I stopped trying to sound professional on my resume and just wrote what I actually did. It doubled my callback rate.
For months, I was doing what everyone says you should do. I used words like synergized, spearheaded, and optimized cross-functional workflows. My resume sounded like a corporate robot wrote it. And for months, I heard absolutely nothing back.
I was getting so frustrated that one night, I decided to run an experiment. I took my resume and stripped out all the jargon. Instead of writing (facilitated client onboarding processes to maximize retention), I just wrote (helped 50 new clients set up their accounts so they wouldn't cancel).
Instead of (spearheaded revenue generating initiatives), I wrote (found a way to save the company $10,000 a month on software we weren't using).
I didn't change my experience or my skills. I just explained them the way I would explain them to a friend over coffee.
I sent this new, dumbed down version to five jobs the next morning. Within 48 hours, I got two callbacks. One recruiter actually told me on the phone, It was so refreshing to read a resume where I actually understood what you did on a daily basis."
We get so caught up trying to beat the ATS filters with buzzwords that we forget a real human being has to read the thing eventually. If they have to read a sentence three times to figure out what your actual job was, they are just going to move on to the next person.
If you are stuck in the resume black hole right now, try reading your bullet points out loud. If you sound like a corporate press release, rewrite it like a normal person. It might feel weird at first, but it works.