Best Practices for Creating a USAJobs Federal Resume

As you may well know, many federal positions out there (if not most) require you to use the USAJobs resume builder when applying for government job openings. Keep the following best practices in mind to help ensure a targeted and effective resume.

1. Find a job at www.usajobs.gov, and read the entire vacancy announcement from top to bottom.
2. Pay close attention to the duties, qualifications, specialized experience, KSAs, time-in-grade, and/or education requirements. Ask yourself, “Will I be able to demonstrate that I have what they are looking for in my resume?”
3. Think of the duties and qualifications as “questions” and consider whether you have done them in a previous or current position. If so, use some of the terminology/keywords and mix them in with your own duties and accomplishments.
4. If there is an assessment questionnaire, click the link to preview the questions. Keep these USAJobs resume tips in mind when creating your resume.
5. For each position going back approximately 10 years, include your key duties/scope of responsibility. Next, include your top 5-10 specific achievements for each position. Try to use bullets that are relevant to the position you are applying for and use the Challenge-Context-Action-Result format whenever possible.
6. Write your resume offline using Microsoft Word, making sure the content in each job is under 5,000 characters.
7. Proofread your work for any errors! Use spell check and ask a friend or colleague to take a look.
8. Take a final “editorial” look, and ask yourself, “If I were the reviewer, would I be able to clearly see that this person possesses the skills, knowledge, KSAs, specialized experience, etc. that I am looking for in the job announcement?”
9. Read the How to Apply and Required Documents sections very carefully. Send in exactly what is requested/required—nothing more and nothing less. For example, if a cover letter or transcripts are not asked for, don’t submit any.