Accounting Resume Book

Click here to read a detailed description of the accounting resume book.

RESUME WRITING TIPS FOR ACCOUNTING POSITIONS
Whether you're applying for an advanced or an entry level accounting position you will strengthen your accounting resume by categorizing your accounting experience. To illustrate this point, we'll look at two examples below. One for an experienced accountant and one for a recent graduate with minimal accounting experience.

An Experienced Accountant
As an example, we'll use Monty who wants an Assistant to the Controller position. Below you'll see a section from Monty’s before resume. Does this section (shown in red below) present Monty as well qualified for an Assistant to the Controller position?
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Before Resume

EXPERIENCE:
Nine years of experience in these responsibilities:
Accounts payable, accounts receivable, purchase orders, general ledger and customer service. Bank reconciliation, supervision and training of 2-6 people, fixed assets, inventory control, office management and payroll data entry.

Additional experience:
Organizing and managing special projects helping to implement new software, chart of account maintenance, maintaining accounting procedures and assisting the controller.
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Did you notice that the very last words in the last section of Monty’s resume address his experience as an Assistant to the Controller? Since Monty has already assisted the controller--and he wants another position doing this--he needs to highlight this experience. Now take a moment and review a very abbreviated section of Monty’s after resume shown in red below.
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After Resume

Assistant to Controller, Southwest Oil 1994-1997

Corporate Accounting Supervisor
Managed 3 sets of books, working directly with Controller to oversee 12 divisions for firm with annual revenues in excess of $125 million.

Project Management
Organized and supervised special projects such as implementation of $2 million computer system utilized by 200 employees.

Client Relations and Contract Administration
Controlled 2,000 accounts receivable accounts and 200 vendor contracts and accounts payable accounts.
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You can see why Monty’s new resume increased his request for interviews by over 60% and landed him a position paying $10,000 more. Categorizing his Assistant to Controller experience gave employers a broad view of Monty’s skills at a glance.

Recent Graduate with Minimal Experience
Cynthia had worked as an Assistant Apartment Manager. She completed an A.A.S. Degree in Accounting and wanted to land her first full time bookkeeping or accounting position. Here’s a section from her before resume shown in red below.
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Before Resume

Assistant Apartment Manager
Answered phones, accepted and recorded rent payments, previewed apartments with potential renters. Supervised office in place of manager who lived off site and was absent 70% of the time. Reviewed and approved credit reports. Hired and supervised maintenance providers.
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Now read a section from Cynthia’s new resume shown in red below. Does this sound like an entirely different person. As you can see this description also categorizes the skills Cynthia gained as an Assistant Apartment Manager.
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After Resume

Accounting and Administrative Management
Managed all accounting and administrative functions for a complex generating revenues of $500,000 annually (in absence of manager who was off site 60% of the time).

Credit Approval and Lease Negotiation
Processed credit applications, reviewed and approved credit reports for up to 100 applications per year.

Hiring of Vendors and Subcontract Administration
Managed subcontract agreements for renovation projects valued to $1 million; conducted inspections and gave final project approval for vendor payment.
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Again, you can see by categorizing skills that Cynthia had gained as an Assistant Apartment Manager--which are accounting-related--she greatly strengthened her resume.

If you have extensive experience in the Accounting field and are seeking positions in the $20,000 to $100,000+ range, then I recommend that you purchase my newest resume book, Proven Resumes: Strategies That Have Increased Salaries. You can read a complete, section by section description of this book by clicking on Proven Resumes Book in the left hand column.

If you are a recent graduate from an Accounting program and are seeking positions in the $8 to $16 an hour range and prefer not to read a longer book, then I recommend that you purchase my accounting resume book - 6 Easy Steps to Create Resumes and Cover Letters for Accounting Students.

All of the resume, cover letter, thank you letter and scanned resume examples in the accounting resume book were written strictly for accounting positions. It contains 78 skill headings, skills and 40 sample sentences for the Accounting field to make creating an accounting resume easy.

The accounting resume book opens by analyzing three sets of full-length resumes and teaching you how they were improved. It then takes you through 6 easy steps to create your resume and provides detailed step by step worksheets that guide you every step of the way.

The first step guides you in listing all of your skills and skill lists are provided for 12 of the most common career fields (this allows you to market both your technical skills and skills gained from other fields besides Accounting). In the second step, you're then guided in determining if skill headings or job titles will market you the best. Many job seekers have titles that are unrelated to the jobs they want. In this instance, they are better off marketing skills.

In the third step, you're shown how to analyze want ads to identify keywords and experience employers want and are shown how to incorporate them into your resume. In the forth step, you decide which titles and skill headings that you've developed are the best match for the ad - you then use these in your resume.

In the fifth step, you begin describing each skill heading or job title you'll use in your resume. To supplement this step you're provided with 12 Questions to help you fully describe your skills as illustrated by the last example in red above.

In the sixth step, you complete your objective, employment and education sections. Again, you're provided with worksheets for each step and examples of how to complete each section of your resume are included.

Two examples are provided that show you how to target your resume for specific positions. Targeting your resume often makes the difference between landing or not landing interviews.

You are also provided with full-length before and after cover letters and you are shown how to analyze ads to develop powerful keyword headings for your cover letter paragraphs. After the cover letter section you are provided with full-length thank you letters. The thank-you letter examples will show you how to remind the employer of your top skills and to market additional skills not mentioned in your resume or during an interview.

The last four pages of the book cover how to convert your nicely formatted resume into scannable and ASCII format.