It is a truth universally acknowledged that recruiters and hiring managers never read a Professional Summary. 

And, to be honest, I rarely read them either when I’m reviewing resumes!

But that’s not because a Professional Summary is useless. It’s because most Professional Summaries don’t provide useful information. 

For a recruiter, useful information is information that helps them (quickly!) decide which pile to place someone in: don’t interview, consider interviewing, definitely interview. 

When I or a recruiter says, “I don’t read Professional Summaries,” what we really mean is “I read the first phrase or two.  When it’s banal … or cliched … or says ‘objective: to find [the exact job I’m hiring for]’ … or I can pretty much guess what’s next, I look at the next section.” 

We all read Professional Summaries when they are useful — that is, when they answer the question, “should I interview this person to learn more about why they could be the right person for the job?” 

As an edskipper, I would argue that a well-written Professional Summary can make a difference in moving you out of the ‘don’t interview’ pile. Too often edskippers get overlooked when they’re applying because their most recent job doesn’t quickly (appear to) translate. 

There are a few reasons I think this is true. First, your most relevant experience is likely scattered throughout your resume, and it might not be quickly apparent how deep your relevant experience is. Most folks who work in education do twenty different things as part of their overall job. For example, if you coordinate a program, that’s probably only part of your job – you’re also teaching, serving on committees, leading professional development, and supervising a club (or five). If you’ve been a program coordinator in three of your five roles, then that’s a lot of experience that gets buried if you’re not doing that in your current job. A well-written Professional Summary lets you feature that program management experience and combine accomplishments from three jobs into a single sentence. 

And second, the professional summary doesn’t make the case to a recruiter for why they should hire you. I often hear educators say, ‘if they could just talk to me for a minute or two, they’d see why I am so qualified.’ A well-written Professional Summary gives you precisely that chance to make your case to the recruiter and say, “here’s exactly why I’m qualified.”

 It can be a powerful tool to differentiate your experience from other educators and other candidates by showcasing your unique skills first. 

A Professional Summary is similar to the advertising blurbs on a book jacket. It’s also similar to those paragraphs at the beginning of a job description we love so much that give a high-level intro to the position. 

Even if (well, when) a recruiter skims this section, it will give them important context to know what to look for as they continue reading the rest of your resume. 

That said, writing a Professional Summary is intense. It’s hard work to summarize a career in a few sentences and feels emotionally awkward to ‘brag’ about our accomplishments. So in today’s post, I’m going to share the three weaknesses I most frequently see in Professional Summaries as well as share strategies to write a strong Professional Summary, whether you’re applying to roles that are looking for exactly the experience you have or relevant skills. 

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