We love working with our senior leaders in the educational equity space. We love the diversity of their experience, the perspective they bring to their job search, and the strengths they’ve built over their careers. And we especially love hearing the (often winding!) journeys of their professional lives.
But with 20+ years of experience, creating a cohesive and compelling resume that tells a clear story can be a challenge. We’re here to help!
More Isn’t Always Better
There is a common misconception that listing everything you’ve ever done on your resume will make you stand out as a superstar. But in reality, all-encompassing resumes often do the opposite. Hiring teams tell us they struggle to see what a candidate is best at versus just what jobs they’ve held. A strong resume doesn’t show breadth, it’s driven by depth.
Instead of reporting everything you’ve done, think of your resume as an argument for why you’re the right fit for this role.
Define Your Next Step
One of our favorite questions to ask in our career coaching calls is: “What’s next?” When you have so many different pathways in front of you, it can be difficult to “call your shot” and choose one of those pathways. However we won’t move forward in our conversation, or with our guidance in resume writing, until we know where we want to be.
To get there, we suggest you ask yourself, “of all the pathways, what functional area are you most interested in? What role(s) are you writing this resume for?” Answering these questions gives us a North Star to guide the structure and content of your resume.
Cut the Clutter, Even Work You’re Proud Of
This is the hard part: we likely have to shorten or completely cut roles and accomplishments you value. If it’s not relevant, if it requires too much context to communicate impact, or if it’s over ten years ago…we don’t need it. Again, your resume isn’t a report. It’s an argument supporting your strengths and track record of results.
For example, we worked with a senior leader that included her Peace Corps experience from 1998, and I completely understood why! This Peace Corps experience had transformed her professional ambitions and was something she referenced often when describing her leadership experience. However, that is something that could come up during the interview process and doesn’t need to be on a resume.
Show Your Results, Not Your Role
This might be the most important shift. Titles and responsibilities don’t tell your story, results do. For example, a bullet saying “leading a district of 25,000 employees” is impressive in scale, but tells me nothing about the impact you and your leadership had during your tenure. “Lead district of 25,000 FTEs to highest staff retention ever?” That’s a defined result! We are happy to help you find, link and quantify your results.
Create Multiple Versions of Your Resume
Finally, we strongly recommend having a few different versions of your resume. These could be organized by function (instructional focus, operations focus, partnership focus), or by organization type (district/network, school support organization, non-profit, funder). This will help make those tough choices of what to include and what to omit (for now!), so you are telling that consistent, data-driven story about the most relevant experiences you’ve had for this particular opportunity.
Final Thoughts
A senior leader’s resume isn’t about capturing every detail, it’s about making a clear, compelling case for why you’re the right fit for this next step in your career. By focusing on what’s next, cutting unnecessary details, emphasizing impact, and tailoring your resume to different roles, you’ll create a document that truly works for you.
Need help refining your resume? We’d love to support you in telling your story.
