How to make a resume for internships – The complete beginner’s guide
‘Hi, I wanted to apply to an internship at your organisation.’
‘Sure! Forward me your resume and I’ll get back to you.’
4 days later, you are still wondering why you didn’t get a callback. Don’t be alarmed; this is because your resume didn’t demonstrate how you would meet the requirements of the employer effectively. What? But I copy-pasted my best friend’s resume format. Well, it wasn’t enough to grab the employer’s attention.
Before I tell you how to write a resume to make the recruiters’ heads turn, let’s have a look at what a resume exactly is.
What is a resume?
A resume is a document, required as a part of an internship application, that summarizes your education, skills, achievements, and internship/training experiences if any. A student resume contains essential details that an employer needs to know about you before offering you a position in her organisation.
Now, I know you have already googled how to create a resume a hundred times and seen all professional resume formats, but if you still don’t have the answer to what to include in a resume and how to do it, here is a detailed insight into how to make a resume that will catch the eye of your recruiter.
1. Contact details – These form the heading of your resume and include your name, email id, phone number, and address. You can either use a large font for your name and list your contact details underneath it or use the same font for all the details.
A few points to keep in mind while adding these details –
a. Ensure that you’re available on the phone number and email id you’re putting on your resume. Put a professional email id on the resume like ajay12@gmail.com or priya.jain@gmail.com and not hunk_ajay@gmail.com or priya_angel@hotmail.com.
b. You needn’t write your complete postal address; mention the locality and city. Also, don’t write both your permanent and temporary address – your current address will suffice!
2. Opening statement – Most of the students use the common template for ‘career objective’ which states things that half of us even don’t understand the meaning of. Before you copy paste the same statement again, let me say it – you know you don’t mean it and the employer knows it better.
So, should you skip it? Of course, not! If written properly, it could grab the attention of an employer to your application in the first 2 seconds. Include the skills you have that are required for the internship, your interest in the field, and what you can bring to the table.
Tips:
a. Don’t use more than three lines
b. Do not use a personal pronoun.
3. Educational qualifications – This section includes your educational degrees along with your institution, your aggregate percentage, and the (expected) year of graduation.
Tips:
a. Always follow the reverse chronological order, i.e. the most recent ones first.
b. Do not mention the percentage/CGPA obtained in all the semesters, rather write the aggregate.
4. Skills – When you are applying for an engineering internship, your technical skills are tantamount to your role. You can categorise your skills and use bullets to list them. For instance, if you’re applying to a web development internship, you can categorise your skills as programming languages, web technologies, etc.
Management students can list their interpersonal skills like leadership qualities, communication skills, time management, critical thinking, etc. (Please don’t write confident and determined as your skills). While putting together this list, think of what you’ve learnt in the classroom, previous internships, and college events.
It may so happen that you’re in the first year of college and have no substantial technical skills. In such cases, enlist the technologies and concepts that you’ve learnt so far. For instance,
5. Work Experience – With the details of your previous internships, this section depicts your learning curve and displays how you’ve grown as a candidate. List the companies that you have worked for, the duration, and your profile. Underneath these details, mention the responsibilities you handled and your achievements. Along with this, mention the responsibilities you’ve handled during your college.
Remember that this is where you have to be creative as well as smart. Let’s take an example of a customer support internship. Now, if you write ‘Replied to student queries’, you aren’t depicting the gravity of your job. You could instead write –
- Addressed the concerns of 200 customers on a daily basis via emails and calls
- Identified and met customers’ needs by helping them register on the platform
These statements would tell the employer that you are good at written and oral communication and have the ability to learn about a product in and out.
Now, what could be daunting is the fact that you are applying for your very first internship and have no prior experience. After all, employers want you to have 5 years of experience before you even graduate! Well, leverage your positions of responsibility in such cases. For instance, if you are an editor for your college magazine, it could be a relevant experience in landing you a content writing internship. While you talk about this, emphasize your research skills, attention to detail, and communication skills.
6. Academic projects – As a college student, you work on various projects as a part of your course. These projects on your resume depict your conceptual knowledge and practical skills. Include the name of your project, a brief description of what it does and how it works, and mention your role in the project explicitly.
7. Training & certifications – Herein, you enlist all the certified trainings that you have taken up so far. These add credibility to your skills and signal the recruiter that you’re qualified enough to take up the job. If you haven’t done a substantial number of trainings, you can merge it with the ‘Work Experience’ section and name it ‘Internships and Trainings’.
8. Additional details – This section clubs your achievements and extra-curricular activities and acts as a saviour when you are taking your first step towards your career. Listing out the details of participation in various college events and competitions denote your holistic growth as a student and give the recruiter an insight into your talents and capabilities and a glimpse of your soft skills – confidence, emotional intelligence, teamwork, and dedication.
Now, strike off those school singing and dancing activities from your resume – it’s not going to land you a marketing internship, is it? And please cut your JEE, AIEEE, and AMCAT ranks unless they are very good! Also, a big no to writing ‘Donated blood’ unless you organised the blood donation camp!
Include your involvement in student organizations and clubs, your volunteering experience, and scholarships. Mention your volunteering experiences along with the activities and competitions you were a part of. If you have given on-stage performances, list them – yes, dancing and singing at college are allowed.
Once you have assembled all the information on your Word Doc, take a scissor and edit out the irrelevant details and shorten the sentences wherever possible. Then, check your resume for typos, spelling mistakes, and grammatical errors – nothing is a bigger turnoff than grammatical errors on one’s resume.
Sample resume for internship
In few minutes, select a resume writing template and put all these details on paper as per the chosen format. You can select from a plethora of resume formats for freshers or take the help of an online resume maker. You can also have a look at a professional resume and make your resume using these Internshala recommended sample resumes for freshers – Sample-internship-resume, Resume-template-1, and Resume-template-2.
Finally, here are some quick resume writing tips and tricks that you should keep in mind.
1. Formatting: Start with a 1-inch margin on each side. Keep the font size between 10-12 points, and use easy-to-read font styles like Arial or Times New Roman. Use bold to emphasize the most important information and headings, and use bullets to organise your resume.
2. Don’t write ‘Resume’ on the top and a declaration at the end of your resume. Also, don’t put your picture on the resume – the employer is interested in your skills, not your looks – unless you are applying for a modelling job.
3. Even Elon Musk has a 1-page resume! So, keep your resume short and try to fit all the details in 1-1.5 page.
4. Strike off all the personal details like your marital status, nationality, sex, and your parents’ names and occupations.
For more such tips on the dos and don’ts of your resume, please check out this guide on the nitty-gritty of resume writing and the resume blunders you should absolutely avoid!
Recommended tools for resume writing-
1. Google Resume – A step-by-step guide for getting your dream internship by a former hiring manager at Google.
2. Internshala Resume – You can create a beautiful resume online by registering on Internshala and filling out your details. We’ll also help you add details needed to improve your resume. You can download this resume and use it to apply to internships wherever you want.
Finally, you have created a resume that employers can’t help but notice. What next? Well, do what you made the resume for – apply to some super cool internships and kick-start your career!
Firstly thank you for giving infirmation about resume. I am confused how to creat resume your this page reduces my all queries regarding resume.
Thanks for giving me some valuable information about resume , mostly people copy their object from Google . so thanks a lot
My heartful thanks for showing an awesome insight for resume making..,
Thanks alot sir / madam for your valuable time and efforts..
Thanks for sharing this helpful article.
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I have been looking for the same as i am fresher job seeker and looking for my dream job. So these resume writing tips will be helpful for me to craft a perfect resume that will led me to get a right job. Thanks a lot for sharing this valuable article!
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Thanks alot sir / madam
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I’m just looking for this article that how to create a resume it is really very helpful.
A resume is the first thing a recruiter see .. It must be attractive and impactful… Thanks for sharing these guide to make resume for beginners :)
Good
Hye nice thanks for sharing this information
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THANK YOU FOR SUCH A INFIRAMTIVE ARTICLE.
Thank you so much for this site.
For internship cv
Internship cv
Hi Naman,
Thank you for writing in.
You may subscribe to Internshala at this link — internshala.com/i/182311. Upon successful verification, we will send you the Internshala Resume Guide.
Thanks :)
Thanks for your valuable information about resume. I have learned a lot from this article . Definitely it will help me in future.
:)
Thanks for sharing this information.
I am home work
Hi,
Thank you for writing in.
Please register on Internshala here – http://bit.ly/IS_N. Once you’ve registered and logged into your account, you may click on the ‘Internships’ button on your dashboard to view all the internships available on the platform.
You can filter work from home or part-time internships according to your preference. Hope it helps.
Thanks :)
Hii for thankful i to have
Thank you for giving a useful information about resume for me.
Thanks for sharing this ..
It’s very helpful..
Your resume decides the first impression and it is really important to having a attractive and on the point resume. As an owner of a company i go through many resumes and the way you have summarized in above post its on the point.
Hi
I wanted to apply to an internship at your organisation
I wanted to do this job at college
Hi Lohitha,
We have plenty of internships available on our platform. You may visit here http://bit.ly/INT_WH to view relevant internships. In case you are looking forward to working with Internshala, you can visit our career page and apply for an internship that matches your profile and interests.
Thanks ~Keshav
I need internship in operations to your organisation I want this job.thank you sharing another person.
Hi Yogeswari,
You may visit here – http://bit.ly/INT_WH to view relevant internships. In case you are looking forward to working with Internshala, you can visit our careers page and apply for an internship that matches your profile and interests.
Thanks,
Tejas
Ya it’s good,
I need internships in operation to your organization thank sir
Hi Gopalakrishna,
Please visit here – https://bit.ly/Operations_is to view all relevant internships available on our platform and apply to the one(s) that suit your interest.
Thanks
Nic
Hey i am imran hossen and i am beginner here i got some very information how to make resume for internship. Thanks for this article.
HEY! thanks for giving this to know about writing skills to me i can resume my internship to you.good to see this for learning skills.thanks to all.
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Hey gyas to resume formatting any problem so that you get informal information please on my website so why are you wating visit on my website.
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Very useful
Thank you
Glad you found it helpful, Manisha. Best wishes. :)
This blog is useful for everyone. Thank you .
This is also a very good post which I really enjoy reading
I’m just looking for this article that how to create a resume it is really very helpful.
I need an intership in marketing field for 2month in the month of may to june
Hey i am Mahima kumari and i am beginner here i got some very information how to make resume for internship. Thanks for this article.
I need internship in operations by which I can able to show my knowledge and skill
I want a internship in operations by which I can able to show my knowledge and skill
Hi Gurupreet,
You may visit here – https://bit.ly/Operations_is to view relevant internships. You may also filter internships according to your location and duration options given on the left side of the page. Hope it helps. :)
Thanks,
Tejas
Will you be so kind to forward me a copy of n good resume as required by you
Regards
Hiii
I would like to join this job because this is very important to my career
So plzzzz select me
I can full fill the needs and I can complete the given task
hello sir ,
I am charly roy .I want to join this internship and learn something from it that will help me a lot in advancing my career.
Ajmarraj@gmail.com
Hy
I need a intenshop for marketing field
Hi Ramkishore,
Apologies for the delay in response.
Please visit here – https://bit.ly/Marketing_is to view all marketing internships available on our platform and apply to ones that suit your profile.
Thanks~Tejas
Goooood
Thank you for this information, I will improve my resume
I want a Internships in operations by which I can able to show my knowledge and skill
Hi Divya,
Please visit here – https://bit.ly/Operations_is to view all relevant internships available on our platform and apply to the one(s) that suit your interest.
Thanks
hello sir ,
I am Rajavemanna reddy j .I want to join this internship and learn something from it that will help me a lot in advancing my career.
Hi Rajavemanna,
Apologies for the delay in response.
Please visit here – http://bit.ly/internship_is to view all internships available on our platform. You may filter internships according to your preferences (category, location, duration etc.) given on the left side of the page to find internships of your interest and apply for the ones that suit your profile.
Thanks
Dear sir/mam
I need to work in this platform
Hi Imran,
Please visit https://internshala.com/fresher-jobs to view all jobs available on our platform and apply to the one(s) that suit your profile.
Thanks~Tejas
I need to work in this platform… please
To
Mam /sir
We need information about” GRAPHIC DESIGN”.
thanks
I am so happy
I want to learn something from an internship
To
Mam/Sir
I need in this platform
I need to work in an iternship
I need to work
Hi Sanket,
Please visit http://bit.ly/is-intern to view all internships/jobs available on our platform and apply to the one(s) that suit your profile.
Thanks~Tejas