About This Resume

Executive recruiters guard the quality of a shortlist for the board, the chief executive, and the search committee. They make sure that every name on it has run something at the right size, and that each career story holds up when the reference calls are made. If you are a director or vice president aiming for the next seat, or a sitting executive changing companies, your resume has to show that scale in the first half page.

Boards and recruiters usually read for scope first: revenue or budget, headcount, the number of sites or countries, and who you reported to. Then comes the change you led. A turnaround, a new market, an acquisition or a margin that moved all count, as long as the numbers are yours and the timeline is clear. Everything else on the page is supporting detail.

What to Include

  • A headline naming the level and function you want, such as Chief Operating Officer or Vice President, Finance
  • A short summary, then three or four selected achievements with numbers
  • Scope for each role: revenue or budget, headcount, sites, and who you reported to
  • Turnarounds, acquisitions, integrations, market entries or cost programs you led, with results
  • Board seats, board committee work or investor reporting
  • An "Earlier career" line that sums up roles from more than about fifteen years ago
  • Advanced degrees and executive education, listed briefly

Executive Resume Sample

Sample resume. The person, employers and contact details are fictional.

Gunnar Brekke

Chief Operating Officer
Minneapolis, MN | gunnar.brekke@example.com | (555) 013-9058

Summary

Operations executive with 20 years in food and packaging manufacturing, the last seven as vice president of operations for a $540 million company. Known for turning around struggling plants and for building plant managers who stay.

Selected Achievements

  • Turned around the lowest-performing plant in the network, from last to first in on-time delivery in two years
  • Cut cost per case 11% over three years while raising line wages and more than halving turnover
  • Integrated an acquired frozen foods business with no lost customers

Experience

Vice President, Operations, Birchline Foods, Inc., Minneapolis, MN 2019 to present

  • Lead 4 plants, 1,100 employees and a $310 million operating budget; report to the CEO and present to the board each quarter.
  • Took the Mankato plant from last to first in on-time delivery within two years by rebuilding its scheduling and maintenance teams.
  • Cut cost per case 11% over three years while raising wages for line workers, which brought yearly turnover down from 48% to 21%.
  • Led the operations side of a 2023 acquisition of a frozen foods maker, closing 1 plant and moving its lines with no lost customers.

Director of Manufacturing, Larkspur Molded Products, St. Paul, MN 2012 to 2019

  • Ran 2 plants making plastic food containers, with 420 employees and $95 million in yearly sales.
  • Launched a lean program with the plant managers that freed 38,000 square feet and put off a planned expansion by five years.
  • Brought the recordable injury rate below the industry average for the first time in the company's history.

Education

Executive MBA, Hennepin Valley University, 2014

Bachelor of Science, Industrial Engineering, Kandiyohi State University, 2004

Skills

Profit and loss management, Multi-plant operations, Lean manufacturing, Acquisitions and plant integration, Capital planning, Food safety programs (SQF), Labor relations, Board reporting

Board Service

  • Board member and finance committee chair, Northside Community Food Shelf, 2020 to present

Earlier Career

  • Plant Manager and Production Manager, Larkspur Molded Products, 2008 to 2012
  • Production Supervisor, Kittson Creamery, 2006 to 2008

Tips for Your Executive Resume

  • Two pages is normal at this level. Use the top half of page one for the headline, summary and selected achievements, since that half page decides whether the rest gets read.
  • Lead each role with its scope. Instead of "Oversaw operations," write "Ran 4 plants and 1,100 employees on a $310 million budget, reporting to the CEO."
  • Keep bullets on decisions you owned and what moved because of them, such as revenue, margin, safety or retention. Daily management can fit in a single line.
  • Follow the same scope-then-results order for every senior role. If you do not have profit-and-loss responsibility yet, you should also include the budgets and programs you controlled following the same format.
  • If you have sat on a board or a board committee, give it a short section of its own with dates, even for a nonprofit, because it shows you know how a board works.
  • Compress the early years. Roles from more than about fifteen years ago can share a single "Earlier career" line with titles and employers, which keeps the page on the work a board is hiring you for.
  • Write the summary last. Once you have the achievements on paper, the summary can say in two or three lines what kind of leader they add up to.
  • Check each number against what a reference, a former board member or a public filing would say. Senior searches usually include close reference checks, and a rounded-up figure can hurt more than a modest true one.

Next steps: the resume writing guide covers every section in detail, and the template library has layouts for other fields and career stages.