Build a Resume That Gets You the Interview

Your resume has one job: get you into a conversation. Recruiters and hiring managers often decide in a quick skim whether to keep reading, so every line needs to earn its place.

Start with a clean, simple layout

Fancy templates can look great and still work against you, especially when an applicant tracking system has to read the file. Keep it simple:

• One page. Unless you have years of relevant experience, one page is plenty.
• A readable font between 10.5 and 12 point, with consistent spacing.
• Clear section headings: Education, Experience, Projects, Skills.
• Your name, email, phone, city, and one or two links (portfolio, LinkedIn, or GitHub) at the top.
• Saved and sent as a PDF with a clear name, like FirstName-LastName-Resume.pdf.

Skip the photo, the full street address, and the "Objective" paragraph. Use that space for evidence of what you can do.

Lead with what's most relevant

If you're a student with limited work history, put Education first, then a Projects section that shows your skills in action. Student films, music releases, club social accounts, hackathon builds, and class projects all count. Once you have relevant internship or job experience, move Experience above Education.

Write bullets that show results

Weak resumes list duties. Strong resumes show what changed because you were there. Use this formula:

Action verb + what you did + how you did it + the result or scope

Here's a weak bullet rewritten:

• Weak: Responsible for posting on the film club's Instagram.
• Strong: Planned, shot, and posted three Reels a week for a 40-member film club, using a shared content calendar to promote screenings and grow event sign-ups over the semester.

And another:

• Weak: Helped with editing videos.
• Strong: Edited 12 short promo videos in Premiere Pro on two-day turnarounds, delivering captioned vertical cuts for each platform.

A few rules for every bullet:

• Start with a strong verb: produced, edited, built, coordinated, launched, mixed, wrote, analyzed.
• Add numbers wherever they're honest: how many, how often, how fast, how big.
• Keep each bullet to one or two lines.
• Use past tense for past roles and present tense for current ones.
• Never inflate. If you'd be uncomfortable explaining it in an interview, rewrite it.

Make your skills section specific

"Microsoft Office" and "hard worker" don't tell anyone much. List the tools and skills that match the roles you want, grouped by type:

• Production: Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, call sheets, location scouting
• Music: Pro Tools, Logic Pro, Ableton Live, session prep
• Marketing and social: Canva, CapCut, content calendars, platform analytics
• Tech: JavaScript, Python, Git, Figma

Only list what you could actually use on day one if someone asked.

Tailor it for every application

Tailoring doesn't mean starting from scratch. Keep a master resume with everything you've done, then spend about ten minutes per application:

1. Read the posting and highlight the skills and tasks it mentions most.
2. Reorder your bullets so the most relevant ones come first.
3. Mirror the posting's language where it's honestly true. If they say "content calendar," don't call it a "posting schedule."
4. Cut anything that doesn't support this particular role.
5. Export a fresh PDF with the same clean file name.

Proofread like it matters

Typos are an easy reason to get passed over. Before you hit send:

• Read the whole thing out loud, slowly.
• Check that dates, titles, and job names are correct.
• Click every link to make sure it opens.
• Make sure formatting is consistent, with the same date style and bullet style throughout.
• Ask a friend, mentor, or career center advisor for a second read.

Tip: Keep a running note of wins, projects, and numbers as they happen. Updating your resume is much easier when you aren't trying to remember last spring.

Next step

Pick one internship that excites you, tailor your resume to it using the steps above, and apply. Browse internships to find your first target.