A resume that gets past the filters has six parts, in this order: contact details, a three-line summary, experience with achievements that carry a number, education, skills, and languages. All in a single column, with plain section headings, and tuned to the job you're applying for. Build it that way and the hard part is done; the rest of this guide is how to write each part well.
Almost nobody is taught how to write a resume. You copy someone else's, download a pretty template, and start filling in the blanks. The result is usually a long document that lists duties instead of results and looks a lot like the other two hundred resumes sent for the same job.
Resume, CV, or "hoja de vida"?
For most job applications, they're the same thing. In the US and Canada it's called a resume; in the UK, Ireland, and much of the rest of the world, a CV. If you apply across Latin America you'll also see "hoja de vida" or "currículum." CV is short for the Latin curriculum vitae, "the course of one's life." Whichever word the posting uses, it's asking for the same document: a one- or two-page summary of what you can do and where you've done it.
One exception worth knowing: in the US, a "CV" often means a longer academic document with publications and research. If you're not applying to a university or research role, a resume is what they want.
What does change by country are the details. In the US and the UK you leave out the photo, your date of birth, and your marital status; in parts of Latin America and Europe a photo is still common. If the posting doesn't ask for something personal, leave it off.
What goes in a resume, step by step?
1. Contact details
Full name, phone number with country code, email, city and country, and your LinkedIn URL if it's up to date. You don't need your street address. Use an email built on your name (something like firstname.lastname@…) and put all of this in the body of the document, not in the page header: many systems skip that area.
2. A three-line summary
It's the first thing anyone reads, and often the only thing. Three lines that answer three questions: what you do (your role or field), how long you've done it or what you studied, and one concrete achievement or strength you bring. Write it for the job you're applying to, not for every job you could possibly do.
If that sounds a lot like answering "tell me about yourself" in an interview, it's because it is the same thing, in writing.
3. Experience, with achievements that carry a number
Most recent job first. For each role: title, company, city, and dates (month and year, always in the same format), followed by two to four bullet points. The golden rule: every bullet starts with a verb and, whenever possible, ends with a number. "Reduced," "handled," "organized," "sold," "trained." The number can be a percentage, a count of people or customers, time saved, or the volume you handled.
If you don't have the exact figure, an honest order of magnitude works too: "a team of eight," "50+ orders a day." What doesn't work is making it up, because the interview will ask about it.
Internships, volunteer work, and freelance projects count as experience. If that's what you have, it goes here.
4. Education
Degree, school, and graduation year (or "expected" plus the date). If you already have work experience, this section comes after it and takes only a few lines. If you're looking for your first job, it can go above experience, and it's worth adding a project or course related to the role. Certifications go here too, but only the ones relevant to the job.
5. Skills
Written as text, never as bars, stars, or percentages: "Excel 80%" tells nobody anything. Lead with the hard skills (tools, software, standards in your field) and use the same words the job posting uses. Six to ten skills is plenty.
6. Languages
Language and level. If you know your level on the European framework (A1 to C2), use it; if not, describe what you can do: "Spanish: I run client meetings and read technical documents." If the role requires a second language, don't bury it at the bottom of the page: mention it in your summary too.
And how long should all of this be? One page if you have less than ten years of experience; two at most if you have more. Whatever doesn't fit probably wasn't needed.
How does it get past the automated filters?
Before a person reads it, your resume almost always goes through software that ranks it against the posting: the ATS (applicant tracking system). It doesn't judge your career; it tries to read the document and compare it with what the role asks for. To make sure it reads you properly:
- One column, no tables or text boxes.
- Standard section headings: "Experience," "Education," "Skills."
- Text you can select with your cursor, not images or designs exported as pictures.
- The same keywords the posting uses, as long as they're true.
The detail behind each rule, why it exists, and how to check your document in a minute are in our guide to writing an ATS-friendly resume.
Which mistakes should you avoid?
Don't just write: "Responsible, proactive, and eager to learn." Write: "Purchasing analyst with 4 years in manufacturing. Negotiated with 30+ suppliers and cut material costs by 8% in one year." Anyone can write adjectives; only you can write a fact with a number.
Don't just write: "In charge of customer service." Write: "Handled an average of 60 customer requests a day and cut complaints by 30% in one year." The first is a job description; the second is your work.
Don't just write: "Excel." Write: "Advanced Excel: pivot tables and weekly sales reports for senior management." The tool on its own says nothing about how well you use it.
Don't just write: "Intermediate English." Write: "English (B2): I lead weekly calls with clients in English." "Intermediate" means something different to everyone.
Don't just write: "Attention to detail." Write it, and then prove it by proofreading your resume before you send it. Nothing undercuts that skill faster than a typo on the same page, a date that doesn't add up, or another company's name left over in your summary.
This is the mistake people dread most, so get it out of the way before you hit send. Read the whole document out loud: your ear catches what your eye skips. Check that every date uses the same format, that your phone number and email are spelled right, and save the file with a clear name like Firstname-Lastname-Resume.pdf. If you can, ask someone else to read it.
And if something still slips through, breathe. Psychologists call it the "spotlight effect": we believe other people notice our mistakes far more than they actually do. A misplaced comma almost never knocks anyone out; what counts against you is a document that's careless from top to bottom.
What does a complete resume look like? Two examples
Example with experience
Laura Méndez
Bogotá, Colombia · +57 300 000 0000 · laura.mendez@email.com · linkedin.com/in/lauramendez
Summary. Purchasing analyst with 4 years of experience in food manufacturing. Negotiated with 30+ local and international suppliers and cut material costs by 8% in one year. Looking to grow into regional supply management.
Experience
Purchasing Analyst · Alimentos del Valle · Bogotá · 03/2022 – present
- Negotiated annual contracts with 30 suppliers, reducing material costs by 8% in 2025.
- Built an order-tracking dashboard that cut average delivery delays from 12 to 4 days.
- Trained three new team members on the purchasing system.
Purchasing Assistant · Distribuidora Andina · Bogotá · 01/2021 – 02/2022
- Processed 200+ purchase orders a month with 99% accuracy.
- Reorganized the supplier archive, halving the time it took to find a contract.
Education. B.A. in Business Administration · Universidad Nacional de Colombia · 2020. Supplier negotiation course · 2023.
Skills. Supplier negotiation · Inventory management · Cost analysis · Demand planning · Advanced Excel (pivot tables) · ERP system, purchasing module.
Languages. Spanish (native) · English (B2, supplier meetings in English).
First-job example
Andrés Rojas
San José, Costa Rica · +506 0000 0000 · andres.rojas@email.com · linkedin.com/in/andresrojas
Summary. Final-year accounting student with an internship at an audit firm. Took over bank reconciliations for 15 small clients and helped cut their month-end close from 5 to 3 days. Looking for a first role as an accounting assistant.
Education. B.S. in Accounting · Universidad de Costa Rica · expected 12/2026. Capstone project: cash-flow model for a 40-member cooperative.
Experience
Accounting Intern · Auditores Asociados · San José · 02/2026 – 07/2026
- Reconciled bank accounts for 15 clients every month, with no open differences at close.
- Drafted tax returns for 8 small businesses.
Treasurer (volunteer) · Accounting Student Association · 2024 – 2025
- Managed the association's annual budget and published quarterly reports for 300 students.
Skills. Bank reconciliations · IFRS for SMEs · E-invoicing · Excel (pivot tables, VLOOKUP) · Month-end close.
Languages. Spanish (native) · English (B1).
Notice that neither one tells everything. Every line answers a question a recruiter would ask: what does this person do, do they do it well, and are they a fit for this role? And in the first-job example, education moves to the top, while the internship, the volunteer role, and the capstone project do the work that experience would otherwise do.
How do you tailor it to each job?
Sending the same resume to every posting is the most common mistake and the one that costs the most interviews. But tailoring it doesn't mean rewriting it every time. Before you apply, read the posting and underline the three or four things it repeats most: tools, tasks, the results they're after. Then make three changes:
- Rewrite your summary so it names the role and uses two of those words.
- In each job, move the achievement that best matches what they're asking for to the first bullet.
- Reorder your skills so the ones in the posting come first.
That's ten minutes per application. Save each version with the company's name so you know which one you sent where. And if you want to see which words from the posting your resume is missing, you can tailor your resume to the job and compare before you send it.
How can you build it for free, step by step?
If you'd rather not start from a blank page, you can build your resume from scratch in Jobifly: you go section by section, in the same order as this guide, turn your duties into achievements with numbers, and end up with a document ready to get past the automated filters. You don't need to pay anything to start.
And when they call you, practice the interview. In the Jobifly interview simulator, a virtual interviewer asks you the questions for your role by voice and tells you which answer to improve when you finish. Your resume gets you the call; the interview gets you the job.