Harvard Resume Template

If you’ve been looking up resume templates online, then you’ve heard of the Harvard Resume Template.

It’s an effective template that’s based off three key fundamental frameworks:

• Action words
• Technical Skills
• Quantitative Results and Accomplishments

The frameworks of the Harvard resume template align with the ones we present whenever we talk about resumes or write resumes for our clients.

Click to buy the premium version of our Harvard Resume Template to 10X Job Interviews and Offers.

March 2, 2024 by Kazu Fujimoto

What is the Harvard Resume Template?

The Harvard Resume Template is a Resume template written in frameworks that emphasize using action words, technical skills, and quantitative results and accomplishments.

Resumes used for jobs should encompass the Harvard Resume Template along with the necessary frameworks.

Check out: Resume Bullet Point Formula

Harvard Resume Template Example

Below, you’ll see an example of the Harvard Resume Template done in Word Doc.

See our homepage for a free download of our Harvard Resume Template: ULTMECHE Homepage

Education

The education section of the Harvard resume template will consist of:

• College or university name
• Degree title
• GPA (if above 3.5+)
• Location
• Relevant coursework (if lacking material to full up on resume)

Example:

• Harvard University
• Major in Computer Science
• GPA: 3.58/4.0
• Cambridge, MA
• Relevant Coursework: Software Engineering, Operating Systems, Algorithms, Artificial Intelligence

Click to buy the premium version of our Harvard Resume Template to 10X Job Interviews and Offers.

Work Experience

The work experience section of the Harvard Resume Template will consist of:

• Employer name
• Position title
• Location of Employer
• Dates of Employment
• Bulletpoints consisting of action words, technical skills, and quantitative results and accomplishments

Example:

• Employer name – Some Engineering Company
• Position title – Mechanical Engineering Intern
• Location of Employer – Los Angeles, CA
• Dates of Employment – JUN 2019 – SEP 2021

Bulletpoints:

• Coordinated hydraulic testing of pumps to verify performance parameters such as total dynamic head, volumetric flow rate, and efficiency; directed post-test work instructions, increasing efficiency by 1-3%
• Created pump quotation software using Excel VBA to configure and price vertical circulating water pumps; reducing the lead time of pump quotations by 80%
• Analyzed $10M of pricing data from domestic or overseas suppliers and determined supply chain decision making for pump components such as discharge heads, columns, casings, impellers, shafting, and bearings
• Designed $3M in pumps from concept to production with CAD software such as Creo / ProEngineer

When coming up with bullet points in your resume, make sure you include action words in your resume.

See: 69 Action Words on Resume

Activities

The activities section of the resume template will consist of any memberships or organizations done in college.

Note that if you’re fairly experienced, you can disregard this entire section.

Work experience will be most important than any other section so as a result, if you are lacking space, remove unnecessary section such as activities and university projects.

Activities and University Projects sections on resume are more geared towards college students.

The activities section of the resume will consist of:

• Membership or organization name
• Position in membership or organization
• Location of membership
• Dates in the membership or organization

Example 1:

• Membership or organization name – Formula SAE
• Position in membership or organization – Chassis Design
• Location of membership – Cambridge, MA
• Dates in the membership or organization – SEP 2018 – Present

Bulletpoints:

• Founded the first ever engineering membership to design, build, and fabricate automotives for 500 students
• Organized and advertised 10+ quarterly networking events with 300+ participants in 3 universities in Boston

Example 2:

• Membership or organization name – Engineering Honor Society
• Position in membership or organization – Committee Member
• Location of membership – Cambridge, MA
• Dates in the membership or organization – JAN 2017 – Present

Click to buy the premium version of our Harvard Resume Template to 10X Job Interviews and Offers.

Bulletpoints:

• Acted as general member of engineering honor society regarding top 10% in GPA; attended networking events, performed community service, and collaborate with other top performing engineering students
• Participated in 10+ quarterly networking events with 300+ participants in 3 cities in California

University Projects

Adding University Projects it the best way for students with no experience to get entry level jobs or internships.

The University Projects section of the resume will consist of:

• Project name
• Date of project completion
• Bulletpoints consisting of action words, technical skills, and quantitative results and accomplishments

Example 1:

• Project name – Tennis Racket
• Date of project completion – Feb 2020

Bulletpoints:

• Designed a $200 tennis racket into 3D CAD using SolidWorks through reverse engineering
• Performed Finite Element Analysis (FEA) on racket using operating conditions; resulted in an 98.7% accurate representation of the force being dissipated throughout the racket

Example 2:

• Project name – Traffic Signal
• Date of project completion – Jan 2019

Bulletpoints:

• Designed and implemented optimal traffic stop light based on traffic data utilizing MATLAB 
• Used various programming techniques to achieve completion of the project such as if/when statements and for/while loops to support city-wide intersection of 10,000+ vehicles daily

Check out: 7 Things to Put on Resume With No Work Experience

Additional

The additional section will be written in the bottom of the Harvard Resume Template

The additional section of your resume will consist of:

• Technical Skills
• Programming Skills
• Languages
• Certification & Training
• Awards

Technical Skills

It’s very important to specify the correct technical skills on your resume.

Technical skills on your resume will consist of those such as:

• Calculation methods
• Software
• Coding Languages and frameworks

Programming Skills

If your industry requires programming such as software engineering, data science, cloud computing, etc. then you’ll need to specify those as a line underneath the additional section.

Recruiters and hiring managers will quickly be scanning this to make sure you have knowledge in the programming frameworks they require.

Examples of programming skills and languages to put on your resume include:

• HTML
• CSS
• JavaScript
• Python
• React
• Node
• Epic

Languages

If the job that you’re applying for will require professional competency in any language, make sure to specify it in the additional section.

Certification & Training

List any and all certifications & training that you’ve obtained throughout the course of your career to help with your job search.

Determine whether or not the certifications are relevant and add them in the “Certification & Training” section of your resume.

Click to buy the premium version of our Harvard Resume Template to 10X Job Interviews and Offers.

Awards

Awards will be consisting of the accomplishments you’ve had throughout your career.

The awards section of your resume will consist of relevant accomplishments such as:

• Dean’s Lists
• Scholarships
• Employee Spot Awards
• Industry Competitions
• Hackathon Awards
• Volunteering Awards

Harvard Resume Template Frameworks

The Harvard Resume Template works because it utilizes three fundamental frameworks in resume writing:

• Action words
• Technical Skills
• Quantitative Results and Accomplishments

Action Words

Action words will be phrases you put in your resume that demonstrate your on the job competence.

The action words on your resume will consist of those in areas such as (LINK)

• Leadership
• Communication
• Research
• Technical
• Teaching
• Quantitative
• Creative
• Helping
• Organizational

Recruiters and hiring managers will be comparing these to the job description and ensure that you have the appropriate experience in these sections.

Click to buy the premium version of our Harvard Resume Template to 10X Job Interviews and Offers.

Technical Skills

Technical skills will be the specific hard skills that the job requires you to do.

This consists of those such as software, tools, or calculation methods that you will need to do on the job.

Identify what specific software and calculations that you’ll need to be doing in the job that you’re applying for and make sure that they’re on your resume.

Quantitative Results and Accomplishments

Quantitative results and accomplishments will be how you showcase your business impact.

Companies are very metric driven.

To determine success in a company, there are factors such as metrics and key performance indicators that are tracked.

As a result, you need to be putting quantitative results and accomplishments in your resume to showcase your business impact.

Check out: Companies LOVE When You Know How To Say You Save Money On Resume!

Why you should use the Harvard Resume Template

The Harvard Resume Template is the best resume template to use when applying for jobs.

It’s clear and concise, broken up into sections such as education, experience, skills, and ATS compliant.

This is exactly the format that recruiters and hiring managers are looking for job seekers.

Check out: Best Resume Format 2023

Should I put a summary on the Harvard Resume Template?

Although many career coaches and website will suggest to add a summary on a resume, we do not.

Through our experience and our clients, we find that a professional summary or a professional profile on a resume is redundant.

Recruiters spend about 6-7 seconds on each resume.

They’re not going to spend the entire time reading the summary.

Instead they’re going to do a quick scan of the following:

• Where a candidate went to school
• What major a candidate studied in college
• Previous employers of a job seeking candidate
• Technical skills of the job seeking candidate
• Quantitative results and accomplishments to review metrics and KPIs

Click to buy the premium version of our Harvard Resume Template to 10X Job Interviews and Offers.

Closing Thoughts on the Harvard Resume Template

There’s a lot of controversy over which resume template is the best format to use, but we recommend the Harvard Resume Template.

It’s a very clear and concise, professional, and business metric oriented which is perfect for recruiters and hiring managers to evaluate the potential for the job seeking candidate.

The format works, especially for high paying jobs in industries such as engineering, finance, healthcare, business, tech, etc.

Positions such as engineering, design, product, management, finance, can all use this format.