Change Management Resume

Change managers play a vital role in businesses by overseeing the success of organizational changes. Projects with efficient change management tend to be successful, so change managers are in high demand in 2023.

To stand a chance of landing a job in change management, you’ll need a resume that clearly summarizes your relevant skills and experience.

Follow these three tips to write an impressive change management resume that separates you from other applicants:

1. Showcase relevant skills on your change management resume

To grow, businesses must keep up with technological advancements and changes to organizational structures, business processes, and job roles. Change managers prepare companies for these changes to maximize operational efficiency and ROI.

Also, these professionals help reduce the negative impact of business changes on both staff and customers.

Change managers are always in touch with various people in the organization, providing support and inspiration during transition periods. So give examples of your communication skills on your change management resume.

You should also include your problem-solving skills to show how you can design the right strategies to execute change and overcome change management barriers.

Your communication and problem-solving abilities are soft skills, aspects of your personality that you use at work. Here are other soft skills to highlight on your change management resume:

• Analytical skills
• Leadership skills
• Organizational skills
• Project management
• Strategic thinking
• Research
• Digital literacy
• Interpersonal skills

Also, give examples of hard skills (sometimes called technical skills) that you learned in class or picked up during your change manager work experience:

• Database user interface and query software: Improvado, Microsoft SQL Server, Amazon RDS
• Video conferencing software: Skype, Zoom, Microsoft Teams
• Document management software: LogicalDOC, M-Files, OpenKM
• Change management software: Whatfix, BMC Helix ITSM, Rocket DevOps

Change managers can work in a variety of industries, so tailor your resume to include technical skills related to your target company’s line of work. For instance, if you’re applying to a hospital, describe your expertise with medical-related software like Prime Suite.

2. Open with a strong change management resume summary

A resume summary is a short statement at the top of a resume. It summarizes your change management qualifications, achievements, and experience in 3–4 sentences.

If this part of your resume is well-written, it’ll convince the hiring manager to read your entire application. So, write the best change management resume summary you can to increase your chances of getting a job interview by:

• including keywords from the job ad to show you fit the employer’s specific requirements
• only listing information that will interest the hiring manager (based on the job description they wrote)

Here’s an example of a well-written resume summary for a change management resume:

And this is how each sentence of the summary emphasizes the applicant’s information that’s relevant to a change management job:

• Sentence 1 states their years of experience in the industry and lists their areas of expertise
• Sentence 2 highlights their skills and how they use them to design solutions and solve challenges related to organizational change
• Sentence 3 explains what they hope to contribute to the company and includes the job title they’re seeking so the hiring manager knows which of the company’s open positions they want

3. Include change management–related keywords in your resume

Ensure you include change management-related keywords in your resume to improve your chances of getting your preferred position.

Often, hiring managers use applicant tracking systems (ATS) to sort applicants’ resumes. This software scans resumes and cover letters, looking for specific keywords from the job ad.

If you don’t include the right resume keywords, your resume may be overlooked.

Also, including keywords from the job ad in your resume skills section will impress managers. Doing so shows that you took your time to customize your resume, rather than just submitting a generic one.

Even if you’re not responding to a specific job ad, use general change management keywords so hiring managers can easily find you in searches on websites like LinkedIn and ZipRecruiter.

Here are some change management–related keywords that will look good on your resume no matter what transition leadership job you apply for:

• Strategy
• Business transition
• Management strategies
• Restructure
• Organizational transformation
• Introduce