Chief Technology Officer Sample

According to the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, roles that fall into the computer and information systems manager category, like Chief Technology Officer, or CTO, will enjoy a 15% increase over the next 10 years (until about 2032). That, of course, means there will be a ton of people vying for those positions. 

They say that competition breeds success, but in reality, too much competition can be counterproductive. If there are hundreds of qualified applicants for CTO positions, what do you do to stand out? How do you get the attention of a hiring manager – whether you’re applying for a role at a new company or an internal promotion? 

The answer is that you have to have a compelling, clearly articulated, and achievement-packed CTO resume!

It can be a challenging thing to do. Fortunately, you’re in the right place! The experts at ZipJob have created this CTO resume guide with an example CTO resume and a lot of tips and tricks to help you land your next interview.

How to write a resume

First things first! How do you write a CTO resume? 

Several factors go into a resume that lands in the hands of a hiring manager and, from there, wows them. First, your resume has to pass those frustrating employer applicant tracking systems, otherwise known as an ATS. This means it needs to be ATS-friendly. Once your resume gets past the ATS, it then needs to stand out to recruiters and hiring managers. 

Here are some tips to help you tackle these tasks. 

Write with an ATS in mind

Most employers, somewhere in the neighborhood of 90%, use an applicant tracking system to screen candidates and build efficiencies into their hiring practices. If your resume can’t be read by an ATS, or the ATS doesn’t believe it’s relevant, then it will likely be rejected. What does that mean? It means that, even if you’re qualified, your resume won’t be seen by a human reader, and we don’t want that!

Here are some considerations for creating an ATS-friendly resume:

Select the best format

There are three resume formats commonly used for US resumes:

• Reverse chronological

• Functional

• Hybrid

You’ll want to select the best format for your circumstances. In most instances, your safest bet will be to go with the reverse chronological format. As mentioned previously, it’s the most easily read by ATS software and the version most liked by recruiters and hiring managers. 

Another benefit of the reverse chronological version is that your most recent experience is listed first, which is considered the most relevant to hiring managers. In other words, hiring managers will see what they’re most interested in at the top. 

Incorporate a strong resume summary

Your resume summary follows your contact information at the top of your resume. The goal of a summary is to capture the attention of the reader so they want to learn more. You want your summary to pack a punch by incorporating the most important elements from your resume in terms of experience, knowledge, and skills. 

Include relevant competencies

Following your resume summary, include a list of 12-15 core competencies that show you have the knowledge to get the job done. The core competencies section generally includes the hard skills you possess. 

Be sure to include all of the core competencies you have that are outlined in the job description. This will stand out to the hiring managers and also show that you have the relevant skills necessary during ATS scans. 

Write achievement-based bullet points

When you get to the meat of your CTO resume – the Professional Experience section – you may be tempted to list everything you’ve done at your jobs. Avoid doing this. Instead, focus on the things you achieved at each position. 

As you write your professional experience section, think about the job description and what the new company wants or needs. The only way they’re going to be able to tell that you have what it takes is to see things you achieved at previous jobs. 

A lot of CTO resumes will write bullets like this:

• Managed the IT department

• Led a team of developers

• Implemented new technologies

While those are great things, you can bet that every other CTO resume will say basically the same thing. So, to stand out from the crowd, transform those bullets into achievement statements like this:

• Managed an IT department consisting of 5 teams and a budget of $100M

• Coached and mentored a team of 12 developers by creating an open environment of communication that facilitated future-facing decision-making

• Architected the release of 3 new products in the SaaS space that set the company apart as an industry leader

Which set of bullets gets your attention more? It’s the achievement bullets that have numbers, right? Those are the same types of bullet points that will impress future hiring managers.

To get your brain juices flowing, here are some ideas you can use to get some quantifiable achievements onto your CTO resume:

• Did you do anything to increase revenue?

• What, if anything, did you do to reduce system downtimes?

• Do you have any numbers related to increasing user engagement scores?

• Did your team implement any processes that improved cybersecurity?

• What have you done with artificial intelligence (AI) or machine learning (ML) to scale analytics?

Here’s a challenge! Try to add a number to every single bullet point on your resume.  

Add extras at the end of your CTO resume

By the time you get to the point of your career where you’re applying to executive-level technology roles, you’ve probably participated in some extra projects or research and development related to technology innovations. You may have even been a member of some committee, board, or task force. 

You can absolutely add those things to your resume. 

All you have to do is add a new section beneath your education to flesh out the details of those extras. Write it up just as you would your Professional Experience section, using the title of the project you participated in, the company you worked on it with, and the timeframe. Also, feel free to add a couple of accomplishment bullets if you need to add more keywords to your resume. 

Here’s an example:

While these types of extras can be critically important on your resume, you should remember that you’re working against a limit of two pages for your resume. You can possibly get away with using three pages if (and only if) the only information on page three is your career extras. 

Hiring managers spend about 10 seconds glancing at incoming resumes. They simply don’t have the time to read page after page of your career history when they have 50 other resumes to get through. Always ask yourself, “Will this be THE THING that gets me an interview?” If the answer is “No,” then don’t include it on your resume. 

Adhere to standard margins, spacing, and fonts

You want your resume to look coherent and consistent throughout. Choose standard margins and line spacing that adhere to what resume readers are accustomed to seeing. Also, use a resume-friendly font type and size. Your font size should be 10 to 14, based on the type of font you select. Some resume-friendly font types include:

• Verdana

• Trebuchet

• Times New Roman

• Tahoma

• Helvetica

• Garamond

• Calibri

• Arial

Use standard naming conventions

When you use unconventional section headings in your resume, you might confuse an ATS. Also, if you want hiring managers to quickly find the information that shows you have what it takes to succeed on the job, it's best to go with what's standard vs. trying to be creative. That means using the following naming conventions for your resume sections:

• Work Experience or Relevant Work Experience

• Education

• Certification

• Technical Skills

• Awards

• Publications

You’ll definitely include a Work Experience and Education section following your contact information and resume summary sections. The additional sections listed above can be included based on your unique circumstances. 

Tailor your CTO resume to the job description

Applying to jobs used to be a numbers game: the more resumes you sent out, the better chance you’d have of hearing back from someone. That simply isn’t the case anymore. 

Because of the rampant use of resume scanning software, you simply cannot send out the same resume to every company. It would be a complete waste of your time and effort. 

You must tailor your resume to every job that you apply to. The easiest way to do that is by focusing on your title/headline, summary paragraph, and core competencies. Of course, you can weave keywords into your resume wherever you can make them make grammatical sense, but working with the top part of your CTO resume is the fastest way to get it done. 

• The title: This should mirror the job description and will likely be changed with every single job to which you apply. If the title of your resume is currently “Chief Technology Officer,” but the job description is looking for a "Technology Strategy Executive,” be sure to change your title accordingly. 

• Profile Paragraph: Your profile paragraph and any highlight bullets beneath are a great place for keywords to appear in your resume. This paragraph basically answers the tell-me-about-yourself interview question. As you review the job description, you will notice that there are some key phrases. These are the tasks that are imperative to the successful completion of your day in the new role. Weave those key phrases into the verbiage of the profile paragraph. 

• Core Competencies: This is the list of skills just below your profile section. This is what career experts like to call the 'Beat the Bots' section. While the skills you possess are important, it’s MORE important to target your resume to the job description. As you compare your current skills list with that of the job posting, make note of keywords that you’re not using and include them here.

Don’t forget about your cover letter

In the spirit of talking about a complete application for a new CTO position, we would be remiss if we didn’t teach you that the tips and tricks involved in crafting a compelling CTO resume hold true for your cover letter, too. 

Not too long ago, the thought process behind cover letters was that they were a waste of time. In the last few years, though, that has changed. Customize it as much as you can, including keywords from the job description and a hiring manager’s name if you can find it. One very important thing to note, though, is that your cover letter shouldn’t simply regurgitate information that’s already on the resume. 

Use the cover letter as a way to inject some personality into your overall application. Talk about why you’re excited to join the company and why you’re particularly suited for the CTO position they have open. Your cover letter should show enthusiasm, your passion for technology, and your dedication to innovation. 

Chief Technology Officer Resume Example

How confident do you feel about your resume? If you need more help, you can always refer to the following Chief Technology Officer resume sample for a position.

Key hard & soft skills for a Chief Technology Officer

Any standout resume will include ample relevant skills for the job. Don't just showcase hard skills, but also incorporate the soft skills necessary to succeed. Of course, you only want to list the hard and soft skills you possess. Below are lists of hard and soft skills you might find on a Chief Technology Officer resume.

Chief Technology Officer resume hard skills

Here are some of the hard skills you might find on a Chief Technology Officer resume:

Chief Technology Officer resume soft skills 

Soft skills might not be easily measurable like hard skills, but an employer knows if you have them or not. The following soft skills are common skills highlighted – typically in the resume summary and work accomplishments areas – of a Chief Technology Officer resume. 

Summary & last words

Writing a resume to pass an ATS and land in the hands of a hiring manager takes a lot of effort. The next step of wowing the hiring team takes additional effort. Fortunately, it's not rocket science. You'll already be one step ahead of the competition by using the tips above and referring to the Chief Technology Officer resume example. 

And if you still need support or don't have the time to write your own resume, you have the option of hiring a team of resume writers to help. 

Introduction to ZipJob: Professional Resume Writers

If you're ready to apply for jobs but not prepared to submit your current resume, you're in luck. You have a team of professional resume writers to support you in writing your resume so you stand out to hiring teams. What does that mean for you? Collaborating with the team at ZipJob means you'll have a Chief Technology Officer resume that lands you interview after interview and leads to the job you desire. 

Why You Should Make Use of Our Resume Writing Services to Land Your Next Job as a Chief Technology Officer 

When it comes to technology, you’ve got all the bases covered. You know how to ensure networks are secure, software is updated, and hackers are shut down before they make an impact. However, when it comes to writing your resume, it’s not your area of expertise. In that case, you can turn to those who do have expertise in resume writing. The ZipJob team of writers will work with you to create a job-winning Chief Technology resume that puts you in the best light possible. 

Resume Writing Service for Chief Technology Officer: Let us write your resume

At ZipJobs, our writers have written over 3000 resumes for candidates across more than 65 industries, including technology. Our resume writing service will ensure you have a resume that gets you past an employer's ATS and into the hands of hiring managers. From there, you'll land interviews that lead to the CTO job you desire due to your outstanding competencies, knowledge, and work accomplishments. You can trust you're in good hands with our team of resume writers.