Open In App

20+ Tips To Get Your Resume Shortlisted For Top Tech Companies

Improve
Improve
Improve
Like Article
Like
Save Article
Save
Share
Report issue
Report

A lot of students and professionals, like you, have a dream to get into big tech companies like Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, Netflix, and Google. However, if you’re not able to get your resume shortlisted – no matter how hard you worked or how much experience you have – still you’re not receiving calls for interviews. 

Have you wondered what’s the reason behind it?

What went wrong with your resume? 

Did you write something wrong in the resume to be rejected? 

These might be some of the questions you must be wondering when you don’t hear back from the recruiters. In this article, we’ll go through 20+ tips on how to get your resume shortlisted for top tech companies.

 20+ Tips To Get Your Resume Shortlisted For Top Tech Companies

 

There might be a lot of reasons why your resume not getting shortlisted for these big tech companies. We are going to share some tips and some mistakes that most people do in their resumes. 

First, you need to understand that these companies get lakhs or millions of resumes every day which are scanned by the Application Tracking System (ATS). An applicant tracking system (ATS) is an element of human resources software that allows employers to organize a large number of resumes. Recruiters and hiring managers can use keywords to search their applicant tracking systems (ATS) for well-matched candidates. You can increase your chances of catching a recruiter’s attention by optimizing your resume keywords and making sure your resume sections are easily identified by the ATS.

For example “Java Developer“, the ATS considers the keyword Java and it will scan all the resumes that will have this word included and the same goes for the other profile. The rest of the resume gets filtered out and after that, these resumes get into the hands of the recruiter for the further process. 

Now we are going to discuss three sections that will help you to get your resume shortlisted in these tech companies. 

To write a good resume, you will need to focus on the main facts of your professional bio. Therefore, your professional bio should look like this:

  • Position
  • Contact details
  • Work experience
  • Education
  • Professional skills
  • Achievements and Certification
  • Recommendations
  • Additional information

How To Get Your Resume Shortlisted

Getting your resume shortlisted is 30% of the resume game. If you’re shortlisted, it means you’ve passed 30% of the journey already. So, what if we give the correct direction that will help you get your resume shortlisted for sure. 

Here are 25 tips that you’ll get your resume shortlisted in no time:

Get the Right Experience

If you have completed your education from a reputed college or you have worked for a reputed company then it will help you a lot otherwise you can boost your resume with some projects and participation in hackathons. 

1. You can build some mobile apps and web apps, or you can also include your ML project. Honestly, it doesn’t matter that much what you’re building as long as you’re building something. You should have a good command of at least one programming language such as Java, Python, Ruby on Rails, C++, etc.

2. Instead of building 5-6 tiny projects (you can build initially but that won’t showcase enough experience), build some big projects which you are most proud of especially when you have no programming background. Doing a project is important to get enough experience and to showcase that you have built something.

3. Participate in hackathons or open-source projects. If you are a college student participate in ACM-ICPC or Google Summer of Code. Participating in these competitions helps a lot in applying for dream companies.

4. Build a website/portfolio and show your experience. A lot of people have a question that where they can find some project ideas or what kind of project they can build. Check open source and it has a plethora of projects which you can build. You can also contribute to some existing open-source projects. Contribution to open-source showcase that you can work in a team.

Build a Great Resume

5. Create your resume of only 1 page (at most two pages if you have more than 10 years of experience). A recruiter only takes 10-15 seconds to scan a resume so if your resume is too long, it just takes your best stuff – the stuff that would have made the “one-page cut” – and dilutes it with more mediocre content. It doesn’t matter how many years of experience you have, be precise and clear in just a one-page resume.

6. As a fresher, if you are confused about whether to write your experience first or your education at the top. So you have to make this selection in such a manner – if you have more experience of internship/freelancing and if you have done an internship in any well-reported or any well-known company then you first write your experience section because you should mention the best things about yourself highlighted at the top. But if your education section is more powerful like your marks are very good or your college is very prestigious, then definitely you should keep your education section above.

7. Use a proven resume format. Don’t create your own — it tends to waste space and look sloppy. Use the right template which can have multiple columns (It will help you to showcase all your skillset). You can build a neat and simple resume on the GFG Resume Builder tool for FREE.

8. Mention 3-5 projects, hackathons, or open-source profiles. Projects can be academic-required projects or independent projects. They do not need to be completed or launched either. As long as you’ve done a great amount of work on them, that’s good enough.

9. If you mention some bullets in your resume then keep it short. Bullets that are 3 or more lines look like paragraphs and won’t be read. Use the word built, created, implemented, designed, architected, and optimized in the first line of each bullet.

10. Mention your accomplishment in your resume instead of responsibilities. It shows your enthusiasm for your work and the impact you have made.

11. Quantify your accomplishments for example if you have optimized something then mention how much.

12. You don’t need to mention the objective in your resume. The company already knows what position you are applying for so it will just waste space. At worst, it’ll limit you since it’ll exclude other positions that might have been interesting to you.

13. Be careful when you mention the programming languages because it’s a “fair game” for the interviewer to test. So it’s better to mention something like “C++ (Proficient), C# (Prior Experience), …”

14. If a project is not finished yet or not official still if it’s great then mention it (you shouldn’t just list everything you’ve ever done).

15. Must attach the link of the certificates and achievements to the resume because there might be times when recruiters take a look at the certificates you have.

Must Read: 12 Best Resume Do’s and Don’ts Tips

Necessary Checks Before Submission 

16. Whether there are grammatical errors in it. Ask a friend to read your resume before submitting it or use the online spell checker. Don’t submit it without proofreading it thrice.

17. The description of the present place of work should contain the verbs of the present tense: work, design, manage. Descriptions of previous jobs should contain verbs in the past tense.

18. The entire resume should have one style of narration, the same applies to abbreviations – if you used abbreviations somewhere, then use them throughout the text (although it is better to abandon abbreviations and write the names in full).

19. The resume format should be easy to read (large margins, no small print, but not too large print, sufficient line spacing, etc.).

20. Use good-quality white paper for the printed version.

21. Always save your resume in pdf format and send your resume in pdf format to companies.

Submit the resume

A lot of people just stick with one avenue. They apply once and then assume that it’s enough which isn’t recommendable. Try all available avenues before sticking to the one.

22. If you’re active on Github, Stack Overflow, LinkedIn, etc, there’s a chance a recruiter will come to you. So it’s good to keep updating your profile and stay active on these platforms.

23. Apply online which means the career page of these companies. It’s tough, but people do get their resumes selected that way.

24 Make connections and take references from your friend or someone who is working in these companies. If someone working in these companies refers you then chances will increase to get shortlisted for the interviews.

25. Try reaching out to Google engineers on Twitter, Quora, or other social media. Remember that your first contact with them is, effectively, a cover letter. Don’t just say “Hi, I’m interested in Google, will you refer me?” Reach out to them and tell them about some of the things you’ve done, and then link them to your resume.

Wrapping Up

People make very common resume mistakes which cost them an opportunity to get into their dream job. The above tips can surely help you to get your resume shortlisted while you apply to FAANG/MAANG companies, no matter what role you’re applying for. Still, if you think you’re lacking or have made mistakes before, you still have ample time to rectify those mistakes. 

Let GeeksforGeeks Resume Builder build you a perfect ATS-proof resume that will highlight the best of your achievements and showcase your skills – all in 1 page, just the way recruiters like it and ATS pass it through.  



Last Updated : 02 May, 2023
Like Article
Save Article
Previous
Next
Share your thoughts in the comments
Similar Reads