75% of executive resumes never reach a human. Here's how to beat the ATS.

75% of executive resumes get rejected before a human ever reads them. Here's the 4-step process I use to fix that for VPs and C-suite leaders targeting Apple, Goldman Sachs, McKinsey, and the Fortune 100.

1. Parse Audit — Run your existing resume through the same parsers recruiters use (Workday, Greenhouse, Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors). Map every field the machine fails to extract. Most executive resumes lose critical data here — nested tables, headers/footers, and text boxes are silent killers.

2. Keyword Architecture — Pull 25+ live job descriptions for your three target roles. Rank exact-match phrases by recruiter weighting and density. Generic "results-driven leader" language doesn't survive this step — specificity does.

3. ATS-Clean Build — Single column, no text boxes, no headers/footers, semantic styles only. This is the boring part nobody wants to do, and it's the difference between >98% parse accuracy and getting silently filtered out.

4. Human-Reader Polish — Once the machine approves it, rewrite for the partner who'll read it in 7 seconds. Quantified outcomes, board-room language, zero fluff. Both audiences matter — most resumes optimize for one and lose the other.

The compounding effect: clients who go through all four stages see ~3.2x more recruiter callbacks. If you're a VP/SVP-level leader and your resume hasn't been touched since your last search, it's probably losing to the ATS before it ever reaches a person.

— Resume Match