Last updated: 25th Mar 2025
Can I be honest with you for a moment? Most resumes suck. They’re forgettable, generic avalanches of corporate buzzwords. And the section where people commit the most resume crimes is the humble “About Me”.
Never introduce yourself with a word salad like “disciplined professional taking business to the next level by building sustainable futures”.
Let me teach you how to write a strong ‘About me’ section that communicates your unique value and helps you win job interviews.
How Important Is Your ‘About Me’ Section?
An ‘About me’ section typically sits under your headline and contact details, making it one of the most prominent parts of your resume. It’s important that it’s snappy and intriguing.
Australians call it “Profile” or “Career Summary”, while North American job seekers prefer “About Me”.
About me’ has a more casual tone that works if you’re still in the early stages of your career, while ‘Profile’ is a better fit for managers and executives.
Some people omit the “about me” section, but I strongly advise against this. A compelling “about me”:
- Is your opportunity to tell your career story. You can explain how your career moves fit together while spotlighting the most relevant achievements.
- Allows you to create a value proposition that positions you as the ideal candidate for your next role. Instead of presenting generic raw facts, you can set a context that will resonate with specific hiring managers and recruiters.
What To Include In Your Resume “About Me/Profile”.
As a general guide, an ‘About me’ section usually covers four main points:
- Recap of your career journey.
- Your core qualifications, skills and knowledge/expertise areas.
- Examples of the results/value you’ve delivered.
- Insight into your values, motivations and personality.
Expert Tip.
Don’t talk about your career goals/ambitions in your profile. This practice is considered widely outdated. You can discuss growth opportunities during your job interview.
The hard part is deciding what to include, and what to exclude.
As a general rule of thumb – less is more. Resist the temptation to write a “War and Peace” novel.
So how do you narrow your focus?
Yes, you want to introduce yourself and make it clear where your skills lie — but it’s more vital to explain what you bring to the table that other candidates don’t.
Think about the business challenge that your hiring manager is experiencing, and position yourself as a knight in shining armour who is about to fix it.
(Related: Free Australian Resume Templates For Getting Hired).
Always refer back to – “what’s in it for them?”
Expert Tip.
Do you know what the company does? Do you know what challenges it’s experiencing? What stage of growth is it in – startup, acceleration, turnaround or BAU? Knowing this will help you write your “About Me”.
Cramming in too many details and superlatives is an obvious mistake. It makes your writing clumsier and less impactful.
Compare this generic and buzzword-laden “about me”:
With this:
Can you see how the latter example quantifies the candidate’s commercial impact while speaking directly to the hiring manager’s needs?
How To Write A Compelling ‘About Me’ Section.
Being specific is one of the hallmarks of every great resume, and your ‘About me’ section is no exception.
If it doesn’t feel like it was written for the hiring manager who’s reading it, their eyes will start to glaze over.
(Related: Should Your Resume Include Referees)?
Being both brief and distinct is deceptively hard to do sometimes. Here’s a three-step process that will help you distill and refine your ideas:
1. Customise For The Business And Industry.
To begin customising your profile, review the job ad, the company’s careers page, public communications and strategic decisions, as well as industry news.
You want to understand:
- How they use titles, their team structure and the way they operate.
- Their ethos, business model, objectives and recent initiatives or spending.
- How the company fits into the market/industry and is impacted by key trends.
Then tweak your profile’s wording to show you’re on the same page as them:
- Do they call people who fill this job consultants? Call yourself an experienced consultant.
- Describe themselves as a SaaS scale-up? Mention your experience in scaling operations/staff.
- Is their industry being affected by regulatory change? Demonstrate you know about compliance.
The more you sound like an ‘insider’ who can fit into the hiring organisation and handle the problems they face, the better your chances of being noticed.
2. Highlight Your Most Relevant And Impressive Qualities.
Here, you want to ensure the specific qualifications, accomplishments and personal attributes you highlight align well with the role description — and the outcomes the hirer is looking to achieve.
Focus on 2-3 key facets of the advertised role that your profile will address. Mention keywords, statistics and dollar figures, but also try to delve deeper.
For example, maybe they list stakeholder management skills and problem-solving skills under ‘requirements’.
But it’s because one of your key responsibilities in the role would be to build out the company’s partner network for a more diverse revenue base.
You might tailor your ‘About me’ section to include a sentence like:
(Related: Showcase Strong Stakeholder Management Skills On Your Resume).
3. Personalise To Convey What Makes You Unique.
It’s important to make sure your ‘About me’ section — in it’s entirety — says something about you that would be hard for another candidate to replicate.
Is it a strong representation of your core strengths, and the value only you can bring? If not, how can you:
- Make it even more specific. It can help to share about more about how you’ve delivered certain outcomes in the past.
- Remove ‘corporate speak’. Get rid of the robotic language and cliches, and look for ways to convey your individual style or passion.
A standard profile might read:
Here’s how it could be better with personalisation:
The second example touches on the same points, but gives a clearer sense of your specialisations and your ‘special sauce’.
Don’t be afraid to inject some enthusiasm — show them you care about your work.
Never Copy And Paste Sections Into Your Resume.
The Internet is full of resume examples.
Never use these in your resume. They’re generic, meaningless and have zero power to help you stand out in a sea of other candidates.
You are unique. No one else has the same mix of experience, personality and career drivers. Your “about me” section needs to prove this.
If you’re struggling to find the right words to express your unique value through your resume, then consider hiring a professional resume writer. Cough cough. Nudge nudge.
Irene
