Resume & Cover Letter Tips for Neurodivergent Professionals
Are you the type of person who actively avoids their resume?
For most neurodivergent people, job applications are tied to feelings of anxiety and overwhelm. Submitting a resume and cover letter to an employer can put you in a vulnerable state. It’s literally an invitation for them to judge you, and potentially reject you.
What’s more, career experts all seem to have different opinions about how you should approach your application documents. Everyone seems to have a different approach to writing resumes and cover letters, which can be frustrating when your livelihood is potentially on the line.
In our most recent Office Hours Live Q&A, our resident career coach answered questions about resumes and cover letters. You can watch the whole Q&A recording with Veronica Yao at the bottom of this blog, or keep reading for the recap!
Applications get you interviews, not jobs.
One of the biggest myths regarding job applications is that they are the key to landing you the job. And it makes sense why, as career professionals have a lot of pressure put on them to develop the “perfect” resume and cover letter that will capture the attention of the hiring manager and fast track them to getting hired.
“Applications don’t get you jobs. They get you interviews.”
- Veronica Yao
The truth is, the function of a job application isn’t to get you the job – it’s to get you an interview. More specifically, a good job application will earn you the opportunity to communicate directly with the employer, whether it’s through an in person meeting or an email exchange.
That opportunity for two-way communication is incredibly valuable, as it affords you the opportunity to address any questions or concerns the employer might have about your qualifications. In order to achieve this, job seekers need to shift their focus on their application documents from “perfection” to “impact”.
“All you want to do with your application documents is make sure there is enough compelling information so they’ll want to continue the conversation,” says Veronica. So it’s important to shift your focus from “perfection” to “impact.” What are the things you want them to remember about you the most? Don't try to list everything – just focus on sharing the most impressive parts of your work experiences.
What makes a strong resume?
A strong resume is a document that makes a strong, intentional impression on the reader, and accounts for their experience when reviewing it. Veronica draws on her experience in brand marketing and user experience design, and combines it with her knowledge of recruitment and hiring practices to help job seekers create that kind of impact and improve their chances of moving on to the next stage of the process.
According to Veronica, there are 4 elements that contribute to a strong resume:
A clear sense of identity.
You can’t convince a hiring manager or recruiter that you are well suited for the job if you aren’t even sure yourself. Knowing your professional identity well and expressing it through your application documents is essential.
Veronica recommends having a “highlights of skills” section at the top of your resume that highlights your top qualifiers for the role, as well as a tagline that summarizes your speciality.
Skimmable; easy to read.
It’s no secret that hiring managers and recruiters review dozens – even hundreds – of applications for each role. So we need to make that short 30-second impression count.
Formatting your resume and cover letter in a way that is well organized, concise, and makes good use of elements like bullets, line breaks, or bolding/italicizing can go a long way to help them absorb the information. Remember, if your resume feels daunting to read (i.e. lots of blocks of text, etc.) it probably feels daunting for the reader as well.
Intuitive layout; easy to locate information.
Similar to the previous point, it’s important to format your resume and cover letter in a way that has a good visual flow. It should anticipate the order in which the reader will read the information, and make it easy to locate important information.
For example, you will want to put your contact information and name in the header of the document so it stands out and it’s easy for the reader to reference when they want to reach out to you. Don’t make contacting you a chore - make it as smooth as possible so they’ll maintain a positive impression about you, even before meeting you!
Contains keywords aligned with the job posting.
Think of this as mirroring the behaviours and language of the employer. By using the same keywords that they used in the job posting, they’re more likely to believe you are on the same wavelength as them, improving your chances of getting a callback.
This also helps with any Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) that you encounter during your job search. This tool helps the hiring manager or recruiter screen your documents to find key information that will hopefully qualify you for the role and earn you a callback. If they see more common keywords in your application, the better chance you have of getting a response.
ATS versus human readers.
The introduction of automation and AI has added a layer of complexity in the hiring process. ATS – also known as Applicant Tracking Systems – are viewed as a timesaver for the employer, but a huge block for the job seeker, who now has to impress both robot and human readers.
For that reason, Veronica recommends having two versions of your resume – one designed to be read by the ATS to get you past the initial screening, and a second version designed to be read by recruiters and hiring managers.
Both should include the same content, but the ATS resume should be stripped of special formatting, like columns and tables, as that makes it more difficult for the system to analyze and pull the right data from your application documents. Note that basic formatting should not affect your ATS resume negatively – for example, bold text, underlining, italics, and bullets.
Aligning keywords with the job posting.
As mentioned in the previous section, it’s important to mirror the language and keywords from the job posting you are applying for in your resume and cover letter. This practice is beneficial for both versions of your resume.
Here’s a practice that you might find helpful: Collect 5 job postings that interest you, and use an AI tool like ChatGPT to analyze them for the most common keywords that pop up. Then make sure those keywords are used in your resume and cover letter documents.
Note that the above exercise works best if you have a more specific type of work you are targeting. So if you’re looking to go into administrative work, all the job postings you analyze should be relevant to your goal.
Handling employment gaps.
Most neurodivergent professionals have experienced some form of employment gap, whether it’s due to medical leave, workplace burnout, discrimination, or difficulty holding down jobs. The fear of being called out during our job hunt is real, especially when it feels like your livelihood is on the line.
“It is very common for us to have gaps in employment,” says Veronica. “We are constantly told ‘you can't have gaps in employment or else nobody's going to want to hire you’... and we’re like “oh god, I’m never going to get hired.”
When it comes to your resume, Veronica has a few methods you can use to “mask” your work history, if you don’t want to call much attention to it:
Highlights of Work Experience
This is a slight variation on the classic chronological resume, where applicants will list their most recent work experiences in order of dates.
Try adjusting the title to “Highlights of Work Experience” and list only the most relevant work experiences you have to the job, even if it’s not in chronological order. This tells the employer that you have curated your resume for them specifically. If they have any questions about your other experiences, you can address them when they reach out for more information or during the interview.
Skills-Based Resume
A skills-based resume is great because it allows you to feature your relevant work experience in the context of your transferable skills, rather than a chronological timeline. This masks your work history and any gaps that you have.
Choose 4-5 skills that you have that would qualify you for the job you’re applying for, and create sub-headers for them. Under each subheader, briefly state your work experience (title, employer, and 1-2 sentences about your role there).
Remember, the goal is to give the hiring manager or recruiter enough relevant information to make them want to call you back, because then you’ll have more influence in the conversation. We want to minimize the reasons they have to disqualify you at the application stage.
Managing overwhelm and anxiety.
If the very idea of updating your resume and cover letter ruins your day, you’re not alone. This doesn’t mean you are lazy or don’t want to job hunt – rather, it’s a mental block that associates the activity with stress, pain, and discomfort, which makes the idea of getting started unbearable.
“There’s something in our brains telling us that if we do this task, it’s going to bring us pain,” says Veronica. Her advice is to be kind to yourself – instead of finding ways to force yourself to do this task, try breaking down the factors that are holding you back, and find ways to support yourself.
For example, shifting your mindset from “this resume needs to help me get the job” to “this resume only needs to get the employer to call me back” might reduce the stress you’re putting on yourself.
Gentle “exposure therapy” might be helpful as well – start by simply opening your resume and cover letter document and get familiar with it. Remind yourself that you are in a safe space, and that you don’t have to tackle the whole thing in one sitting.
If you find you hate updating your resume because it’s boring and understimulating, try using external stimulation to push through it (for example, listening to high energy music). If the opposite is true, and the activity is too overstimulating, perhaps body doubling or parallel work with another person might be helpful to ground you during the process.