Chief operating officer resume examples from 2025

A well-written resume summary is basically an elevator pitch. You are summing up your skills and experience in a few sentences to wow recruiters, hiring managers, and decision makers into giving you an interview. Here are some tips to putting your best foot first with your resume summary:

Step 1: Start with your professional title, or the one you aspire to.

Step 2: Detail your years of experience in chief operating officer-related roles and your industry experience.

Step 3: What are your biggest professional wins? Here is your opportunity to highlight your strongest accomplishments by placing them at the start of your resume.

Step 4: Don't forget, your goal is to summarize your experience. Keep it short and sweet, so it's easy for recruiters to quickly understand why you're a great hire.

Hiring managers spend under a minute reviewing resumes on average. This means your summary needs to demonstrate your value quickly and show why you are the perfect fit for the chief operating officer position.

Your Skills section is an easy way to let recruiters know you have the skills to do the job. Just as importantly, it can help your resume not get filtered out by hiring software. Here is how to make the most of your skills section and make sure you have the right keywords:

1. Look to the job listing. You often need to include the exact keywords from the job description. Take note of the skills listed for the job.
2. Put all relevant hard and soft skills in your skills section.
3. Be specific. If you are too broad, you may not be giving the best picture of your skills and leave the hiring manager uncertain of your abilities.
4. Be up to date. Software names change and companies merge. Don't look out of touch by being careless.
5. Be accurate. Spelling and even upper or lowercase can dramatically change meanings. Make sure you are correctly listing your skills.

These five steps should give you a strong elevator pitch and land you some chief operating officer interviews.

A work experience section is a vital part of your resume because it shows you have the experience to succeed in your next job.

1. Put your most recent experience first. Prospective employers care about your most recent accomplishments the most.
2. Put the job title, company name, city, and state on the left. Align dates in month and year format on the right-hand side.
3. Include only recent, relevant jobs. This means if you're a fairly experienced worker, you might need to leave off that first internship or other positions in favor of highlighting more pertinent positions.

Remember, your resume is not a list of responsibilities or a job description. This is your chance to show why you're good at your job and what you accomplished.

Use the XYZ formula for your work experience bullet points. Here's how it works:

• Use strong action verbs like Led, Built, or Optimized.
• Follow up with numbers when possible to support your results. How much did performance improve? How much revenue did you drive?
• Wrap it up by explaining the actions you took to achieve the result and how you made an impact.

This creates bullet points that read Achieved X, measured by Y, by doing Z.

Here are effective examples from chief operating officer resumes:

Here is the best way to format your education section:

• Display your highest degree first.
• If you graduated over 5 years ago, put this section at the bottom of your resume. If you lack relevant work experience, the education section should go to the top.
• If you have a bachelor's or master's degree, do not list your high school education.
• If your graduation year is more than 15-20 years ago, it's better not to include dates in this section.

Here are some examples of good education entries for resumes:

Certifications are a great way to showcase special expertise or niche skills. Some jobs even require certifications to be hired.

Include the full name of the certification, along with the name of the issuing organization and date of obtainment.

If you have any of these certifications, be sure to include them on your chief operating officer resume:

1. Project Management Professional (PMP)
2. Certified Professional - Human Resource (IPMA-CP)
3. Certified Management Accountant (CMA)
4. Program Management Professional (PgMP)
5. Certified Manager Certification (CM)
6. Certified Sales Professional (CSP)
7. Certified Management Executive (CME)
8. Basic Life Support for Healthcare and Public Safety (BLS)
9. Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR)
10. IT Information Library Foundations Certification (ITIL)