How to build a professional quality engineer resume?
Quality engineers are crucial members of any production or manufacturing team, ensuring that each product is of the highest quality and meets company and regulatory standards. To land a job as a quality engineer, the first step is to create a compelling resume that catches the attention of employers.
In this guide, we will teach you everything you need to know about writing a resume as a quality engineer. Keep reading to learn how to:
- Select a resume format that matches your experience level
- Write a resume summary that impresses employers
- Include key quality engineering skills on your resume
- Describe your responsibilities and accomplishments at previous jobs
- List your educational credentials correctly on your resume
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1. Select a resume format that matches your experience level
As a quality engineer, you will generally want to select a resume format that highlights your real-life professional experience. The best format for this purpose is the reverse-chronological resume, which focuses primarily on work experience.
In the reverse-chronological format, you will list your most recent job first, working chronologically backward from this point.
However, a format that focuses on work experience is not ideal for all applicants – especially those who have less than a year’s experience within the field. In this case, you can consider using one of the following alternative formats:
- The functional resume: Functional resumes focus on education, skills, and unpaid experience rather than formal work experience. This format is very well-suited by recent or soon-to-be college graduates who have extensive academic experience but limited employment examples.
- The hybrid resume: Hybrid resumes eliminate any central focus, instead spreading the emphasis of the document out more evenly between all sections. This format works well for applicants who have professional experience in other fields who are changing careers, as well as those who are working around gaps in their work histories.
Choose your preferred template and make your resume shine.
2. Write a quality engineer resume summary that impresses employers
A resume summary is a brief introductory statement at the start of your resume. In this summary, you should focus on including information that is highly valuable and eye-catching to employers, such as years of experience and notable accomplishments.
To demonstrate how to write an effective resume summary, we have included a weak example below, followed by a corrected example and explanation.
Incorrect quality engineer resume summary example
Experience Quality Engineer with a background in cosmetics manufacturing. Proven track record of increasing production output through optimized workflows that simultaneously reduce errors. Skills include product quality testing, quality assurance, quality auditing, and deep knowledge of compliance.
Why is this incorrect?
In this example, the applicant is far too vague when discussing their “proven track record.” When describing accomplishments, it is always better to show rather than tell, meaning you should use quantifiable figures and statistics when possible. Additionally, the applicant focuses too much on their various skills – these should be omitted and moved to a dedicated skills section.
Corrected quality engineer resume summary example
Resourceful Quality Engineer with 7+ years of experience with cosmetics manufacturing plants. Specialized in quality assurance and auditing, averaging a 65% decrease in production errors at 3 previous positions. Achieved a 40% increase in production output while maintaining a production error rate of less than 2% in most recent position.
Why is this correct?
In this corrected example, the applicant is much more explicit with the details they provide. An employer reading this will have much greater context around their skills and accomplishments, making them more likely to continue reading the rest of the document due to the impressive achievement detailed in this summary.
3. Include key quality engineering skills on your resume
As a quality engineer, your job will require you to not only have the technical know-how to ensure proper production standards are met but also a strong set of interpersonal abilities to effectively communicate with your company and team.
To show that you possess this full range of abilities, you should include both hard and soft skills on your quality engineer resume. Hard skills refer to your technical and learned abilities, while soft skills refer to your interpersonal ones.
Below are 10 ideas for both hard and soft skills that look great on a Quality Engineer’s resume:
The best quality engineer hard skills to put on your resume
- Process documentation
- Production reports
- Product testing
- Material & equipment inspection
- Developing quality management systems
- OSHA safety standards
- Quality control workflows
- Data analytics
- Improvement recommendations
- Quality assurance consultations
Effective soft skills to put on your quality engineer CV
- Clear communication (both verbal & non-verbal)
- Collaboration
- Leadership
- Critical & analytical thinking
- Attention to detail
- Thoroughness
- Organization
- Time management
- Active listening
- Strict adherence to deadlines
4. Make your quality engineer work experience section stand out
Crafting the ideal work experience section on a resume requires more than simply listing out your responsibilities at a previous job. You should aim to include as many specific and quantifiable details as possible, with an emphasis on key accomplishments that employers will find valuable.
Additionally, to keep this section organized, you should use bullet points to create your job descriptions. Each bullet point should contain one concise sentence and should ideally be no more than two lines of text. However, for accomplishments that require extra contextual information, an additional sentence or line of text may be acceptable.
Here is an example of a work experience entry from a quality engineer resume:
Mac’s Manufacturing, Birmingham, AL
Quality Engineer
April 2019 to January 2022
- Prepared annual product reviews for all basic products, improving production review efficiency by 20%.
- Supervised onsite product testing and performance, providing full performance reviews and recommendations for improvement monthly.
- Implemented 10 new quality assurance procedures, reducing product errors and malfunctions by 35%.
5. List your educational credentials correctly on your quality engineer resume
To work in an engineering position, employers will almost always expect you to have a minimum of a bachelor’s degree in a related engineering program.
However, to make both your resume and yourself as a professional more competitive, you should also consider completing relevant certification programs as well. This is especially important for quality engineers, who may have an engineering degree that is not specialized in quality engineering.
Here is an example of a well-crafted education section on a quality engineer resume:
Education
University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL
B.S. in Engineering
Graduated: 2016, Magna Cum Laude
Certifications
- Certified Quality Engineer — American Society for Quality (ASQ), 2020