What Is an ATS-Friendly Resume—And Does It Matter?

That knot in your stomach when you read “We’ve decided to move forward with other candidates” for the tenth time this week? It tightens so much faster when the rejection arrives not three minutes after you hit send. No human could have read your resume that quickly, right? 

If you feel like your applications disappear into a void of ones and zeros, you’re not alone: 98.8% of Fortune 500 companies use ATS software (or applicant tracking system software). Plus, 66% of large companies and 35% of small companies use these systems. They’re awfully hard to avoid. With the average corporate job getting around 250 applicants, there are a lot of job-seekers wondering if a computer just decided their fate. 

Twenty-five years ago, Jonathan Anderson was figuring out staffing technology as a junior recruiter, where he manually entered resumes into databases. Today, as a Senior Vice President of Professional Development at Kelly’s subsidiary Softworld, he coaches hiring stakeholders and job seekers through much more complex systems. 

“People should view it as  the ATS organizing chaos, not making decisions,” he says.

Does the ATS really decide if you get hired?

Here’s what a lot of job-seekers believe: A sophisticated (and possibly magical) AI scans your resume, assigns you a score, checks for any relevant planetary alignments… and decides whether or not you’re worthy of human attention. One wrong keyword and you’re out.  

Here’s what often really happens.

An ATS is essentially a digital filing system with search capabilities. Anderson, who has seen these systems evolve from basic databases to today’s technologies, describes it as “a repository that holds applicant data and information.” That’s a lot less exciting than the all-knowing AI some job-seekers imagine!

Still, there are understandable concerns. One report found that 88% of employers believe their system has rejected highly qualified applicants; the authors of the report recommend that systems shift from “negative” to “affirmative” filters. ATS’s set up with affirmative filters “act as a prioritization engine,” Anderson says. “If you’ve got a hundred resumes, these are the top 20 that best represent  the preset criteria the hiring managers are looking for.” The ATS organizes and ranks. It doesn’t decide. 

While the ATS doesn’t make final hiring decisions (or even pick who to interview), there are ways to present your resume and experience in the best light to maximize the chances that you’re  a best-fit candidate. 

Does your resume need to match every keyword? 

Common job search wisdom says that perfect keyword-matching often yields success. Include each relevant skill from the job description and you have the best chance for  an interview.

Except that’s not always the case. Even with 100% keyword matching, you’re usually one of dozens of applicants with the same qualifications. 

“What job seekers forget is that hiring managers don’t review individual applications in a bubble,” Anderson says. “They compare them to other people with similar backgrounds and employment histories, applying to the exact same job.”

So yes: Keywords can help. But it’s not going to get you to the finish line. When 50 professionals have identical skillsets, hiring managers want more specifics to distinguish the best candidates. 

“ LinkedIn feeds are filled with professionals understandably frustrated about having 10 out of 10 skills and getting rejected,” Anderson says. “You’re qualified. You have the skills. You’re a great professional—but so are 50 other applicants. What’s different about you?” 

He recommends including data from successful projects and highlighting career wins most tailored to the problem(s) that hiring companies are trying to solve in order to showcase what makes your working style special.  View your own resume as a vehicle to showcase your best fit for a job, not merely a set-in-stone personal biography that you created in a vacuum.

Do formatting tricks help your resume beat the ATS?

The internet is full of tips and tricks to “beat the ATS.” Add keywords in white text that human readers can’t see, but the ATS can. Pack your skills section with every technology the job description mentions. These tactics aren’t new—and they mark you as someone trying to work around the system, not with it.

Anderson saw these “white-text” tricks early in his own career, and would hear about them within the first online and ATS resumes as far back as the 1990’s” “I remember scanning documents and seeing a whole bunch of invisible words magically appear onscreen,” he says.

Yes, these tactics might occasionally help you trick the machines.  But most veteran recruiters and hiring managers are savvy —so the real risk is how these make you look once humans catch on. When hiring stakeholders spot these attempts, “they usually react with shoulder sags and eyerolls,” Anderson says. 

Remember: The humans reviewing your resume after the ATS aren’t new to the game. They’ve seen every workaround, and they know every trick. They’re looking for professionals who stand out for the right reasons.

Should you use AI to tweak your resume?

If you’re turning to ChatGPT and other AI tools to tweak your resume you’re not alone: 65% of job seekers say they used AI at some point in the application process hoping that technology will give them the edge. 

Anderson sees a different reality unfolding. “Everyone is touching up using AI, , and its yielding every resume feeling the same,” he says. You ask ChatGPT to tailor your resume to a job description hoping you can stand out—but “so is every other applicant.”

“Many hiring leaders  believe that resumes will eventually become so heavily AI-generated that no one will be able to trust them,” Anderson says. He says he wouldn’t be surprised if the entire application process shifts to work samples and live assessments within a few years. 

In the meantime, this doesn’t mean you can’t use AI to help tweak your resume. But be mindful of it feeling artificial, or too generic. Make sure to include your career highlights, milestones, and accomplishments, with as much results-oriented detail as possible.You want to feel like a human, not an AI-generated avatar. 

Do your resume and LinkedIn need to match? 

If you’re applying to a diverse list of job roles, you might be maintaining a basic LinkedIn profile while customizing each resume dramatically. Unfortunately, that can backfire; you might be surprised by “the amount of people who have been outright rejected when their resume is wildly different from their LinkedIn,” Anderson says. 

So what needs to align? “At a minimum, the career levels should be the same, and the dates should match,” he says. Any differences need clear explanations—even something as theoretically simple as clarifying a company merger. 

That doesn’t mean you need to copy your LinkedIn word-for-word into every application. But if your resume shows five years at a company and LinkedIn only shows four, that gap alone might end your candidacy before anyone evaluates your actual qualifications.

What actually works when facing the ATS

After decades spent watching resumes succeed and fail, Anderson has clear advice for what makes a real difference. 

• Fix the basics first. Simple errors still plague applications at every level. “They don’t spell check. They don’t check grammar. It’s painful to say that,” Anderson says. These mistakes happen more often than you might think—even from senior professionals.

• Add quantifiable accomplishments to every role. “If someone detailed one or two accomplishments for every job, and literally made no other changes, that would measurably impact the strength of their candidacy,” Anderson says.

• Think comparatively, not individually. Remember that both machines and hiring stakeholders are comparing you to other similarly qualified professionals. Instead of proving you can do the job, demonstrate why you should do the job. How would your approach or results stand out?

The human element still matters

Despite technological advances, human connection remains the most powerful force in hiring. A 2022 survey by Aptitude Research found that 84% of companies believe referrals are the most effective way to find new hires. 

This means personal relationships and career networking are significantly more important than sneaking the right keywords into your resume. When you apply through a referral, often the ATS is “more of a box check for compliance reasons,” Anderson says. 

The system was never designed to find the one best applicant for the role. Instead, ATS’s reduce hundreds of applications to manageable and qualified handfuls, so that human judgment can take over. Referrals or recruiters often help you bypass that process and connect directly to the human stakeholders. 

Ready to skip the ATS black hole? Work with Kelly recruiters to identify opportunities where you’re not simply qualified—you’re the standout choice.