Here are the keywords and skills that appear most frequently on recent Design job postings. In other words, these are the most sought after skills by recruiters and hiring managers. So try to include them on your resume where possible. Go to the Sample Templates ↓ below to see how to include them on your resume.
Remember that every job is different. Instead of including all these keywords on your resume, identify the keywords most relevant to the job you're applying to and include those. Use the free Targeted Resume tool to help with this.
Does your resume contain all the right skills? Paste in your resume in the AI Resume Scan ↓ section below and get an instant score.
Paste your resume below and our AI will identify which keywords are missing from your resume from the list above (and what you need to include). Including the right keywords will help you get past Applicant Tracking Systems (i.e. resume screeners) which may scan your resume for keywords to see if you're a match for the job.
Here are examples of proven resumes in related jobs and industries, approved by experienced hiring managers. Use them as inspiration when you're writing your own resume. You can even download and edit the resume template in Google Docs.
Graphic design managers have to juggle a lot of different roles. As well as the usual design skills, you’ll need an ability to manage a team, develop strategies, work collaboratively with other departments, and evaluate the performance of other employees. To land the role, make sure your resume reflects soft skills like leadership and conflict management on top of your graphic design experience.
When it comes to listing your achievement in bullet points, the more specific you can be, the better. If you’ve led a team, mention how many people were on it. Explain exactly how many projects you’ve created, what type of graphic design work you’ve done, and the concrete impact that had on your company’s success.
To lead a team, you’ll need a lot of soft skills as well as hard skills. The best way to emphasize these is through your accomplishments. Mentioning the size of the teams you’ve worked with shows your leadership and teamwork skills, while creating social media strategies, marketing content, or publications is a great way to highlight communication skills.
An electrical design engineer conducts research and creates designs for new electrical systems. They also develop and test these systems, making any necessary changes as they go. You’ll need a strong knowledge of electrical theory and design software for this role, so your resume should highlight your technical skills as well as your educational background.
To become an electrical design engineer, you’ll need to be fluent in computing languages such as MATLAB, and you should also be familiar with design tools like CAD software. Having the right technical skills for the job is essential, so make sure to list your computing and software proficiencies in a skills section on your resume.
While this candidate has an impressive work history within electrical design, it’s worth noting that he or she holds a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering along with a Master’s degree in Electrical Design. Your educational background becomes less important than work experience as you advance in your career, but if you have advanced degrees within a relevant field, don’t skip mentioning them on your resume.
education section on your resume especially if it’s relevant - Electrical Design Engineer Resume"/>
Interior design assistants are integral to the smooth running of design firms. To succeed, you’ll need both administrative and creative skills, as your tasks can range from providing administrative support to assisting with design tasks, maintaining client relationships, and managing projects. Your resume should demonstrate your ability to assist with any aspect of the job, so make sure to emphasize the hard skills and experience that employers are looking for.
Showing that you’ve worked your way up from the bottom emphasizes loyalty, commitment, and a willingness to take on any whatever task is needed. If you’ve held other positions related to interior design — like sales assistant, event planner, or design consultant — including those titles on your resume can show the kind of career growth that recruiters want to see.
Using hard numbers is the best way to provide context and emphasize the scope of your accomplishments. Including metrics for how much you increased sales, how many team members you’ve trained, or how much you increased customer referrals outlines your achievements in objective, concrete terms that are easy for hiring managers to understand.
Mechanical design engineers are focused on creating prototypes and models, doing research, and generating reports for new products. Because they are so focused on the design aspect of engineering, they need to be proficient with CAD software and other design tools. Recruiters also like to see a proven track record of design successes in previous roles you’ve held.
Lead into your past achievements with strong action verbs that tell recruiters about your capabilities. Engineering-specific action verbs like “prototyped”, “designed”, and “evaluated” are especially good choices because they highlight your industry expertise.
Mechanical design engineering is a bit more specialized than mechanical engineering -- and since you’ll be spending extra time working with design software, you’ll want to show hiring managers that you know how to use programs like AutoCAD or CATIA. It’s best to list these types of hard skills in a separate skills section so they’re easy to see.
Safety engineers can specialize in product, workspace safety, and systems. We talked about the first two earlier. Now, it is time to talk about safety engineers who maintain order and security in production systems. Safety design engineers conduct quantitative and qualitative research to forecast potential danger. Then they will recommend improvements in the production systems to prevent hazards.
Your safety design engineer resume must be simple. This career is already very technical, so you shouldn’t overcomplicate your presentation. The best way to simplify your resume is by using bullet points that help you describe your responsibilities.
The fashion design director is tasked with overseeing all aspects of the fashion design process within a company. They will work with other designers to analyze the company’s current line of apparel, develop new design ideas, and improve on existing fashion designs. They may also help with the marketing of these designs, such as organizing photoshoots or web pages. To be a fashion design director, you must have a mix of the right skills and education. Typically, hiring managers will look for someone with a bachelor's degree in fashion design. A master’s isn’t always required but can help you land this role more easily. Companies will certainly be looking for someone with several years of experience in the world of fashion design. Prior experience as a fashion merchandiser, assistant designer, creative consultant, or curator is necessary to land this role. Fashion design directors will exhibit several necessary soft skills, such as creativity, teamwork, leadership, and superb communication skills.
A big part of the fashion design directors role, apart from creating designs, is to know how to properly market these designs to make sales. The director of fashion design may need to create email campaigns, advertisements, or design window displays to market new designs to customers. Previous experience marketing physical goods, particularly apparel, will stand out to hiring managers. Even better if you can provide numbers and data on how your marketing efforts increased sales or decreased stale inventory.
The fashion design director is responsible for looking at a company’s current apparel line and identifying what it might be missing. Often this means coming up with new designs or new sectors of apparel to break into. For this reason, it’s important that aspiring fashion design directors can show they are creative and able to develop new designs. On your resume, you should detail any original designs you have come up with, and how they helped the company’s bottom line.
The following word cloud highlights the most popular keywords that appear on Design job descriptions. The bigger the word, the more frequently it shows up on employer's job postings. If you have experience with these keywords, include them on your resume.
Here are some of the most popular skills we see on Design resumes:
If you are writing an Industrial Designer resume, try to emphasize skills like Industrial Design, Keyshot, Concept Development, Product Design, Design Thinking, Sketching, Design Strategy and Rendering.
Similarly, if you are writing a Project Designer resume, emphasize skills like AutoCAD, Revit, Design Research, Architectural Design, SketchUp, Space Planning, Submittals and Sustainable Design.
Depending on the specific role you apply to, you may need to emphasize different skill sets. Here are a few examples:
While the keywords above are a good indication of what skills you need on your resume, you should try to find additional keywords that are specific to the job. To do this, use the free Targeted Resume tool. It analyzes the job you are applying to and finds the most important keywords you need on your resume.
It is personalized to your resume, and is the best way to ensure your resume will pass the automated resume filters.
Thank you for the checklist! I realized I was making so many mistakes on my resume that I've now fixed. I'm much more confident in my resume now.
