Controller resume examples for 2025

Your resume summary sums up your experience and skills, making it easy for hiring managers to understand your qualifications at a glance. Here are some tips to writing the most important 2-4 sentences of your resume:

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

Step 2: Detail your years of experience in controller-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 controller position.

Use your Skills section to show you have the knowledge and technical ability to do the job. 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 controller 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 great bullet points from controller 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 from controller resumes:

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

Start simple. Include the full name of the certification. It's also good to mention the organization that issued the certification. Next, specify when you obtained the certification.

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

1. Certified Management Accountant (CMA)
2. Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA)
3. International Accredited Business Accountant (IABA)
4. Chartered Certified Accountant (ACCA)
5. Certified Professional - Human Resource (IPMA-CP)
6. Certified Manager Certification (CM)
7. Program Management Professional (PgMP)
8. Project Management Professional (PMP)
9. Controls Specialist
10. Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA)