What is a Career Change Resume?

A career change resume is a document that shows your technical skills and experiences relevant to the new industry or role. The main difference with the traditional resume is that instead of highlighting your chronological work history, you emphasise transferable skills and relevant accomplishments that align with your new goals of switching careers.

This functional resume format requires carefully analysing and selecting your professional experience to draw explicit connections between your past experiences and the requirements of your new role. The main goal is to reframe your career history, showcasing how your unique combination of skills and experiences makes you the right fit for potential employers.

Analysing Transferable Skills

Transferable skills are valuable and applicable abilities that can find their purpose in multiple jobs and industries. Identifying and showcasing these skills is vital if you would like to go on a journey towards a successful career change. They include soft skills like communication skills, leadership, project management, analytical and problem-solving skills.

Go through every job description on your new career path and look for recurring skills and competencies potential employers are searching for. Once you identify them, return to your experience and find a match of these skills. Their demonstration would form the basis of your career change resume.

Creating a Skills Inventory

Here, we will discuss tips for creating a comprehensive list of transferable skills relevant to the new career and applicable to your career change resume:

  • Revisit your previous roles and their job descriptions, performance reviews and significant achievements.
  • Do a cross-reference with the skills required in your career transition.
  • Request feedback from ex-colleagues, mentors or managers about your performance, qualities and talents.
  • Utilise the online skills assessment tools.
  • Don’t forget to include skills gathered from volunteer work, hobbies, or personal projects, as they are also important.

Structuring Your Resume for Maximum Impact

A career change resume example contains elements that prioritise relevant skills over chronology. Begin with a strong summary statement and skills summary section. Include them both in the resume summary, where you will show your transferable skills. Then, present your experience from previous jobs, highlighting the achievements and responsibilities most relevant to your desired career path.

Include previous relevant projects and key achievements in separate sections to highlight specific examples of how you applied your transferable skills in ways that align with your new career change.

When defining your skills, start the bullet points with an action verb illustrating how you’ve used the transferable skill in your previous role. For example, instead of writing “problem-solving skills”, include some quantifiable measures that can catch the eye of the potential employer, like: “Reduced the negative talk about colleagues by 80%”; “Found and implemented AI tools that speed up the process by 33%.”

Choosing the Right Resume Format

The choice for a career change resume format is crutial. Most career changers choose a functional resume format or a hybrid one. A functional resume emphasises your skills and abilities rather than your work history. A hybrid resume combinates elements of both functional and chronological formats, allowing you to highlight relevant skills while also providing an essential work history. Your choice should allow you to draw explicit connections between your past experiences and the desired role.

The functional resume can also be an effective tool for people with employment gaps. It helps them minimise the attention on career breaks and periods of unemployment while focusing on achievements rather than the uninterrupted timeline.

Engaging Summary Statement

In your summary statement, write about a resume objective or summary that frames your career change as a strength. It is your opportunity to explain the motivation behind your transition. In your concise summary statement, you should include:

  • Your clear intentions for the career change
  • The most relevant transferable skills
  • Your unique background and how it adds value to the desired role
  • Demonstrate your enthusiasm for the new position

See this example for a clearer picture: “Experienced recruiter transitioning to project management, bringing strong analytical and user-focused problem-solving skills. I kept creating and organising projects for my closest friends and family my whole life, so I finished the Project Management Professional (PMP) certification. Now, I want to share my talent with the world”.

Highlighting Relevant Experience

Carefully think and answer all these questions to highlight your experience correctly:

  1. What accomplishments in your career thus far can illustrate your suitability for this new path?
  2. What projects or tasks allign the closest with your career trajectory?
  3. How can you describe your achievements to be relevant to your resume objective?
  4. Can you measure and match your previous results to your career change goals?

Answer those questions using industry-specific language to show you know how to apply all your hard and interpersonal skills to your new role.

Shifting Focus From Titles to Talents

In a proper career change strategy, the focus shifts from past job titles to the talents and competencies you bring. Emphasise them to demonstrate your potential in the new field. For each entry in your work history, highlight:

  • Projects or initiatives that showcase relevant abilities and achievements
  • Leadership and partnership experiences
  • Problem-solving skills demonstrating flexibility and intelligence

Showcasing Education and Professional Development

This section demonstrates your commitment to your career change path and shows you’re proactively acquiring the necessary knowledge and skills. Highlight recent education, courses or certifications you’ve completed or are pursuing. Mention all the workshops, seminars or conferences that you attended where you gathered practical new industry knowledge. Don’t forget to emphasise your personal projects related to your future career – even though they are not high-level, they leave a high impact in the eyes of future employers.

Transitioning Careers with Olive Recruit

Changing careers shouldn’t be a complex task when you have the right partner beside you to guide you through the process. People at Olive Recruit understand the unique challenges and opportunities that arise when there’s a need for a career change. We are here to help all job seekers, including those on their career change journey. Our experienced recruiters offer tailored guidance on writing your career change resume, setting a resume objective, preparing for the interview, and creating a job search strategy.

At Olive Recruit, we work closely with various employers across various industries, giving us valuable insights into the abilities and qualities they seek to find in a quality career change resume.

Whether you want to pivot industries or explore entirely new roles, we can help you position yourself effectively and connect you with opportunities that align with your career change goals. Contact us and turn your career change aspirations into reality.