Looking to build the perfect ski instructor resume? You might be newly qualified instructor or a seasoned pro looking for new opportunities. Either way, you’ll want a clean and eye-catching resume to land those dream ski school job offers.
Some ski schools see hundreds of applications from ski instructors. It’s a huge task to deal with. So, every single pre-season, employers will try to streamline the process as much as possible. The decisions you make and how you present your ski instructor resume can push you to the top of the pile, or in to the recycling bin.
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Ski Instructor Resume Formatting
Formatting is first thing ski schools will notice. This is usually the first test to pass. Does your resume formatting make sense in a logical and easy to understand way? Is the font appropriate for the type of resort or ski school that you’re applying to? These are questions you should be asking yourself.
Take a look at your current ski instructor resume. The most important question you should ask yourself. Can you see your experience, qualifications and relevant details in less than one minute? If not, you’re adding to more work to an already busy recruitment team.
Format your ski instructor resume in a simple and easy to follow structure. Through a quick skim, you should be able to see how qualified you are, where you’ve worked and any other relevant information. If your resume format is clear, you’ve made it past the first hurdle. Anyone looking at your resume can then look into more detail if they wish to, or may simply move your application onto the next stage.
Things to Avoid in Ski Instructor Resume Formatting
Avoid overly elaborate formatting. You might want to format your ski instructor resume a little differently. Maybe something that will stand out from a basic document. This is totally fine and if done well can make your application a little more memorable.
Be careful not to go too far with fancy formatting. You might have a lot of photos of yourself with smiling guests, or snippets from TripAdvisor reviews mentioning how great you are. But, if this distracts from the core information or makes it tricky to find the details employers want to see, you’re working against yourself.
Your Experience
As a ski instructor, experience is a big selling point. If you’re just starting out and lack real teaching experience, don’t worry though as we have some tips about that too. If an employer sees a clear outline of your experience, you’ll usually be shortlisted right from there. Let’s talk about how to make your experience crystal clear without bloating your resume.
You might already have a long list of different ski schools and resorts as a ski instructor. Traditionally, in other industries it might look bad to move jobs every six months, but ski instruction is very different because it’s seasonal. Employers completely understand this. But, they don’t want to have to spend time deciphering where you worked and exactly how long.
If you have a lot of ski instructor experience, try to highlight only the important areas on your resume. For example, you don’t need paragraphs of text for each ski school you worked at. If you’d like to include some more information, choose a couple of your more recent ski schools. Alternatively, you can summarise your most notable positions such as race coach or ski school supervisor. Employers love to know your background, but don’t need to hear an extended life story.
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What If You Lack Experience as a Ski Instructor?
This is a concern for many newly qualified ski instructors. You want a great resume, but you simply don’t have experience to include. Everyone has to start somewhere and being less experienced won’t stop you from working at many ski resorts. What you’ll want to include is any relevant ski training or other experience. The key word here is relevant.
If you took part in a longer instructor training course, such as a season long course offered by a training company, you can list this as your experience. As you may have little or no real-world ski teaching experience for your resume, you should highlight what you achieved in your course. Maybe you shadowed a working ski instructor during some lessons, or maybe your course included specific guest service training that is worth highlighting.
While you might not be able to compete with those who have been teaching skiing for years, you don’t have to. Almost all ski schools accept a number of fresh ski instructors to take on each season. You’ll want your resume to stand out amongst the other new instructors to guarantee your success.
Things to Avoid in Your Resume Experience
Remember, ski schools are looking for a lean and clean ski instructor resume. If you have a lot of experience, make it clear. Listing employment dates or even total months/years experience is better than repeated names of the same ski school over multiple seasons. If you have space, you might want to include experience outside of being a ski instructor.
Avoid irrelevant information such temporary work between winter seasons on your ski instructor resume. If you have large gaps between working as a ski instructor then it might be best for you to include your other work, just so it makes some chronological sense. Or, if you’ve worked in a similar field such as personal training or as a tennis coach etc, then including this is a good idea. But, you should certainly avoid unrelated work, it will simply clutter your resume and realistically only serves to say, “hey, I did this work for this amount of time, it’s not really relevant but you had to read it anyway, sorry for wasting your time”.
Ski Instructor Qualifications
This can be the simplest part of your ski instructor resume, yet it’s something that many still make mistakes in. Ski instructor qualifications are international, but the standards are slightly different. One of the most challenging things as a ski school recruiter is to understand different countries qualification systems and tie it all together with the ski school’s minimum standard. Or, equate your qualification to their own country’s system.
It’s in your best interest to represent your qualification in the most understandable way. This is easier if you have a Canadian or Australian qualification for example, you’re essentially going to have a level between one and four. But if you have a European qualification, this can get a little more confusing as some countries opt for a name-based qualification, instead of a level ranking. Make sure the person reading your resume knows exactly how qualified you are at first glance. The last thing you want is for the employer to mistake your hard-earned qualification for a something else.
A Simple Guide to Snowsports Instructor Qualifications
Other Sports and Interests
Including other sports and interests on your ski instructor resume is a personal choice. But in saying that, it comes down to one question, is it relevant? You might want to show a rounded personality with varied interests. After all, teaching skiing is certainly a social career. Realistically though, it should add something to your resume, and that shouldn’t be clutter.
If you want to show that you love the outdoors, or that you volunteer for a local kids sports camp then that can be a great addition to your ski instructor resume. But remember, a resume is really just something that sells you and your skills, and makes it clear how that will be an asset to a ski school. If you choose to include sports and interests, streamline it and make sure it sells you as a ski instructor.
Final Words
Ski instructor resumes should be lean, relevant and most importantly, easy to read. Imagine you were standing in a room full of 500 other ski instructors and given 15 seconds to summarise your qualification, experience and skills. If you give a clear, concise and easily digestible response, you’ll instantly move to the next round. Think of your resume as this.
Ski schools have a huge task when it comes to recruitment, make their job easier and you’ll be making those shortlists every time. You’ll quickly find that you have your pick of ski schools and resorts to work at.
