Engineering Resume Example & Writing Guide

An engineering resume is a brief professional document used by job seekers to highlight their experience, education, and skills. Its purpose is to demonstrate your qualifications to a recruiter, convincing them that you’re the right person for a position in their organization, thus securing you a job interview.

This article represents a deep dive into an engineering resume, teaching you how to write and format the document, what information to include and what to omit, and which mistakes to avoid. We’ll give you a step-by-step guide for every section and immediately put theory into practice by showing you the examples.

Mechanical Engineering Resume Example

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Electrical Engineer Resume Example

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Aerospace Engineer Resume Example

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How to Write an Engineering Resume: 5 Key Sections Explained

Writing a good engineering resume is all about proper structure, so make sure to include the following sections:

Of course, you don’t have to stop there. If you have some more room on your resume and more valuable information to add to it, you can also insert a few additional sections. These include certifications, languages, publications, awards, hobbies and interests, and more.

In case you don’t feel like making your engineering resume from scratch, you can take advantage of our resume-building tool! It comes with plenty of different options that allow you to adjust everything—from font to layout—with just one click. Once you get a desirable look, simply fill in the blanks with your information, and you’re good to go!

Engineering Resume Template

Here’s one of many professional engineering resume templates that you can make in a matter of minutes using our resume builder:

#1. Contact Information

To allow back-and-forth communication with recruiters, you must provide your contact information in your resume header. This step is a piece of cake—all you should do is just state the following details:

Let’s take a look at an example:

Keep in mind that the ATS can read your title as a keyword, so you want to match it with the one mentioned in the job posting. Not to mention how an unprofessional title such as “Code Wizard” might not do well with recruiters.

Speaking of things to avoid, adding your address is an outdated practice. Only do it if a job posting or a specific state law in the area where you’re applying for a job requires you to do so. Even then, only include your city and state.

Of course, there are a few more things you could add to this section. For example, if you’re active on LinkedIn, you can add a clickable link to your LinkedIn profile. On top of that, depending on the type of engineer that you are, you could also add links to your portfolio, GitHub, Stack Overflow, and other websites and profiles related to the field.

#2. Resume Objective/Summary

Considering that hiring managers often spend less than a minute reading through a single resume, you could have as little as one paragraph—called a resume objective or summary—to grab their attention. 

That paragraph goes at the beginning of your resume and aims to highlight your most prominent skills, achievements, and professional endeavors. Which one of these two you may need depends on your level of expertise and the amount of work experience you have.

If you lack professional experience or don’t have any specific achievements in the field (due to a career change or any other reason), you should write a resume objective. Instead of focusing on professional endeavors, it draws attention to your skills and career goals. This way, you show that you’re ready to learn and improve even though you have little to no work history.

On the flip side, a resume summary is an option for you if you have solid work experience, as it puts your most impressive workplace accomplishments in the spotlight. This enables you to summarize your career and entices recruiters to keep reading.

Engineering Resume Objective

As someone who is at the beginning of their career, you want to show potential right off the bat. Talk about your skills and show that you’re a go-getter by setting a specific career objective.

You’ll score bonus points if your professional goals line up with the needs of the company you’re applying to. They’ll see you as someone who is there for the long term and, therefore, worth investing time and resources in.

Let’s take a look at a good example of an engineering resume objective:

For comparison, here’s a bad example that shows no skills and features no specific goals:

Engineering Resume Summary

If you have years of professional experience behind you and numerous relevant accomplishments to highlight, you should write an engineering resume summary. Use it to draw attention to your greatest career achievements and briefly summarize the rest of your resume. This way, recruiters will see the best of you right away, and they’ll likely want to know more about you.

Let’s see a good example of a well-written resume summary:

Now here’s a bad example that lacks any substance or concrete information, which makes it far less likely to impress anyone:

#3. Work Experience Section

Out of all sections of your engineering resume, the one dedicated to work experience shows recruiters how well you might perform at your new job most directly. This is where you should state all the previous job positions you held and other important details related to them.

When adding previous jobs to this section, include the following information:

If you have a lot of experience, the best way to organize the information related to it is to list all the positions you held in reverse-chronological order.

The part that will have the biggest impact on recruiters is the list of your responsibilities and achievements. While the former is important, you want to focus more on your accomplishments within the role, as they show the actual results of your competence.

To display them optimally, use bulleted lists since they convey more information than blocks of text and are easier to read. Also, by including exact numbers and percentages next to relevant accomplishments, you’ll quantify them and make them more specific in the eyes of hiring managers.

Furthermore, you can make this section—and even your entire resume—more memorable by using action verbs and power words. Substitute bland, overused terms that recruiters run into on every other resume with creative and memorable synonyms. For example, the next time you want to say you “made” something, try using “engineered” or “formulated” instead.

Engineers With No Experience

Regardless of the lack of professional history, you can still write an impressive work experience section.

Whether you’re a student, a recent graduate, or someone who changed careers, you’ll usually have other experiences to leverage. For instance, if you’re still in college, you can write about challenging projects, volunteer work, freelance experience, internships, and much more.

If you follow the tips we outlined in a previous chapter, you’ll end up with a professional work experience section line, as in the following example:

Experienced Engineers

If you’re a seasoned professional in the field of engineering, you’d want to bring out the big guns when writing your work experience section. The best way to do it is to create a compilation of your most impressive achievements by using 3–5 highly effective bullet points per job.

List multiple previous employments in reverse-chronological order, but make sure they are all relevant. Don’t add jobs that happened a long time ago or are completely irrelevant to the engineering field.

Here’s how to do it:

#4. Education Section

Engineering is a very technical field where most jobs require a bachelor's or higher degree. For this reason, we can say that this section is usually equally important as the one dedicated to work experience. Still, you want to keep this part brief and concise.

Generally, you should only add your latest degree—add more only if there’s room for it on a resume or if you have a modest work experience section. What you definitely shouldn’t do is include your high school diploma unless it’s the only degree you have obtained so far.

When writing this section, include the following:

Here’s an example:

Similarly to the work experience section, the education part should also feature some notable achievements in the form of bullet points. Anything from an impressive GPA (3.5 or higher) to extracurricular activities, exchange programs, and relevant coursework will be a valuable addition to this section.

But what if you’re still a student?

In such a case, include your degree in your resume anyway and add “expected” next to a graduation date, or omit it and put “current” instead. Even if you dropped out of college, you can still state how many credits you earned toward your degree.

#5. Skills Section

Engineering is a vast field where every job requires a certain skill set, and you definitely want to showcase yours when writing an engineering resume.

Start by researching the job ad to find out what the employer is looking for. Then match some of the skills they want with the ones you have and add those to your resume.

Since engineering is a highly specialized vocation, you want to emphasize your job-specific hard skills. Customize and fine-tune this section until you’ve made it perfectly tailored to the position you’re applying for.

Of course, hiring managers always love to see desirable traits and interpersonal skills in candidates, too. That’s why you also want to include soft skills in your resume as well—just make sure you list them separately from hard ones since these two categories are different in nature.

Hard Skills

Here are some of the hard skills engineers should consider adding to their resumes:

Soft Skills

Recruiters in the engineering field are usually looking for the following soft skills:

Optional Sections on an Engineering Resume

The best way to stand out from the competition is to show more than the bare minimum, and the easiest way to do that effectively is through optional sections. Here are some optional sections to consider:

Certifications

Certifications show that you have been formally educated on a specific subject and that you possess a highly focused knowledge of the topic. Obtaining these is the perfect way to supplement your education section and add more value to your skills, too.

Here’s an example of how a network engineer would add certifications to their resume:

Languages

This section is especially valuable if you’re applying for a position overseas or if your future job may involve communication with clients and coworkers from other countries. To get the most out of this part, list languages based on your proficiency level, which can be:

Projects

Projects (both academic and personal) show that you can apply your skills in practice and that you’re a strong problem-solver. This section is particularly important for entry-level engineers who lack professional experience. Besides mentioning projects in a separate section, you can add them to your work history as well.

If you’re going the optional section route, you should still use the work experience formatting method by adding the project’s name and a bullet list of relevant features, metrics, and results. Depending on the project, you can also include the skills or technologies used.

Here’s an example:

Publications

Publications can help your engineering resume stand out if you’re applying for academic roles, R&D, and fields that require advanced engineering. They signal analytical prowess coupled with strong technical writing skills, with a passion for attaining and spreading knowledge.

When listing publications to your resume, make sure to include the following details:

Let’s see that in an example:

Other Sections

There are many other optional sections you can add to your resume to spruce it up. Some of them are:

What is the Right Format to Use for an Engineering Resume?

Resume format represents the way the information is organized and presented in your resume. There are three popular options you can use:

Resume Layout

A resume layout represents the way your resume looks and displays information to the reader.

For starters, you want to keep your resume one page long. Since most recruiters spend less than a minute reading each resume, you want to ensure they see everything they need while just skimming through it. To achieve that, check out the following guidelines:

Should You Submit a Cover Letter With Your Engineering Resume?

The short answer is yes—for optimal results, you should definitely write a unique cover letter for every position you’re applying for. That shows diligence and a willingness to go the extra mile for a cause that matters to you, which immediately places you ahead of other candidates.

It’s recommended to personally address the recruiter and write a few brief paragraphs where you will describe your skills and career achievements relevant to the job in more detail. This document also allows you to explain why you want to work in a specific position and what the employer can expect from you.

How to Optimize an Engineering Resume for ATS?

Before we wrap up the article, here are a few ATS tips to help you optimize your engineering resume to pass software screening with no effort:

Closing Thoughts

To create a job-winning engineering resume, you need to be concise and precise. Do your research to pinpoint which skills recruiters want to see and focus on your most impressive accomplishments. Add numbers to quantify your efforts and demonstrate results, and you’ll jump ahead of the competition.

If the writing process feels overwhelming, check out our website for professional engineering resume examples. They can guide you as you work on your document, ensuring your structure and formatting are on point. For all but guaranteed success, you can always use our resume builder and finish the job in minutes!

Engineering Resume FAQs

#1. How long should an engineering resume be?

An engineering resume should be one page long. You should go for quality over quantity and only showcase your most impressive and most relevant skills and accomplishments. You can only add another page to your resume if you have years of valuable experience or if the job ad requires it.

#2. What skills should I put on an engineering resume?

What skills you should put on an engineering resume depend on the role that you’re applying for. You need to research the position and the company to discover which abilities recruiters are looking for in candidates. Make sure to add a mix of hard and soft skills.

#3. Should I include a photo on my engineering resume?

No, you should not include a photo in your engineering resume. Adding a photo to your resume can lead to an automatic disqualification, since it can lead to bias. Employers may discard your resume preventively, due to the risk of anti-discrimination hiring practices.

#4. How do I write an engineering resume with no experience?

To write an engineering resume with no experience, you can leverage analogous activities, like internships, personal projects, or volunteer work. These are great substitutes that allow entry-level candidates to demonstrate their knowledge and its application in real-life scenarios. Alternatively, you can use the skill-focused functional resume template.

#5. What is the best format for an engineering resume?

The best format for an engineering resume is the chronological resume format, in most cases. This is the most common format in the job market, because it neatly lists past jobs and accomplishments in reverse-chronological order. It’s a recruiter’s favorite format, and it’s compatible with applicant tracking systems.