You need evidence, even without a job title
Your first resume can draw on coursework, personal projects, volunteering, student clubs and internships. Choose examples that show skills needed for the role. A small project you understand is more useful than a long list of technologies you cannot explain.
A simple section order
- Name, email, phone and relevant professional links.
- A short target-role summary, if it adds useful context.
- Education and relevant coursework.
- Two or three relevant projects.
- Technical or role-specific skills.
- Internships, volunteering or leadership experience, where applicable.
Put your strongest relevant evidence earlier. You do not need an empty Work Experience section. Start with one page when the content fits comfortably; do not stretch a short history just to fill a template.
Example summary for a junior analyst
Recent graduate with project experience analysing sales data using SQL and spreadsheets. Built a dashboard to compare monthly revenue and investigate missing records. Seeking a junior analyst role combining data validation and clear reporting.
The example is fictional. Adapt the degree, tools and project to your background. Avoid “expert” or “industry experience” when your work was academic. Being clear about project context makes the application easier to trust.
Turn a class project into useful bullets
Weak: Made a sales dashboard.
- Cleaned a sample sales dataset by standardising dates and checking duplicate invoice IDs.
- Wrote SQL aggregations for monthly revenue and product-level sales, then checked totals against the source file.
- Built a dashboard with filters and documented how refunds affected the revenue calculation.
Include the question, your contribution and how you checked the result. Mention the size of a dataset only when you know it and it helps explain the work. Label tutorial-based projects honestly and explain what you changed or extended.
Make other experience relevant
A student society role can show planning, communication and responsibility. Describe the task you owned: coordinating speakers, reconciling an event budget or maintaining registration records. Use measured outcomes where available, but do not invent a percentage to make a bullet sound impressive.
Before you apply
- Use a working email address and test every project link in a private browser window.
- Check that education dates and grades match your records.
- Remove empty sections, skill-rating bars and unsupported claims.
- Read the employer's file-format instructions and review the exported file.
- Prepare a short explanation of your strongest project.
For general writing guidance, Harvard's resume and cover-letter resource is a useful reference. Our examples here are original illustrations. When ready, use the free resume builder and practise explaining your project in Mars AI Interview.