How to Organize Resume Sections: 5 Must-Have Sections & Tips

When you submit your resume for a job, it’ll most likely be processed through an applicant tracking system (ATS) before a human recruiter reviews it. For the ATS and the recruiter to properly evaluate you as a candidate, your resume must meet their expectations, and that starts with writing and formatting must-have resume sections.

In this guide, you’ll learn what the main sections of a resume are and how to write each one, with formatting tips and examples to help you organize your resume so your strengths shine. You’ll also get tips on optional sections to consider for maximum impact and answers to common questions about how to arrange and optimize your resume for job search success.

What Sections Should Be on a Resume?

First things first: How many sections should a resume have, and what are the key sections of a resume? Resumes vary depending on whether you’re a recent graduate, changing careers, or looking to move up in leadership. But no matter what your level of experience is or what industry you’re in, experts say you should include five key sections on a resume:

1. Contact information
2. Resume summary or objective
3. Work experience
4. Skills
5. Education

While these five sections are essential, you’re not strictly limited to them, either. As long as you share relevant information for your target job and employer and keep your resume concise, you can include additional sections, such as certifications and volunteer work. Keep reading to learn how to write those extra sections to present your achievements effectively.

How to Write the 5 Must-Have Resume Sections

Before we dive into additional sections, let’s go through the information you should include in each resume section and why the details matter to recruiters and can help you land a job.

1. Contact Information

Every resume must begin with a section for your contact information, meaning your name for identification purposes, different methods of contact, and details about your work location. This information is basic, but it serves a real purpose in your initial candidate screening.

• Your name: Including your full name allows employers to identify you and differentiate you from other applicants, as well as conduct a quick search to verify your identity and perform an initial screening for red flags.
• Your work location: Your location is a key factor in helping employers determine whether you’re a suitable candidate for legal and financial reasons, such as tax laws, salary ranges, and licensing requirements. Employers will also use your location to assess whether you can work on-site, commute, or align with time zones for work-from-home jobs. To protect your privacy, all you need to list is your city and state; there’s no need to include your full address.
• Your contact information: Sharing your contact details, such as your phone number and email, makes it easier for recruiters to reach you about the hiring process.

Example resume contact information section:

Gracie Peterson

555-555-5555 | example@email.com | Princeton, NJ

Some optional details you can add to your resume’s contact information, if they’re relevant to your profession, include:

• Your LinkedIn profile
• Your portfolio or professional website with work samples
• Professional, work-related social media accounts

Example resume contact information section with LinkedIn profile:

Gracie Peterson

555-555-5555 | example@email.com | Princeton, NJ

https://www.linkedin.com/in/gracie-peterson

2. Resume Summary or Objective

After your contact information, include a brief statement that introduces yourself to employers by highlighting your most relevant qualifications for the position. This section is crucial because it gives the hiring manager a quick overview of your credentials and experience, and a recruiter will usually know if you’re a potential candidate just by looking at this section.

To avoid having your resume discarded into the reject pile, you’ve got to tailor this section to the particular job you’re applying for and play to your strengths.

You can opt for one of two approaches—the summary strategy or the objective strategy:

• Resume summary: Preferred by recruiters, a resume summary lists key qualifications for the role, such as your profession, years of experience, top skills, and at least one impressive career accomplishment.
• Resume objective: Also known as a career objective or objective statement, a resume objective benefits candidates with little to no relevant experience or career gaps. While you should mention any job-relevant skills you possess, you also want to share a bit about your goals for this job and how you plan to accomplish them.

Example resume summary section:

Results-driven marketing professional with over 7 years of experience developing and executing successful digital campaigns. Skilled in SEO, content strategy, and data analytics, with a proven track record of increasing organic traffic by 60% year over year. Adept at using creative problem-solving to drive brand growth and audience engagement.

Example resume objective section:

Motivated recent graduate with a degree in computer science seeking a junior software developer role. Eager to apply strong coding skills in Python and Java while contributing to collaborative projects and gaining hands-on experience in full-stack development to support the company’s technology goals.

3. Work Experience

Your resume’s work experience section is essential because it allows employers to get an overview of your work history. They can learn a lot about you just by knowing your past job titles, where you worked, and for how long.

You should always be truthful when writing your work experience section because employers can (and most likely will) verify that information by contacting your previous employers. Any discrepancies between what you wrote on your resume and what previous employers share are a big red flag and can cost you the job.

Depending on the resume format you choose, which we’ll delve into more in-depth below, you can opt to include a few bullet points describing what you achieved in each job. When drafting these bullet points, you want to focus on unique achievements and results instead of generic job duties to show employers exactly how your contributions benefited the company.

Example resume work experience section:

Work Experience

Marketing Coordinator
Allora, New York, NY | June 2022 – Present

• Developed and executed digital marketing campaigns, increasing website traffic by 45% in one year.
• Managed social media accounts, growing followers by 30% and boosting engagement through targeted content.
• Collaborated with cross-functional teams to launch product promotions, achieving a 20% increase in sales.

Marketing Assistant
Creative Edge Agency, Brooklyn, NY | January 2020 – May 2022

• Assisted in creating email marketing campaigns that improved open rates by 25%.
• Conducted market research to support new client pitches and campaign strategies.
• Coordinated events and promotional activities, contributing to a 15% growth in client acquisitions.

4. Skills

The skills section of a resume consists of a list of six to eight of your best professional skills for the job. While your work experience serves as a detailed description of your accomplishments, your skills section offers recruiters a quick snapshot of your areas of expertise, proficiency with tools, and interpersonal abilities that make you the best candidate for the job.

It’s essential to include a balanced mix of hard skills and soft skills on your resume:

• Hard skills demonstrate your technical and subject matter expertise.
• Soft skills highlight personal traits that make you an effective team member.

Example resume skills section:

Skills

• Project planning
• Budget management
• Risk assessment
• Agile/Scrum
• Leadership
• Communication
• Problem-solving
• Time management

5. Education

Last but not least, every resume should have an education section detailing your academic credentials. This section demonstrates to employers that you possess the required education for the job, whether that’s a high school diploma or an advanced degree.

Here’s what to consider when writing the education section of your resume:

• If you’re listing your high school education, you can simply write “High School Diploma” and share the name of your high school and its location.
• If you have a degree, you don’t need to include your high school diploma or GED.
• If you have multiple degrees, list them in reverse-chronological order, starting with your most recent degree.
• Avoid graduation dates to prevent ageism-related hiring bias from recruiters. If you’re still in the process of obtaining your degree, clearly state your expected graduation date, such as “Expected May 2026.”
• When listing your degrees, include your degree title, the name of the university or college you attended, and its location (city and state only).

If you want to optimize your education section, you can include details like:

• Your GPA: Include your grade point average if it’s 3.4 or higher, which puts you well above the average of 3.15 of college GPAs.
• Honors or awards: Honors and awards, such as valedictorian status, Dean’s List, scholarships, or student leadership awards, convey your commitment to excellence.
• Relevant coursework: Including a list of classes you’ve completed that are relevant to your target job shows employers you have the specialized skill set and experience, even if you acquired them outside of the workforce.
• Projects: Showcase any projects that demonstrate you’ve had a preview of what it takes to ideate, organize, execute, and analyze a significant project, which shows how well-prepared you are for a job.
• Publications: If you’re pursuing an academic profession or a writing job, a list of publications is tangible proof of the quality of your work.

Example resume education section:

Education

Master of Business Administration (MBA)
University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Chicago, IL

• Relevant Coursework: Strategic Management, Financial Analysis, Marketing Strategy, Organizational Leadership
• Honors & Awards: Dean’s List, Leadership Excellence Award
• GPA: 3.9

Bachelor of Science in Business Administration (BS)
University of Florida, Gainesville, FL

• Relevant Coursework: Accounting, Business Law, Operations Management, Economics
• Honors & Awards: Cum Laude, Beta Gamma Sigma Honor Society
• GPA: 3.8

Once you’ve completed these five sections, you’ve made a professional resume that has all the information employers need to determine if you’re a good fit for the job.

If you need more help writing a resume, including formatting and filling out key resume sections with well-written content, you can try a professional resume builder and create a polished document fast.

Optional Resume Sections to Strengthen Your Application

While a resume is complete with the five essential resume sections outlined above, you can customize it with more sections to showcase a broader range of qualifications.

Depending on your target role’s requirements and your own credentials, these are some additional resume sections you can consider adding to your resume:

• Certifications: If your profession requires certifications in a specific area or an active license, consider adding a separate “Certifications” section to highlight these credentials.
• Awards and accolades: If you’ve been recognized by peers for excellence in your profession, adding a resume section to showcase those accolades is a great way to show employers your claims of skills and expertise are legitimate.
• Volunteer work: If you’re passionate about community service, adding a resume section to showcase volunteering can help you make a great first impression on employers.
• Languages: Being proficient in two or more languages is a valuable skill for many professionals. If your role requires speaking a language other than your native one, or if multilingualism adds value to your work, highlight language skills on your resume.
• Hobbies and interests: Some hobbies and interests can give employers insight into unexpected but valuable professional skills. If you have space on your resume and believe your hobbies demonstrate cultural fit, relevant professional skills, or values aligned with the company, consider including them.

How to Organize Your Resume Sections: 3 Key Formats

With a better understanding of what sections to include on a resume, let’s discuss how to organize your resume sections for job search success.

There are three recruiter-approved ways you can rearrange the order of your resume sections. These layouts, also known as resume formats, highlight the sections that help your strengths shine while minimizing perceived setbacks, such as a lack of experience.

1. Chronological Resume Format

The chronological format is the most commonly used resume layout because it puts your work experience front and center. Because chronological resumes emphasize a detailed work experience section, it’s best for job seekers with 10+ years of experience.

For each job you list in a chronological resume, you’ll put your experience in reverse-chronological order, meaning your latest or current job is listed first, and so on. You’ll add a few bullet points describing your accomplishments beneath each role, followed by a skills section that should include six to eight job-relevant qualifications.

Here’s what a chronological resume order of sections looks like:

1. Contact information
2. Resume summary
3. Work experience
4. Skills
5. Education

2. Functional Resume Format

The functional resume format, or skills-based resume, focuses on an expanded skills section in which you’ll outline achievements that reflect your core abilities. Functional resumes are ideal for candidates with little to no experience. If you’ve never had a professional job, you can share other types of work experiences, such as internships or volunteering.

In a functional resume, you’ll highlight at least three key skills related to the job you’re applying for and share accomplishments that demonstrate how you applied those skills in real-world situations. Although you still have to include a work experience section in a functional resume, this section only includes your job titles, employment dates, and company details—no bullet points. You might also opt for a resume objective, vs a summary, due to a lack of experience.

Here’s what a functional resume order of sections looks like:

1. Contact information
2. Resume objective
3. Skills
4. Work experience
5. Education

3. Combination Resume Format

As the name suggests, the combination or hybrid resume format combines aspects of both chronological and functional resumes. The combination format is beneficial for mid-level professionals, promotion-seekers, and professionals returning to the workforce after a break or changing careers, as it prioritizes qualifications to minimize the impact of an employment gap. 

In a combination resume, your skills section should come before your work experience to highlight your abilities first. You’ll share a quick list of professional skills, and then a chronological work history with bullet-point achievements. You can even include an optional summary of qualifications near the top of your resume to emphasize your top skills and credentials.

Here’s what a combination resume order of sections looks like:

1. Contact information
2. Resume summary
3. Summary of qualifications (optional)
4. Skills
5. Work experience
6. Education

Resume Formatting Best Practices for a Polished Layout

After ordering and formatting your resume sections according to the three main resume formats, you also need to ensure your resume’s page layout is consistent and easy to read.

Apply these formatting tips after organizing your resume sections:

1. Use a professional, easy-to-read font (Arial, Helvetica, Times New Roman).
2. Keep font size between 10-12 points for body text and 14-16 points for section headers.
3. Limit your resume to one page if you have under 10 years of experience; two pages are acceptable for more seasoned professionals.
4. Set margins at one inch on all sides to maintain a clean, balanced layout.
5. Use single line spacing, and add a blank line between sections for easier scanning.
6. Stick to a simple, one-column layout for maximum readability, and avoid photos, graphics, tables, and complex designs that could confuse an ATS.

Craft a Resume That Gets Noticed

More than a formality, a well-structured resume is an opportunity to make a strong impression on employers. By including the five essential sections—contact information, resume summary or objective, work experience, skills, and education—you create a clear, organized snapshot of your qualifications.

Take the time to tailor each section to the job you’re applying for, emphasizing your most relevant strengths and achievements. With the right structure and focus, your resume can stand out and help you land the interview that moves your career forward. Monster’s free resume templates are a great place to start.