Due to the effects of COVID-19 on the healthcare world, healthcare organizations want to hire dynamic executives. They want leaders who can manage operations and make strategic business decisions to increase revenue. As such, your healthcare executive resume must prove your accomplishments. It should also be Applicant Tracking System (ATS) – compliant. Then, you have to make sure to capture the reader’s attention within the first ten seconds.
Seems daunting, right? Condensing your extensive experience into a C-level resume is tough. It is important not to dilute the impact of your skills.
In this article, I’ll break down the process of writing your healthcare executive resume to get more interviews. I’ll also share a template that you can use and copy.
Quick side note: if you’d like a quick, two-page resume cheat sheet, which breaks down exactly how a marketing manager was able to double the initial offer they received, you can get your own copy by submitting your information right here:
Name*Email Address*SubmitIf you prefer to have it done for you, invest in our one-on-one resume writing service. I will write your resume from scratch after speaking to you about your history.
Healthcare Executive Resume Sample
I am going to use one of my healthcare executive resume samples to show how you can redo your resume to get more interview calls.
If you’re pressed for time, download the cheat sheet version of this article for my before-and-after sample. I talk about the three most common mistakes healthcare executives make. I also share how I resolved these issues for one client. To protect her privacy, I’ve fictionalized her as “Hermione Granger.”
After I redid her resume, she soon landed an executive-level job in a healthcare organization. In her own words,
CareerTuners was a pleasure to work with. I was a client of theirs. They are very skilled in their craft. Their communication was impeccable. They delivered a comprehensive product before the agreed-upon deadline. I would highly recommend working with them.
Read on to find out how you can redo your resume to apply for healthcare executive jobs:
Step 1: Integrating Keywords into Your Healthcare Executive Resume
Keywords are phrases that ATS algorithms focus on when they scan resumes. They help ATS understand who you are and what skills you have. This is how they rank you against other professionals applying for similar jobs.
Keywords are critical to bypass ATS and can be quantified and tested. For example, the name of an EMR software.
Common keywords include:
- healthcare terms
- licenses
- degrees
- training
- subject areas
- tools
To find which keywords to add to your resume, go through the job listings you are interested in. What key skills are being discussed? Add those to your resume.
Here are some keywords for healthcare executives. Feel free to copy and paste these into your resume if they match your skillset.
Healthcare Industry Keywords 2021
Because you are an executive and leading the organization, here are some trending healthcare terms that will act as keywords in 2021 and beyond:
Below are some of the keywords I added to Hermione’s resume. By placing the keywords towards the top portion of her resume, I immediately show readers her skills. This adds weight to her candidacy.
These keywords were previously missing in her resume. This was likely hurting her ranking in Applicant Tracking Systems.
Step 2: How to Create Accomplishments for Your Healthcare Executive Resume
After the resume is shortlisted by the ATS, it has to go through a human reader, like a recruiter or an HR Manager.
So, your next task is to impress the recruiter within the mere few seconds they spend skimming through a resume.
The best way to do this is by replacing responsibility statements with powerful accomplishments. Accomplishments are essential for resumes because they show an improvement path They show that you made things better for the organizations you worked at. They help prove to the readers that you’re a very strong candidate.
Take a look at this example. Which sentence makes the candidate seem stronger?
Quantitative accomplishments are the best way of highlighting how you helped make things better. These include improvements in patient care delivery, capital expansion, regulatory adherence, and cost reductions.
However, qualitative accomplishments can also prove your skills. For instance, improving processes and enhancing operations shows that you used your executive skillset to make things better.
The following questions will help you identify your accomplishments:
Hermione had a very impressive career history. It just wasn’t captured on her resume.
By asking some questions from the list above, I was able to unearth some great accomplishments for her. To see all of her accomplishments, check out the complete file here.
When editing your resume, make sure that all the keywords you selected from Step 1 are covered in the job experience.
First, focus on writing everything. Then, edit down to get to two pages. This will help you create a more powerful resume. You don’t want the editing (analytical) and writing (creative) parts of your brain to clash.
Moreover, you should include only relevant experiences in your resume.
When editing, think of yourself as a product and your resume as your sales pitch.
Step 3: Creating a Powerful Career Summary for a Healthcare Executive Resume
Like most pieces of text, resumes are read most carefully towards the beginning and the rest is skimmed. This is likely how you read resumes when hiring, too.
The top portion of the resume, i.e. the first half of the first page, is where readers tend to pay the most attention. According to my research, this is the part that they remember most after reading, too. I call this the “visual center” of the resume.
If the visual center of your resume successfully grabs recruiters’ attention, they will read the rest of your resume a little more carefully instead of just skimming it.
To create an impactful visual center, add the following to the top of the resume:
- A brief summary statement that readers what key problem you solve. This article breaks down how to create a powerful summary statement.
- You can cut and paste three of your proudest accomplishments from the professional experience into the summary. As an alternative, use a career summary proving why you are the best fit for the job.
- A list of skills.
After that, read it out loud or have a friend read it. If it is interesting for you to read, then it will be interesting for your reader as well.
If you need more help creating a strong summary for your resume, check out this article.
Here’s how I did it for Hermione:
Before
Hermione’s original summary was not capturing her strengths. It didn’t really differentiate her from other candidates. Most candidates competing with her can say they are able to “work closely with healthcare teams to build successful programs and operational foundations.” But most didn’t have Hermione’s unique experience improving the reach of programs over multiple states.
After
To make a solid first impression, we made our point hard and fast. This also maintains the reader’s attention. The result is as follows:
I wrote a career summary that highlighted her extensive experience in the healthcare sector. I also mentioned the tasks she was most proficient in. Moreover, the visual center included a list of her best skills from Step 1. However, I avoided adjectives and self-descriptors like “ambitious” and “dynamic” since recruiters consider these words cliché.
Another important part of the visual center is the contact information. Many people put the contact information into the header. However, the information in headers and footers of Microsoft Word is not read by some ATS. Add your contact information clearly to the top of the resume page. It should include the following:
- Phone number
- Email address
- City and state
- Zipcode
- LinkedIn profile link
Step 4: Using Healthcare Volunteer Experience and Projects
If you have an employment gap in your resume, recruiters may think that your skillset is not up to date. A great way to cover them is to add projects and volunteer experiences to your resume. This article has more details on how to use such experiences to skillfully cover your employment gaps.
You can also polish your skills by joining a healthcare professional association, such as the following:
- American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE)
- American Association of Healthcare Administrative Management (AAHAM)
Moreover, below are the most sought-after healthcare certifications. They are helpful if you’re interested in closing a skill gap through a formal program:
- American Association of Healthcare Administrative Management (AAHAM) Certification
Step 5: Making a Strong First Impression on LinkedIn
More than 94% of recruiters use LinkedIn as a sourcing tool. It becomes your first impression to recruiters that are searching for candidates.
LinkedIn Headline
The first thing recruiters see in your LinkedIn profile is your headline. Unfortunately, it is also the most neglected part. Most people simply put their job titles there and don’t add any extra keywords.
As a result, two things happen:
- It hurts your ranking on LinkedIn on healthcare-related keywords.
- Also, it is unlikely that people will click on your profile if your exact job title phrasing isn’t relevant to them.
Below are two examples of a good LinkedIn headline. Wouldn’t you be more interested in visiting these profiles rather than someone with a headline like “Hospital Operations, St. Mary?”
LinkedIn Summary
The summary and professional experience sections have a 2000-character limit each. They give you more space than your resume to highlight your accomplishments.
My favorite way to create a LinkedIn summary is as follows. I am using Hermione’s experience here to bring my concepts to life.
a) First, pick the main idea that you want to focus on. What key skills have you shown throughout your career?
For Hermione, I came up with this:
b) Then, back up this main idea with three supporting ideas that show how you achieved your “main idea” in the past. For example,
The sky is the limit here. If you run out of ideas, check out the questions in Step 2.
c) Call to action: I like ending the summary with something like this:
“Please send me a connection request if you are interested in growing your hospital’s reach with the help of a data-driven decision-maker.”
But you can skip this step if you’d like not to advertise the fact that you’re looking for a job.
Looking for more information? Check out these links:
Writing is not everyone’s forte, but it is definitely mine. This is the reason my healthcare executive resume writing best practices have been approved by dozens of recruiters in the healthcare space. If you need help showcasing your skills and career history, upload your resume here for a free critique.
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