sentence 2: A specific, quantified achievement that is the single most impressive thing on the resume
- Sentence 3: A differentiator -- the unique angle or second strongest signal (industry specialization, technical depth, scope of leadership)
- Sentence 4 (optional): Target statement -- what type of role or impact the candidate is seeking (skip if it narrows unnecessarily)

**Summary anti-patterns to eliminate:**
- "Results-driven professional" -- meaningless filler; replace with an actual result
- "Passionate about [field]" -- passion is not a credential; replace with demonstrated commitment (e.g., "Built two open-source tools with 2K+ GitHub stars")
- "Proven track record" -- claim without evidence; replace with the actual track record in one sentence
- "Excellent communication skills" -- everyone claims this; remove entirely or prove it ("Authored 12-article technical blog series with 50K monthly readers")
- Summaries longer than 4 lines -- recruiters will not read them

### Step 7: Final Proofread and Export Check

The last 5 minutes are spent on credibility protection.

- Read the resume aloud -- the ear catches errors the eye skips
- Verify that every company name, title, and date is consistent with the user's LinkedIn profile -- recruiters cross-reference
- Confirm the email address is professional -- a personal nickname email is a red flag for corporate roles
- Check LinkedIn URL format: use a customized URL (linkedin.com/in/firstnamelastname) not the default alphanumeric string
- Export to PDF and open the PDF to verify: no garbled characters, no missing sections, no font substitution, no formatting collapse
- Check file size -- a text-only resume PDF should be under 500KB; if it is larger, the file likely contains embedded images or fonts that can cause ATS parsing errors
- Test ATS compatibility by copying the entire PDF text into a plain text editor -- if the text comes out garbled, reordered, or with missing sections, the format will fail ATS parsing
- Name the file `FirstName-LastName-Resume.pdf` -- never submit a file named "resume," "CV," or with version numbers

---

## Output Format

When delivering a resume polish analysis to a user, use this structured format:

```
## Resume Quick Polish Report

### Triage Assessment
**Primary Failure Mode:** [ATS Rejection / Recruiter Skim Failure / Duties Language /
Keyword Mismatch / Length-Density / Credibility Killers]
**Secondary Issues:** [List any additional failure modes in priority order]
**Estimated Time to Fix:** [X minutes with suggested time allocation]

---

### Audit Results

| Category | Item | Status | Priority |
|----------|------|--------|----------|
| Format | [Specific issue] | FAIL / PASS | High / Med / Low |
| Content | [Specific issue] | FAIL / PASS | High / Med / Low |
| Keywords | [Specific issue] | FAIL / PASS | High / Med / Low |

---

### Keyword Gap Analysis

**Target Role:** [Job title and company if provided]

| Keyword / Phrase | In Job Description | On Resume | Action Needed |
|------------------|--------------------|-----------|---------------|
| [exact phrase]   | Yes                | No        | Inject into [specific bullet] |
| [exact phrase]   | Yes                | Partial   | Reword to exact match |
| [exact phrase]   | Yes                | Yes       | No action needed |

**Keywords to inject (priority order):**
1. [Keyword] -- suggested placement: [specific role/bullet location]
2. [Keyword] -- suggested placement: [specific role/bullet location]
3. [Keyword] -- suggested placement: [specific role/bullet location]

---

### Bullet Rewrites

**[Company Name] -- [Job Title]**

| Original Bullet | Rewritten Bullet | Improvement Type |
|-----------------|-----------------|------------------|
| [Exact original text] | [Rewritten version] | Quantified / Verb / Scope |
| [Exact original text] | [Rewritten version] | Quantified / Verb / Scope |
| [Exact original text] | [Rewritten version] | Quantified / Verb / Scope |

---

### Summary Rewrite

**Original:**
[Paste original summary or "None -- no summary present"]

**Rewritten:**
[New 3-4 sentence summary following the formula]

---

### Formatting Fixes Required

- [ ] [Specific fix with exact instruction]
- [ ] [Specific fix with exact instruction]
- [ ] [Specific fix with exact instruction]

---

### 30-Minute Action Plan

| Time Block | Action | Expected Outcome |
|------------|--------|-----------------|
| 0-5 min | [Specific task] | [What this fixes] |
| 5-15 min | [Specific task] | [What this fixes] |
| 15-20 min | [Specific task] | [What this fixes] |
| 20-25 min | [Specific task] | [What this fixes] |
| 25-30 min | [Specific task] | [What this fixes] |

---

### Before/After Snapshot

**Top 3 Highest-Impact Changes:**
1. [Change] -- Impact: [Why this matters to recruiters or ATS]
2. [Change] -- Impact: [Why this matters to recruiters or ATS]
3. [Change] -- Impact: [Why this matters to recruiters or ATS]
```

---

## Rules

1. **Never fabricate metrics.** If a user says they cannot quantify a result, help them calculate or estimate using legitimate methods (hours saved, team size, volume counts). Do not invent a number and do not suggest they invent one. A caught fabrication ends a candidacy and can result in termination after hire.

2. **Always ask for the job description before optimizing keywords.** A resume optimized without a target is a generic document. The entire value of keyword injection depends on mirroring the specific posting. If the user does not have a single target JD, ask for their primary target role and industry and extract likely keywords from that context.

3. **Prioritize ATS structural fixes before language improvements.** A beautifully rewritten resume that never clears ATS parsing is worthless. Fix tables, columns, headers/footers, and text boxes before touching a single word.

4. **Do not add a summary for users with fewer than 5 years of experience.** Entry-level and early-career summaries read as padding. The experience section should carry the weight. Summaries become valuable when there is enough career narrative to synthesize.

5. **Enforce the 10-to-15-year experience window.** Roles older than 15 years should either be dropped entirely or reduced to a single compressed line (e.g., "Early career: Marketing Coordinator, ABC Corp, 2003-2007"). Older roles dilute focus, extend length, and invite age bias.

6. **Never recommend including a photo, headshot, or any graphic element on a US-market resume.** Photos are standard in some international markets (Germany, many Asian countries) but actively disadvantaged in US hiring due to bias risk -- many US companies have policies specifically to exclude them. For international market resumes, note the convention but flag the distinction.

7. **Reject soft skills from the Skills section.** "Leadership," "teamwork," "communication," and "problem-solving" listed as skills are ignored by ATS systems and dismissed by recruiters. The Skills section must contain only verifiable, testable items: technologies, tools, methodologies, languages, certifications, platforms.

8. **Do not allow more than 5 bullets per role, and no fewer than 2.** More than 5 bullets per role bloats the resume and implies inability to prioritize. Fewer than 2 bullets signals either a short tenure that should be explained or insufficient contribution to that role.

9. **Flag LinkedIn inconsistencies immediately.** Title differences between a resume and LinkedIn (e.g., "Senior Manager" on the resume vs. "Manager" on LinkedIn) are caught in 30 seconds by any recruiter and signal either dishonesty or sloppiness. Both interpretations kill candidacies.

10. **Do not recommend sending a Word (.docx) file unless the employer explicitly requests it.** PDF preserves formatting across every operating system and email client. Word files can reflow on different versions of Microsoft Office, potentially destroying the layout. The only exception is when a job posting explicitly says "submit in Word format" -- some internal ATS systems parse .docx more cleanly than PDF, and the employer knows their own system.

---

## Edge Cases

### The User Has No Quantifiable Achievements

Some roles genuinely involve process execution with no business metrics attached -- an administrative coordinator, a junior QA tester, an entry-level customer service rep. Handle this systematically:

- Calculate implied metrics: "Managed scheduling for 6-person executive team, coordinating 40+ meetings per week across 5 time zones" -- volume and scope are quantification
- Use quality proxies: "Maintained 100% on-time delivery of weekly board reports over 18-month tenure" -- perfect streak is a metric
- Use comparative language: "Reduced ticket backlog from 200+ open items to under 30 within first 90 days" -- even if no percentage is available, absolute numbers tell the story
- Use scale language when no outcome metric exists: "Processed 300+ vendor invoices monthly with zero reconciliation errors" -- throughput is quantifiable
- If truly nothing is quantifiable, prioritize scope and context bullets over bare duty statements: "Sole HR coordinator for 150-person organization during $2M office expansion" signals scope without fabrication

### The User Has an Employment Gap

Gaps of under 3 months rarely need explanation on a resume. Gaps of 3 to 12 months should be handled as follows:

- Caregiving: List as "Family Caregiver, [Year] -- [Year]" as a role entry -- this is legitimate and respected
- Layoff / job search: Use a "Career Break (Transition)" entry only if the gap exceeds 6 months; otherwise, adjust the date format from month/year to year-only to compress the visual gap (e.g., "2021 -- 2023" instead of "Jan 2021 -- Mar 2023")
- Freelance or consulting during a gap: List the freelance work as a role even if informal -- "Independent Consultant, [Year] -- [Year]" with legitimate client bullets
- Education or certifications during a gap: List in the Education or Certifications section with the year prominently shown
- Health-related gaps: Users are not obligated to disclose medical history on a resume; coach them to use "Personal Leave" or year-only dating without elaboration -- they can address it in interviews if asked
- Pandemic-era gaps (2020-2021): These are universally understood and rarely need explanation; a brief note in a cover letter suffices

### The User Is Switching Industries

Career-changers face two distinct resume challenges: vocabulary mismatch (their background uses different terms than the target industry) and relevance signaling (the most impressive things on their resume may not be the most relevant).

- Lead with a strong summary that explicitly frames the transition: "Operations leader with 10 years in healthcare administration transitioning to technology project management" -- do not hide the change, contextualize it
- Identify transferable competencies by comparing the target job description to the current experience and finding functional overlaps (e.g., healthcare compliance project management shares 80% of skills with software project management)
- Rename experiences using target-industry vocabulary where accurate: "Patient intake optimization initiative" can become "Cross-functional process improvement initiative reducing intake cycle time by 35%" -- the achievement is unchanged, the framing is more transferable
- Promote education, bootcamps, certifications, and side projects that demonstrate target-industry competence to higher positions in the document
- Create a "Relevant Projects" or "Relevant Skills" section to surface new competencies that do not have work experience attached yet

### The User Has Too Many Roles (Job Hopping Pattern)

A pattern of 10 or more roles in 15 years, or multiple roles under 12 months, will trigger recruiter scrutiny. Do not try to hide it -- try to contextualize it.

- Group contract, consulting, and freelance roles under a single umbrella entry: "Technology Consultant (Contract), Various Clients, 2018 -- 2022" with client names as sub-entries if the clients are recognizable brands
- For acquisitions and mergers that caused role changes, note them: "Company Name (acquired by X Corp, 2020)" -- this explains the apparent change in one line
- For legitimate strategic career moves (e.g., a person who moved companies four times in 10 years to double salary), do not change anything -- the trajectory speaks for itself and the resume should emphasize growth progression
- If a user has three roles under 6 months each, acknowledge that this is a real issue that no resume technique fully solves -- the cover letter and interview are the places to address it, not the resume itself

### The User's Resume Is Way Over Length

A three-or-four-page resume for a non-academic professional signals poor editing judgment -- a soft but real negative signal. Cut in this priority order:

- Remove all roles older than 15 years entirely, or condense to a one-line entry at the bottom of the experience section
- Cut the least-impressive bullets from each role, keeping only the top 3 to 5
- Remove the Education section's supplementary details (Dean's List, club memberships, coursework) if the user graduated more than 5 years ago -- only degree, institution, and year are needed
- Remove the Objective Statement or overly long Summary -- summaries over 4 lines should be cut to 3 sentences
- Remove Skills section entries the user cannot speak to in an interview -- especially technologies listed for only one minor project 8 years ago
- Tighten bullet language -- a 20-word bullet can almost always be rewritten to 12 words with no loss of meaning
- Change margins from 1 inch to 0.6 to 0.75 inches to recover 10 to 15% of vertical space
- If still over two pages after all cuts, the user likely needs a career narrative prioritization conversation -- some experience must be de-emphasized strategically

### The User Submits to International Roles (Non-US)

Resume conventions vary significantly by country. Key divergences from US conventions:

- **UK/Australia:** "CV" is the standard term, can run 2 to 3 pages, personal statement is common, no photo required for professional roles
- **Germany/Europe:** Photo is expected, a "Lebenslauf" format is standard, date of birth is commonly included, full list of references is often attached
- **Canada:** Functionally identical to US conventions -- no photo, no age, ATS-optimized formatting
- **Middle East:** Length norms are more flexible, photos are common, nationality is sometimes required on the form, not the resume itself
- Do not apply US-centric ATS rules to international applications without first confirming the local norms -- a German employer using a structured Lebenslauf format does not run it through the same ATS systems US employers use

### The User Has a Highly Technical Background and Wants to Move Into Management

Technical-to-management transitions require restructuring the resume's signal hierarchy. Technical depth should remain present but should no longer be the headline.

- Lead every role description with leadership and impact bullets, not technical implementation bullets -- even if the user spent 80% of their time coding, the management role they want cares about the 20% where they led, mentored, or decided
- Surface people management experience explicitly: team size, direct reports, performance review cycles, hiring decisions made
- Quantify business outcomes from technical work: "Led migration of legacy monolith to microservices, reducing deployment time from 2 weeks to 4 hours and enabling 3x faster feature release cycle" -- this is a business result stated in language a non-technical hiring manager understands
- Move the Technical Skills section lower in the document -- it should not be the first thing a hiring manager sees when evaluating a management candidate
- Add any cross-functional project leadership, budget ownership, or vendor management to every role where it occurred -- these are often omitted by engineers who consider them routine

---

## Example

### Input

"I'm a software engineer with 6 years of experience applying to a Senior Software Engineer role at a mid-size SaaS company. Here is my current resume bullet for my most recent role, and here is an excerpt from the job description. Help me polish it quickly."

**User's current bullet:**
"Responsible for working on the backend API and helping the team with database performance issues."

**Target job description excerpt:**
"We are looking for a Senior Software Engineer with experience in Python, REST API development, PostgreSQL optimization, and cross-functional collaboration with product and design teams. Must be comfortable leading technical design reviews and mentoring junior engineers."

---

### Output

## Resume Quick Polish Report

### Triage Assessment
**Primary Failure Mode:** Duties Language -- the bullet describes responsibilities rather than results, and uses passive construction ("Responsible for," "helping")
**Secondary Issues:** Keyword Mismatch -- the bullet contains none of the exact-match keywords from the job description (Python, REST API, PostgreSQL optimization, technical design reviews, mentoring)
**Estimated Time to Fix:** 25 minutes total -- 5 minutes keyword analysis, 10 minutes bullet rewrites, 5 minutes summary, 5 minutes final review

---

### Keyword Gap Analysis

**Target Role:** Senior Software Engineer -- Mid-size SaaS Company

| Keyword / Phrase | In Job Description | On Resume | Action Needed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Python | Yes | No | Inject into backend API bullet |
| REST API development | Yes | Partial (says "backend API" not "REST API") | Reword to exact match |
| PostgreSQL optimization | Yes | No (says "database performance issues" vaguely) | Inject with specific result |
| Cross-functional collaboration | Yes | No | Add to scope language in bullet |
| Technical design reviews | Yes | No | Add as standalone bullet if experience exists |
| Mentoring junior engineers | Yes | No | Add as standalone bullet if experience exists |

**Keywords to inject (priority order):**
1. PostgreSQL optimization -- inject into the database performance bullet with a quantified result
2. REST API development -- replace "backend API" with exact-match language
3. Mentoring junior engineers -- add as a dedicated bullet if the user has any mentorship experience
4. Technical design reviews -- add as a dedicated bullet if the user has led or contributed to design reviews
5. Python -- inject as the leading technology reference in the API bullet
6. Cross-functional collaboration -- add to scope language (e.g., "collaborating with product and design teams")

---

### Bullet Rewrites

**[Current Company] -- Software Engineer**

| Original Bullet | Rewritten Bullet | Improvement Type |
|---|---|---|
| "Responsible for working on the backend API and helping the team with database performance issues." | "Engineered Python-based REST APIs handling 2M+ daily requests, and led PostgreSQL query optimization initiative that reduced average query latency from 1,400ms to 180ms -- an 87% improvement -- for a 50K-user SaaS platform." | Quantified + Strong verb + Exact-match keywords + Scope |

**Two additional bullets to add (if the underlying experience exists -- confirm with user):**

| New Bullet (if applicable) | Rationale |
|---|---|
| "Led technical design reviews for 4 major backend features, aligning engineering approach with product and design stakeholders and reducing post-release rework by 30%." | Addresses "technical design reviews" and "cross-functional collaboration" keywords directly |
| "Mentored 3 junior engineers through weekly 1:1 sessions and code reviews, all of whom were promoted to mid-level within 18 months." | Addresses "mentoring junior engineers" keyword -- critical signal for Senior level |

---

### Summary Rewrite

**Original:**
None present.

**Recommended Summary (since user has 6 years of experience -- borderline but justified given senior-level target):**

"Software Engineer with 6 years of backend and API development experience in Python and PostgreSQL, with a track record of optimizing high-throughput systems at scale. Reduced database query latency by 87% on a 50K-user SaaS platform through targeted PostgreSQL optimization. Experienced in technical design reviews and mentoring junior engineers toward promotion. Seeking a Senior Software Engineer role where technical depth drives measurable product reliability."

*Why this works: Sentence 1 establishes identity and tech stack. Sentence 2 leads with the single most impressive quantified result. Sentence 3 directly mirrors the two softer keywords from the JD (design reviews, mentoring). Sentence 4 signals intentionality about the senior-level move.*

---

### Formatting Fixes Required

- [ ] Verify resume uses no tables or columns -- if LinkedIn export was used as a base, it often inserts invisible table formatting that breaks ATS
- [ ] Confirm all dates use consistent format throughout -- "Jan 2019 -- Present" not a mix of "2019 -- Present" and "January 2019 -- current"
- [ ] Move programming languages and tools (Python, PostgreSQL, REST APIs, etc.) to a dedicated Technical Skills section if they are buried inside bullets -- ATS systems score skills sections separately
- [ ] Verify file name is "FirstName-LastName-Resume.pdf" before submitting
- [ ] Check LinkedIn profile matches the resume title -- if resume says "Software Engineer" but LinkedIn says "Backend Developer," update LinkedIn to match

---

### 30-Minute Action Plan

| Time Block | Action | Expected Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| 0-5 min | Copy the full job description. Highlight every required skill, preferred skill, and repeated role descriptor. Build a checklist of 10-15 keywords to inject. | Clear keyword target list; nothing missed from JD |
| 5-15 min | Rewrite the backend API / database bullet using the rewritten version above. Add the design review bullet and the mentoring bullet if the experience is real. | Three strong, keyword-dense bullets that mirror the JD |
| 15-18 min | Add the professional summary using the template above, customized with actual numbers from the user's experience | First thing a recruiter reads now signals Senior-level value |
| 18-22 min | Add or update Technical Skills section: Python, PostgreSQL, REST API development, [other relevant tools the user knows] -- verify all entries are honest and interview-ready | ATS keyword density on skills section dramatically increases |
| 22-27 min | Fix any formatting issues from the checklist above. Standardize dates, remove any tables, verify font consistency. | Document passes ATS structural requirements |
| 27-30 min | Export as PDF. Open it. Copy all text into Notepad or TextEdit to verify plain text extraction is clean. Rename file correctly. Do a final read-aloud proofread. | Submission-ready document with no last-minute errors |

---

### Before/After Snapshot

**Top 3 Highest-Impact Changes:**

1. **Bullet rewrite from duties to achievement** -- the original bullet contained zero measurable outcomes and would have been invisible to both ATS keyword scoring and recruiter attention. The rewritten version contains three exact-match JD keywords (Python, REST API, PostgreSQL optimization), a specific quantified result (87% latency reduction), and a scope signal (50K-user platform) -- this single change has more interview-generating power than any other fix on the document.

2. **Keyword injection for soft leadership signals** -- "mentoring junior engineers" and "technical design reviews" are the two phrases in the JD that differentiate a senior role from a mid-level one. Without those phrases, an ATS evaluating seniority will rank this resume below other applicants who have them. Adding two targeted bullets that mirror this language exactly moves the resume from mid-level signal to senior-level signal.

3. **Professional summary addition** -- for a candidate applying to a senior role, a recruiter spending 6 seconds on the top of the first page needs to immediately see "Senior Software Engineer" language, a flagship result, and a technology stack match. Without a summary, the first thing a recruiter reads is the most recent job title, which says "Software Engineer" -- immediately creating a seniority question. The summary preemptively answers that question with evidence.
