Christina Martin

A Stanford study just analyzed 4 million real job applications — and the findings explain why so many job seekers are hitting a brick wall. Here's what algorithmic monoculture means for your resume, and what you can do about it.

This is the single most common question I get and see in resumes — across every industry, every level, and every career stage. The bullets on the page describe what someone was expected to do in their role, but they don’t show what that person actually accomplished. And that distinction is the difference between a resume that earns interviews and one that gets passed over. What Are Responsibilities? Responsibilities are the duties that came with your job. They’re the things listed in the job...

You know the moment. It’s the look on a client’s face, mid-Zoom, mid-sentence, when they realize that the thing they’ve been doing at work for years is actually a real, measurable, impressive accomplishment. They just never saw it that way before. “Wow. I’m more impressed with myself.” I hear some version of that in almost every session I do. And it’s why I named this blog The Lightbulb Moment. Because the hardest part of writing a great resume isn’t formatting or keywords or beating the...