Nutritionist Resume Example

After reading this article, you'll feel confident creating a nutritionist resume that effectively showcases your relevant skills and experience. You'll learn how to show employers you've got the relevant qualities, skills and experience for the job, all presented in a format that employers prefer to see. The article also includes tips for formatting your resume according to your experience and strengths. Read on to learn the tips Jobseeker careers experts recommend as the best for your nutritionist resume.

Main elements of a nutritionist resume

A successful nutritionist resume will typically include each of the sections listed below, with some optional sections.

Your resume layout and structure may differ depending on your experience levels, but make sure your resume includes the following:

Resume Header

Your nutritionist resume header is the place to add your contact details. Start by adding your full name and underneath, include your email address, phone number and location. Adding your LinkedIn profile, if you have one, can help the employer get a better insight into your skills and industry expertise. You don't need to include any additional personal information or a photo. Make sure your resume header is as brief as possible and doesn't take up too much valuable space. Choose a clear, professional design that sets the tone for your application.

Make sure the email address you list in your header is professional-looking and doesn't contain any inappropriate content such as nicknames or unsuitable language. Opt for an email address based on your name or profession, or a combination of both. Finally, check your contact details before sending your resume, to ensure everything's up-to-date.

Resume Summary

Next, write a short paragraph to introduce yourself. You could also call this section 'resume summary' or 'personal profile'. In two or three sentences, explain your professional background, achievements and key skills. If you choose to write a resume summary, this focuses on your career experience to date. On the other hand, a resume objective addresses your future plans and career ambitions. In addition, your objective should highlight why you're an ideal candidate for nutritionist roles by showing key skills and qualities that reflect the job description.

Alternatively, use this summary to introduce your personal career ambitions and explain why nutritionist roles are a good fit for you at this stage of your career.

A great resume summary should highlight why you're an ideal candidate for nutritionist roles by showing key skills and qualities that reflect the job description and provide evidence to support them. It should also introduce your personality and unique qualities to the reader, to help them start to form an opinion about you as a candidate. The graphic below showcases some good examples of what to include in your nutritionist resume summary.

On the other hand, an unsuccessful resume summary is one that mentions irrelevant skills, qualities and achievements and fails to differentiate you from other candidates. The visual above includes some examples of what not to do with your nutritionist resume summary

Work History

In the next section, list your employment history focusing on the most relevant previous roles and achievements that showcase your nutritionist skills. Add each previous employment in reverse-chronological order. This means starting from your current or most recent role and working back in time from there. Include your job title, the company name, the location of the job and your dates of employment.

Under each job entry, add several bullet points highlighting your responsibilities and achievements. Consult the job description for a list of the key requirements for the role and make sure your work experience section showcases how you meet these requirements.

An effective resume work experience section is one that constantly echoes the skills and experience listed in the job description, and shows how you used your skills to positive effect in each job. Each bullet point should be carefully crafted to showcase a particular skill or achievement relevant to nutritionist jobs, with evidence to show the value you added. There are some examples of strong resume work experience sections below.

In the graphic above, you'll see some examples of less effective resume work experience sections. A poor resume work experience section would typically use vague descriptions of activities in previous jobs, while focusing too much on responsibilities rather than achievements. Failing to focus on the skills and experience that match the job description is likely to harm your chances of success.

Education and Qualifications

Under education, add details of any degrees or professional qualifications relevant to nutritionist roles.

A nutritionist role tends to require candidates to have a university or college degree, so make sure you list yours in your resume. A Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Dietetics degree or similar is the most suitable for this job, but you could also include any other relevant qualifications that show your nutrient intake analysis or educational material creation.

Include any qualifications relevant to the role. For each, add the name and level of the award, the institution name, its location and your dates of study. You can enhance this section by adding bullet points that show any outstanding grades, awards or achievements and any specialist subjects you studied. These details can make you stand out from other candidates.

If you organized or participated in any clubs or societies while at university, or you took part in any voluntary work, you could also mention these here.

Skills

Adding a list of your key skills provides a quick reference for the reader of what you can bring to a nutritionist role. Skills such as dietary needs assessment or communication skills are particularly useful for nutritionist jobs. Again, refer to the job description and make sure you include skills that the employer has listed as essential or desirable for employment as a nutritionist.

Highlighting your hard skills

For your hard skills list, include any technical abilities or specific industry knowledge that's essential to working as a nutritionist. These could be skills gained through work experience or qualifications. Furthermore, your list of hard skills provides a strong indication to the reader of your expertise in nutritionist roles, and how well you'll fit into the position. Include around four or five key hard skills that are listed in the job description. These skills will help to convince the hiring manager that you're a good fit for the position.

Your resume hard skills list should reflect your unique and specific industry expertise and experience, while also fulfilling the requirements listed in the job description. See the examples below for an idea of what an effective nutritionist resume hard skills list looks like.

Listing soft skills on your nutritionist resume

In your list of soft skills, add any personal strengths, qualities or transferable skills that make you a good fit for the job. Soft skills are often less specific to different industries, but that doesn't make them any less important. In fact, you can develop soft skills throughout your career, and they tend to be suitable for various roles and professions. In this section, add four of five transferable skills that match the job description.

The strongest resume soft skills sections include a mix of skills that match your best personal strengths, and that reflect the skills listed in the job description. See below for some examples of effective soft skills for a nutritionist resume.

Relevant Certifications and Licenses

Your certifications section is the place to mention any relevant professional nutritionist certifications, licenses or qualifications. These could be official licenses required for the job or certifications that improve your employability. Therefore, list any official licenses and certifications, along with their dates, so employers can assess whether you've got the necessary qualifications to work as a nutritionist.

Review the list below for some suitable certifications for a nutritionist resume:

Optional Resume Sections

If you need to provide further evidence of your suitability for the job, optional sections can be useful for a nutritionist resume. Choose optional sections from the list below, if they help to showcase your relevant skills and experience.

Hobbies and Interests

Hobbies and interests can be a useful way of showing your skills and experience beyond your work and education. Hobbies can help you show different sides of your personality and make your resume more memorable to hiring managers. They're ideal to include if you're a junior candidate who might lack real world nutritionist experience. Only include hobbies and interests that showcase your personality and personal qualities, and add something different to your application.

Voluntary Work

Voluntary work can help you develop useful skills, so it's a valuable addition to your nutritionist resume. Include the title of your volunteer role, who you volunteered for, as well as the dates you carried out the work. Provide brief details of your responsibilities and the impact you made.

References

References aren't a standard nutritionist resume section, but employers do sometimes ask for them. Check the job advert and only include them if requested. Add two or three professional references, and be sure to approach each referee before you include them.

Best words to use in a nutritionist resume

Add strong verbs to your work experience section to show the hiring manager the impact you made in your previous roles. Choose from the list of words below to increase the impact of your work experience section.

Jobseeker's resume templates were created by careers experts to help you produce a professional resume in minutes. You can also find cover letter templates to complete an eye-catching job application that gets you noticed.

Example of a nutritionist resume

Using each of the sections above, we've created this example nutritionist resume, to help guide you when creating your own:

Tips on creating an ATS-optimized resume

Applicant tracking systems (ATS) are increasingly taking responsibility for the management and processing of job applications, helping hiring practices to become more efficient. This can include screening resumes by scanning and ranking each application according to how closely it matches the job description. If you follow a few simple tips when writing your nutritionist resume, you'll give yourself a better chance of ranking highly in the ATS screening and progressing to the next stage.

Follow these simple rules when writing your resume, to make sure it's ATS compliant:

• Opt for an established, traditional resume format such as a reverse-chronological or functional structure. These will ensure your resume includes all the necessary details ATS systems scan for.
• Use of job description keywords throughout your resume will help it rank higher in the ATS scanning stage, as it will more closely match the requirements laid out in the job description.
• Using clear, simple headings makes it easier for an ATS application to scan your resume, as it can easily identify what's in each section of your document.
• Utilize a clean, clear resume design that helps make your content more readable. Use simple fonts and subtle color accents and design elements that don't detract from the written content.
• Adopt simple, professional language to keep your resume as concise as possible. This tends to make your document more readable, and easier for ATS software to scan.

Takeaways for a winning nutritionist resume

The best resumes focus on your skills and the value you've added to previous roles, rather than focusing on your duties and responsibilities. Pick a resume format that matches your experience levels, and tailor the content of your resume to reflect the details of the job description.

HR-approved resume templates and other tools by Jobseeker are the easiest way to create a winning job application. Sign up and follow the simple instructions to complete a resume that stands out from the crowd. A stylish, professional cover letter can make all the difference to your job prospects. See Jobseeker's cover letter examples, written by careers experts, to help you craft an eye-catching application.

Sources:

(1) Tips for Writing a Federal Resume, U.S. Department of Labor: https://www.dol.gov/general/jobs/tips-for-writing-a-federal-resume

(2) Resume Tips, Duke University: https://careerhub.students.duke.edu/resources/resume-tips/