In her nearly 18 years working at Google, from November 2006 to September 2024, Jenny Wood had occasion to hire many people — especially when she reached more senior roles like director in media operations. She also "founded one of the largest career development programs in the company's history," she says.

These days, Wood offers career advice in her newsletter and is releasing a book about achieving your goals, "Wild Courage," in March 2025.

For those looking for work or simply for more job opportunities in the new year, here are two of her resume green flags.

One-line bullets show 'such intentionality'

First, Wood likes short bullets under job titles. Specifically, "I like it when a bullet doesn't go beyond one line," she says.

It's easy to want to cram a lot of information under a job description, but keeping bullets concise "shows such intentionality," she says. "It shows such discernment, and it shows you're being brutal, right? You're cutting what doesn't need to be there." It also shows you're being considerate of the person reading your resume. Multi-sentence bullets take much longer to read.

Big picture, "it makes you look like an absolute superstar when you have bullets that are one line only," she says.

Add quirk to your resume as 'a differentiator'

Second, Wood loves some personality on a resume.

This could come in various forms. Wood has a muffin and a mic icon in the "passions" section of her resume to represent her love of baking and performance, she says as an example, and she's seen some great specificity when people mention their hobbies.

She tells the story of a woman she profiles in her book named Carlye. When Carlye applied for a job at Google, the last line on her resume read "that she was in constant pursuit of the perfect oatmeal raisin cookie recipe," says Wood.

This gave a glimpse of her personality, it showed she was willing to take risks by being quirky and that she was curious and keen to learn. In a sea of other qualified candidates, it made Carlye stand out. After the interview process confirmed she was just as qualified — and fun — as her resume implied, Carlye landed the job.

"In a competitive candidate pool with a lot of people to the right and the left of you who have the same skills, background and experience and pedigree," says Wood, "personality is a differentiator."

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