AI Optimized/Scannable Résumés

Newton, Jobscan, Talentsquare, & Textkernel are programs employers use to run OCR on scannable, plain text, and/or inline resumes.

Prefatory Note

Up until five or ten years ago, the predominant thinking is that job seekers should prepare a scannable resume—a physical copy of a resume and/or a digital copy ready for “scanning” and OCR (optical character recognition).

Scanning means taking a physical, paper document, running it through a scanner, and turning it into a digital file (usually a .pdf file).

Simply doing that—running a print document into a scanner and turning it into a pdf means that the text on the page is an image—like a photograph of text. Have you ever had a professor who scans pages of a book or article, saves it as a pdf, and then uploads to Canvas? Have you ever opened up one of these files, tried to highlight a passage of text, and were unable to? If this happened to you, it’s likely the pdf file is just an image of text (not actually text itself).

If, on the other hand, you opened up the pdf file and were able to highlight specific lines, words, or passages, it’s likely the pdf has undergone OCR—optical character recognition—and your computer recognizes the text as text.

So, back to five or ten years ago… a scannable résumé generally referred to a resume that was scanned into a computer as a digital image, and then turned into searchable text using an optical character recognition (OCR) application.

Today, most job applications happen digitally. Some employers will ask you to copy and paste the text of your resume into a text box. Since you’re pasting text, there’s no need to run OCR—any computer can already read the text as text. Some employers may ask you to upload a .pdf copy of your resume—and, depending on a number of variables—some sort of OCR like application is likely to turn your pdf into plain text.

But how—and how well—will the employer’s application turn your file into text? It depends… again on a number of factors… and what determines how an employer’s applicant tracking system (ATS) will us AI to narrow down applicant pools, select the best candidates, and determine whose resume is evaluated by human eyes?

So many variables! We will discuss the variables in class.

For now—for the purposes of this course material on AI optimized/scannable resumes—we’re going to walk through what you need to know about AI optimized/scannable resumes as you prepare to enter the job market.

Introduction

A scannable résumé generally refers to a resume that is scanned into a computer using an optical character recognition (OCR) application. OCR, or optical character recognition, applications turn scanned or digital images into searchable text.

After a resume is scanned using OCR, it is turned into a searchable text file that employers can use to find ideal applicants by searching for keywords (by human hand or with the use of AI) contained within the file/s.

OCR programs are built into various job search platforms, and are also available as standalone applications such as Newton, Talent Square, Text Kernal, and Job Scan.

The key to creating a good AI optimized/scannable resume is to do everything in your power to create a resume that is scanned cleanly and a resume that will return the maximum number of “hits” by anticipating what employers (or employers’ AI systems) will search for and how they will search. For that reason, good AI optimized/scannable resumes don’t look like traditional paper resumes, and they don’t use the same language, either.

For our purposes, we will discuss three important areas of revision required to turn a traditional resume into a AI optimized/scannable resume: formatting, keywords, and language shifts.

(These rules work for other formats of electronic resumes, too—inline and plain text resumes. Inline resumes are those copied and pasted into the body of an email, and plain text resumes are those copied and pasted into text input boxes in online application systems. Both inline and plain text resumes should be formatted for “electronic” reading and optimized for searchability to maximize “hits.”)

What Does an AI Optimized/Scannable Resume Look Like?

AI optimized/scannable resumes

• are very plain (boring)
• are usually longer than two pages
• are “plain” text with no formatting, no graphic highlighting (no bolding, no italics, and no underlining), and no non-text elements (no bullet points, no dividing lines)
• are in 12pt or 14pt basic sans-serif font, usually Helvetica or Arial
• are entirely left aligned, use no indentation (no tabs), and have a ragged right margin
• use little or no punctuation

AI Optimized/Scannable Resume Formatting

Why Does Formatting Matter?

The image at the top right shows a professional formatting traditional print resume. It uses a professional serif font (Literata), and has has a few non-text elements (diamond shaped separators, thin blue dividing lines, bullet points), some graphic highlighting for contrast (boldface font), and uses columns and indentations to organize content and lay out information in an aesthetically pleasing manner.

The image just below it shows the OCR scan of that same print resume. As you can see, the non-text elements are turned into non-text elements (big ugly squares, random characters) or ignored. The serifs on the font in the print version make some of the letters too close together for clean OCR recognition, turning words like “writing” into “wribng” and “marketing” into “marketnng.”

AI Optimized/Scannable Format Rules

AI optimized/scannable resumes use plain, clear, highly machine-readable font, and

• should use 12pt or 14pt sans-serif font, usually Helvetica or Arial
• should use a plain, regular typeface (do not use type styles; do not use boldface, italics, or underlining)
• should be plain text only (do not use lines, rules, boxes, or other non-text elements)
• should be left aligned with no indentation
• should use little or no punctuation

Keywords

In incorporating keywords into a AI optimized/scannable resume, you should try to anticipate what employers might search for.

Consider including

• commonly searched for terms
• terms in the job advertisement (or job ads for your field/position more generally)
• buzzwords (in the industry or field)
• valued interpersonal traits/skills
• synonyms and alternate ways to say/write things

Some sources suggest creating a list of keywords to maximize the chances that searched-for terms and phrases will appear in your resume. Many sample AI optimized/scannable resumes have lists of keywords.

I strongly disagree with this advice for a few reasons:

• Often, the keyword section contains skills, characteristics, experiences, etc. the resume author couldn’t otherwise incorporate into their resume. But why couldn’t they incorporate the keywords? Often, the resume author can’t find more natural ways to fit the terms into their resumes because they either don’t possess the characteristic/skills, or can’t actually demonstrate that they have it or use it.
• Incorporating a list of keywords often appears to be keyword stuffing (which is, or appears to be, unethical)
• It’s lazy. It takes two seconds to copy and paste a list of keywords into a resume. It takes two minutes to write out a list of keywords. It takes time and effort to thoughtfully consider keywords and find ways to ethically incorporate them into your resume.

Bottom Line?: For the purposes of your Job Search Portfolio project AI optimized/scannable resume, you should not have a “Keyword” section or list a bunch of words hoping to maximize “hits” or matches. While I encourage you to use keywords (words likely to be searched for), you need to find ways of ethically and naturally incorporating them into your resume.

Shifting: Verbs to Nouns & Past to Present

Verbs → Nouns

As part of anticipating what terms employers might search for, applicants should think about what grammatical forms might be searched over others.

Think about how you use a search engine like Google to search for information (including goods and services). If you are looking for someone to walk your dog while you’re at work, would you search for “walk [dog]” (verb / [noun])? Or would you search for “dog walker” (noun)? If you were searching for someone to do your hair before a special event, would you search for “styling [hair]” (verb / [noun])? Or would you search for “hair stylist” (noun)?

In most cases, you’d search using nouns instead of verbs. In the same regard, employers search using nouns over verbs. To anticipate these searches, when possible, shift action verbs to nouns.

Past Tense → Present Tense

If and when employers search for verbs, they’re more likely to search for present tense verbs over past tense verbs. It makes sense when you consider how an employer looking for a new employee might think—they think about the present and the future and not about the past. They want someone who can do and will do—not someone who did.

To anticipate these searches, shift past tense verbs to present tense (even if the action was one you did in the past).

How to “Write” an AI Optimized/Scannable Resume

Here’s what I do to create an AI optimized/scannable resume.

1) Research, Draft, Revise Traditional (Print) Resume

• research, draft, revise, and edit your traditional (print) resume—chronological, skills (functional), or combination (hybrid/mixed)

2) Format AI Optimized/Scannable Resume

• copy all of the text in your traditional resume, open a new file, and paste as unformatted or plain text (“Paste Special” in Word)
• adjust any remaining formatting according to the list of “dos” and “don’ts” below:

3) Revise/Edit Resume Content to Optimize for AI and Scannability

After you have a plain text version of your resume, go through your text carefully and make the following adjustments, additions, and deletions

• remove all punctuation—remove anything that isn’t a letter or number
• put headings and subheadings in all caps
• where/when possible, shift verbs to nouns
• shift whatever remaining verbs to present tense (get rid of past tense verbs)
• when/where possible, include synonyms, full-spellings and/or acronyms, alternate spellings
• check nouns and verbs against the job advertisement—when possible, use the same language as the job ad
• anticipate commonly searched for terms—buzzwords, interpersonal traits, applicable field/industry/position terms and find ways to incorporate into resume content (ethically and as naturally as possible)

AI Optimized/Scannable (Partial) Example