Resume- Ultimate Guide to Resume Preparation

Mon Jun 7, 2021

You shall be quite aware and selective of the things that shall go on your resume. Here are a few examples:

YES to:

• Name and contact details
• Courses, internships, and Skills
• Previous professional experiences (if any)
• Awards / certificates/ honours
• Blog / portfolio/ website links
• references

• Irrelevant social media handles
• Irrelevant experiences
• false information
• Grammatical / spelling errors
• Unnecessary Hobbies or interests
• Negative remarks regarding someone

An example would be - a growing marketing manager with 5-years in sales. Whereas for a fresher, it can be A fresh marketing manager with Masters's degree with a specialization in Marketing and creative and innovative ideas to engage customers. 

A summary statement is, well, a summary. It can be a paragraph or bullet points. It shall summarize all your skills and work experiences. It shall basically be the reason for hiring you for the position. New professionals may not have a lot to fill in here, so they can write their resume objective statement.

Next comes formatting. Select an appropriate format and organize all the information as per it. Make sure everything looks proper and professional, with only relevant details included. You can have a chronological, functional, or combination format. Mostly, a combination format (also called the hybrid) is used as it is the most widely used and highlights your experience and skills equally, best for a new position or a better one on the same road. You can modify your resume specifically according to your job role.

Your name and contact details, which shall include your phone number and professional email id, shall be visible and the viewer should not have to search for it. You can add your address as well, but it isn't a necessity.

Tip: to make things easier you can add your LinkedIn URL, shortened if possible. 

Now comes the time to become meticulous. Add in intricate details of your previous work experiences, internships, the courses and activities you've completed, the skills you have, and such relevant things. 

When we mention activities, we mean all the profession-related activities you have done or enjoyed doing, for instance, learning languages, reading business-related books/ articles/ journals, etc, and not simply any and every activity which has no relation to the job position whatsoever. 

Before a job experience, working as an intern looks really well on a resume and creates a great impression. There are really good websites where you can find internships for CA students. 

If possible, dive deep while describing your work experiences. The company name, Your position, duration of the work, location of the company, samples of your work there (if allowed to reveal), accomplishments, and certificates during the work. Ensure that everything is visible.

Also add in good references, if any. Your references can be your former employer, professors, or such, and avoid adding your family members or relatives. References assure the employer that they can trust you and your application and have the chance of cross-checking in with someone to verify you and your work ethics and other things. Although, always ask the person before listing them down as your reference.

Mention your education and qualifications. All your degrees, courses, and certifications shall be shown to create an image of a well-qualified applicant.

Your awards and achievements are something that can grab attention. Jot down the achievements and where you earned them while doing what. Sometimes, even when you do not have a lot of industry experience in that specific field, your awards can persuade minds. A brief telling of how it is relevant to your desired field helps out, so add that as well.

Keywords play a significant role. If your resume keywords match the ones given in the job ad, you have a higher chance of getting an interview. While final reviewing and polishing your resume, try to add words that your employer will most likely use, or look for. They need to be used in the right context and reflect your actual skills/achievements. Do not use keywords just for the sake of having them in your resume.

Don’t overdo it. And don’t lie.

There are two main categories of keywords the recruiters or managers are looking for: 

(1) job-related skills and (2) action verbs. 

Job-related keywords describe your primary skills (both hard and soft) and your core qualifications for this particular job.

Once you’ve pinpointed all relevant keywords from the job description, it’s time to put them down in your own resume. Listed at the end are some relevant and useful keywords you can use for your resume.

Even if you still have doubts and worries regarding your resume, it's no harm and in fact best to learn from some professional. We have the Getting Interview Ready (GIR) workshop that helps you out with such aspects of the interview part, which includes a good resume. This workshop will not only teach you

• How to build your strong and impactful resume
• Tried and tested Resume & Cover Letter templates that will give you results
• Personal resume feedback and pro tips
• The only resume checklist you will need

A resume is a vital element and a game-changer from being an applicant to a potential employee. The hiring teams first look at a resume and then you. It's all a game of first impressions.

143 Finance and Accounting Resume Keywords

1. (FASB) Financial Accounting Standards Board
2. Accounting
3. Accounts Payable
4. Accounts Receivable
5. Adjusting/closing entries
6. Analysis/analyzing
7. Annual Budget
8. Annual Reports
9. Asset Management
10. Audit/auditing/audit controls
11. Automatic Data Processing (ADP)
12. Balance sheet
13. Benefits administration
14. Billing
15. Bond(s)
16. Budget/budgeting/budget control
17. Business plan
18. Buyout
19. CAD (Cash Against Documents)
20. Campaign
21. Capital budget
22. Cashflow
23. Cash Flow Statement (CFS)
24. Cash management
25. CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst)
26. Chart of accounts
27. Client/client base
28. Collections
29. Commercial lending
30. Compliance
31. Consumer lending
32. Contract management
33. Corporate governance
34. Corporate treasury
35. Cost accounting
36. Cost-benefit analysis
37. Cost-Effective
38. Cost of goods sold (COGS)
39. Cost reduction and avoidance
40. Credit management
41. Data Analysis
42. Data Collection/Entry
43. Data Management
44. Data Quality
45. Debt management
46. Debt refinancing
47. Debt service
48. Debt to worth
49. Depreciation/accelerated depreciation
50. Disbursements
51. Discount cash flow
52. Dividend(s)
53. Due diligence
54. EBIT/EBITDA
55. Efficiencies
56. Equity
57. Equity underwriting
58. Expenditures
59. Expense analysis
60. FAFSA
61. Fast-paced
62. Feasibility
63. Financial Analysis
64. Financial Management
65. Financial Modeling
66. Financial Planning
67. Financial Reporting
68. Financial Statements
69. Fixed assets
70. Fixed cost
71. Forecast/forecasting
72. Foreign exchange
73. GAAP
74. General accounting
75. General Ledger
76. High stress
77. Income Statement
78. Inflow/outflow
79. Initial Public Offering (IPO)
80. Interest rate(s)
81. Internal controls
82. International Financial Reporting Standards
83. Inventory control
84. Inventory management
85. Investment analysis/management
86. Investor relations
87. Invoicing
88. Job (order) costing
89. Journal/journaling
90. Lending
91. Letter of credit
92. Liabilities/liability
93. Liquidity
94. Loan administration
95. Machine Learning
96. Management reporting
97. Markets
98. Mergers and acquisitions
99. Mutual fund(s)
100. Net present value (NPV)
101. Net worth
102. Operating reports
103. Overhead
104. Payroll administration
105. Portfolio Analysis
106. Process improvement
107. Profit and loss analysis
108. Profit and loss statement (P&L)
109. Projections
110. Public speaking
111. Purchase accounting
112. Quarterly/year-end reporting
113. Real estate
114. Receipts
115. Reconciliations
116. Regulations
117. Relationship management
118. Reporting and analysis
119. Revenue Growth
120. Reverse takeover
121. Risk Management
122. ROE/ROI/ROA
123. Sarbanes Oxley
124. Securities
125. Shareholders
126. Spreadsheets
127. Standards
128. Statistical models
129. Stock(s)
130. Strategic Planning
131. Strategic Thinking
132. Tax accounting
133. Taxation Compliance
134. Technology
135. Transaction
136. Treasury
137. Trend analysis
138. Underwriting
139. Valuation
140. Variance analysis
141. Vendor
142. Venture capital
143. Yield