Event Planner Resume: Examples That Will Stun Recruiters

Event Planner Resume (Text Version)

Contact Info:

Suzy Redford
[email protected]
1 (678) 432-0039
Atlanta, GA 30322
linkedin.com/suzyredford

Summary Statement:

Event Planner: Versatile and highly creative event planner, known for collaborating closely with clients and fulfilling expectations concerning event oversight and attention to detail. Skilled at themed presentations and working within historical venues. Over seven years of experience planning a variety of events, including weddings, corporate functions, socials, and banquets.

Key Accomplishments/Areas of Expertise

• Banquets
• Weddings
• Socials and Soirees
• Creative Design
• Marketing
• Adaptation
• Punctuality
• Leadership
• Critical Thinking
• Budgeting
• Staff Acquisition
• Delegation

Professional Experience:

Katie Scarlett’s Southern Events | Atlanta, GA
Event Coordinator | July 2017 – Present

• Expertly plan themed events with attendees from 50 to 400 people
• Arrange event catering and entertainment according to client desires
• Perform comprehensive research for Antebellum-themed soirees
• Oversee event setups and take-downs in accordance with event specs

Weddings and Such | Athens, GA
Event Planner | January 2015 – May 2017

• Worked with clients to ensure ideal venue selection & execution of event 
• Contracted caterers and coordinated regarding allergies & diet restrictions 
• Managed reservations, including impromptu changes by clients & vendors
• Increased callbacks by 10% via newly developed marketing brochures 

Southern Fried Events | Atlanta, GA
Event Planner | August 2012 – December 2014

• Organized event packages
• Executed banquet events and selected venues
• Adhered to client budgets and expectations
• Available to event hosts throughout planning/execution stage

Education/Certifications

BACHELOR OF ARTS IN BUSINESS MANAGEMENT
The University of Georgia, Athens, GA
Class of 2012

• Certified Meeting Professional (CMP)
• Certified Quality Event Planner (CQEP)

Before you jump into writing your event planner resume, it is essential to first think about how you want to lay it all out.

The first thing a hiring manager is going to notice before reading anything is the font and format you select.

The initial look of your resume is critical when you consider that hiring managers only spend about 6 seconds on average, looking at each resume they review.

When deciding on what format to use, make sure that it is easy to follow, which means it has proper spacing and organization that draws attention to your strongest qualities.

Ordering details in reverse chronological order will also allow for your most recent and impressive jobs and skills to be noticed first.

Aside from the structure, the other key component to consider is the font you choose.

The font you select should be legible and neat so that words can be read and understood at a glance.

If you can organize your resume into an easy to read and follow format, you are off to a great start.

Now that you have decided on how to lay out your event planner resume, it is time to start writing it.

Just like meeting a new person, you should always start with a short introduction of yourself.

This section of your resume is called your summary, and it usually consists of a short paragraph (about three sentences) that describes some of your best attributes as an event planner.

Make sure that as you write your summary, you describe yourself in a way that highlights key qualities that would benefit you in the position you are applying to.

The “Yes!” example describes the candidate using rich and varied speech to highlight their natural and practiced qualities.

The “No!” example describes the candidate with minimal detail and a lack of powerful keywords that should highlight the candidate and separate them from others.

PRO TIP: When describing your accomplishments and qualifications in any section of your resume, make sure to quantify specific details whenever possible. If you can say that you have planned over 20 successful weddings, don’t just say that you have planned “many” or “a lot” of weddings.

Now that you have laid out a brief introduction of yourself, you will want to include an eye-catching section that consists of a list of your most impressive skills and key accomplishments.

The skills you select should highlight your best qualities but also make sure you are listing abilities that directly relate to the position you are applying to.

This section is going to be the easiest thing to notice when someone takes a look at your resume.

Key Accomplishments/Areas of Expertise:

• Banquets
• Weddings
• Socials and Soirees
• Creative Design
• Marketing
• Adaptation
• Punctuality
• Leadership
• Critical Thinking
• Budgeting
• Staff Acquisition
• Delegation

As you start to think through what skills are the most important to include, consider that there are two different kinds of skills – hard skills and soft skills.

Hard skills:

• Teachable
• Practicable
• Easy to Quantify
• Technical

Hard skills are essential to include when you want to make sure the hiring manager knows that you have practiced experience with particular types of events and specific tasks.

Soft skills:

• Personality Traits
• Subjective
• Harder to Quantify
• Innate
• Not necessarily teachable

Soft skills are especially important when it comes to event planning because you spend so much of your time working with clients and with other team members helping you execute an event.

Make sure that you include a nice balance of both hard and soft skills to show off that you are a well rounded and experienced candidate.

PRO TIP: Always reference the job posting multiple times as you draft your resume to ensure that you are including relevant details; usually, the job posting will directly state what they are looking for.

(See below for a helpful table of some suggested hard and soft skills to include in your event planner resume.)

Your work history is the section that ordinarily takes up most of your resume space, and for a good reason.

While this section is seen as a list of previous jobs to some, in reality, it is an opportunity to back up the skills and qualifications you claim to have.

In order to “walk the walk” with this section, it is necessary only to list your most notable and relevant work experience.

You will also want to list your jobs in reverse chronological order so that your most recent work is seen first.

Hiring managers like to see what you have been up to lately and an added benefit is that your most recent work is usually your most impressive.

Once you have decided what jobs to include, write out a few bullet points (three to five) describing what your role was in each position.

Let’s look at a few examples.

The “Yes!” example lends specific details concerning what tasks are performed to show how successfully the candidate executes them.

The “No!” example lends minimal detail when listing the duties performed, creating a one-dimensional candidate that will likely get lost in the pile.

PRO TIP: Start by listing out your day-to-day tasks with little to no detail and then go through your list and pick out what is most pertinent for your resume. Then go through each bullet point and add in specific aspects and strong keywords to describe how you completed each task.

(If you lack work experience, see below for a helpful section.)

More About Bots

As you draft your resume, you are likely thinking about a manager as the main audience you are writing for. This isn’t wrong; however, there is one other thing to consider.

Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS), or bots, are a new kind of technology used to sort through resumes before a hiring manager takes a look.

Bots search resumes by looking for specific keywords that are associated with “good candidate potential” and flag those resumes for further review.

If your resume doesn’t catch the eye of a bot, it will likely not be seen by human eyes.

While this might sound a bit daunting, the use of strong keywords is important in any resume, no matter who is reviewing it.

Some people try to combat this issue by packing their resumes full of as many keywords as possible, and to do so, they use paragraph format as opposed to bullet points.

Let’s take a look at the difference between these two formats.

Standard Bullet Point Format:

Weddings and Such | Athens, GA | Event Planner | January 2015 – May 2017

• Worked with clients to ensure ideal venue selection & execution of event 
• Contracted caterers and coordinated regarding allergies & diet restrictions 
• Managed reservations, including impromptu changes by clients & vendors
• Increased callbacks by 10% via newly developed marketing brochures 

Paragraph Format:

Weddings and Such | Athens, GA | Event Planner | January 2015 – May 2017

Worked closely with clients to ensure ideal venue selection and execution of event details. Contracted caterers for wedding events and coordinated meal specifics concerning allergies and diet restrictions for all invited guests. Tactfully managed reservations and scheduling in an efficient manner, including instances with impromptu changes by clients and vendors. Developed effective and distinct marketing brochures that led to an increase in callbacks by 10%

A third option to consider is using a setup that involves both paragraph and bullet point formatting.

Weddings and Such | Athens, GA | Event Planner | January 2015 – May 2017

Worked closely with clients to ensure ideal venue selection and execution of event details. Contracted caterers for wedding events and coordinated meal specifics concerning allergies and diet restrictions for all invited guests. Tactfully managed reservations and scheduling in an effective manner, including instances with impromptu changes by clients and vendors. Developed effective and distinct marketing brochures that led to an increase in callbacks by 10%

• Microsoft Office
• Budget Management

Whatever route you decide to go with, using keywords is going to be important in both formats.

At Big Interview, we suggest sticking with a well-versed bullet point format so that your event planner resume can remain eye-catching and easy to read.

Just don’t forget to describe yourself and your skills with strong and varied speech.

Likely, the most straightforward section of your event planner resume will be the education section.

Your education section is made up of a list of your degrees in order of most impressive to least.

For example, if you have multiple degrees, you would list your Master’s before your bachelor’s, and your bachelor’s before your associates, and so on.

For each degree, be sure to include the basic details surrounding it (e.g., year of graduation, name of the school, and the full degree title).

Example:

Bachelor of Arts in Business Management

The University of Georgia, Athens, GA
Class of 2012

If you have any certifications or workshops related to event planning, be sure to include those in this section as well.

Example:

• Certified Meeting Professional (CMP)
• Certified Quality Event Planner (CQEP)

Possible Sections to Include

In certain instances, you might have information about yourself that is pertinent to your resume but doesn’t quite fit into any of the previous categories.

If this is the case for you, it is acceptable to include additional sections.

Some sections to consider including are:

• Awards and honors
• Publications
• Noteworthy Projects
• Social Media Influence
• Speaking Engagements
• Hobbies/Interests
• Volunteer Work

What if You Have No Experience?

Depending on where you are in your career, you might not have a lot of relevant work experience to include in your event planner resume.

Whether you’re a new graduate or you just switched professions, it can feel a bit intimidating to fill out a resume.

Rest assured that everyone does have to start somewhere, and there are a few ways to rework your resume around this concern.

To start, you will likely want to move your education section below your summary.

Moving your education section ahead of your work history is beneficial when your education is more related to event planning than your job experience is.

You can also add some more details to this section if this is the case as well.

If you earned any awards or honors while in school or graduated with an impressive GPA, these details can help you stand out a bit.

You can list any specified coursework that is directly related to the job you are applying to and include any workshops you did outside of school as well.

You will also want to strongly consider including any additional sections that sound impressive or relevant.

If you have done any sort of volunteer work, fundraising, or internships that involved the skills of an event planner, those details will surely help you stand out from the crowd.

Most importantly, stay positive and confident – if you are determined and driven in the field of event planning, that attitude can go a long way.

Utilize the space

Realizing that structure and formatting are the first things a person notices when they look at your resume is a huge game-changer. Make sure that you list your most impressive attributes first and utilize bullet points to set the most important details apart from the crowd.

Keep things fresh

Every time you start a new sentence or bullet point, make sure that you are using different power words each time. If you use the same words to describe yourself or the tasks you fulfilled in a past job, you are going to come off redundant and one dimensional.

Look things over

Make sure that you are reviewing your resume thoroughly. Don’t just read things over once and assume you are all set to go. If you can get someone else to review your resume, take advantage, and if that isn’t an option, read through it more than once and read it out loud to yourself so you can hear how it is going to sound.

Don’t overdo it

Possibly the biggest resume no-no is writing a resume that is longer than one page. If a hiring manager is only spending about 6 seconds reviewing each resume, it’s reasonable to assume that they don’t have time to look at a resume that is two pages long. Make sure you are narrowing things down to only the most significant details.

Don’t say “I” and “me”

If you are new to resume writing, it might feel strange at first to write so much about yourself without the use of these two words. In reality, though, it is already implied that you are talking about yourself, and including “I” and “me” will just come off awkward.

Don’t use crazy fonts

This might sound like a no-brainer to some; however, it isn’t uncommon for people to try and stand out by using a “unique” font or a crazy format. Keep in mind that you want your resume to be easy to sort through and read. Sometimes those flashy fonts just come off as desperate.

(See below for a helpful table of some suggested power words.)

Event Planner Resume Power Words

• Administered
• Founded
• Adept
• Formulated
• Built
• Implemented
• Created
• Improved
• Consolidated
• Initiated
• Coordinated
• Launched
• Developed
• Pioneered
• Designed
• Organized

Event Planner Resume Skills List