Highlight your operations and management experience

Chief Administrative Officers are responsible for overseeing all administrative functions in an organization. Emphasize your experience managing operations, facilities, HR, IT, and finance.

Strong resumes include:

• Managed operations for a 500+ employee company, overseeing $10M+ in annual budgets across HR, IT and facilities
• Directed administrative functions for a global business with 10+ offices, supporting 1,200+ staff

Avoid being vague like this:

• Handled operations and administration
• Responsible for managing multiple functions

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   Show your strategic planning abilities

CAOs need to be strategic thinkers who can develop long-term plans. Highlight how you've created strategies and business plans that drove organizational success.

Impactful examples:

• Developed and executed a 5-year strategic plan, resulting in 25% revenue growth and 20% cost savings
• Created an operational excellence strategy that improved efficiency by 30% and customer satisfaction scores by 15%

Generic statements to avoid:

• Participated in strategic planning
• Helped with creating business plans

   Quantify your impact on the bottom line

The best resumes demonstrate how you've boosted revenue, cut costs and improved profitability. Use hard numbers and metrics to show your impact.

Powerful bullet points include:

• Negotiated new vendor contracts, saving $500K annually on IT and office equipment costs
• Implemented a new ERP system under budget, resulting in a 10% increase in productivity and $2M in cost efficiencies

Drove profitable growth as Chief Administrative Officer by optimizing operations and strategic planning. Reduced annual expenses by $5M, increased revenue by 15% to $200M+, and improved efficiency across HR, finance, IT and facilities. Positioned the company for successful IPO.

   Demonstrate leadership and team building skills

CAOs manage large, cross-functional teams. Spotlight your ability to lead, motivate and develop staff to achieve goals.

Compelling achievements:

• Led a team of 50+ through a major corporate restructuring, maintaining morale and productivity during transition
• Mentored and promoted 5 directors to VP-level roles, building a strong leadership pipeline

Weak, non-specific examples:

• Managed a team in administration
• Provided leadership to staff

   Showcase your change management expertise

Top CAOs are change agents who can lead organizations through transformation. Feature examples of how you've successfully managed change.

Excellent illustrations:

• Spearheaded a company-wide digital transformation, moving all operations to the cloud and automating 50+ processes
• Led a post-merger integration of two HR and finance teams, unifying processes and technology platforms

Lackluster descriptions:

• Helped with change management during transformation
• Worked on post-merger integration

   Tailor your resume to the job description

Customize your resume for each Chief Administrative Officer job you apply to. Mirror the language in the job posting.

If a job description states:

Seeking a Chief Administrative Officer to oversee IT, HR, legal, and facilities. Must have experience scaling operations to support 10%+ annual business growth.

Your resume should include accomplishments like:

• Oversaw IT, HR, legal and facilities for a $500M business, supporting 15% year-over-year growth
• Scaled operations and administrative functions to enable 10% headcount and 20% revenue growth

Don't submit a generic resume with statements like:

• Experienced operations leader
• Handled administration for a large company