Finance Manager resume examples & templates

A dynamic finance manager resume is like a carefully balanced financial plan. It envisions a bright career future and demonstrates how to get there. A stale resume could stall your job hunt before it gets started. Garner high interest with a resume that elevates your assets and yields those interviews.

What gives a resume that power? Clear vision, passion and a balanced portrayal of your value.

As a finance manager, you know that when you present a budgetary plan, you need to impress from the start with a clear goal and the data to back you up. Without that initial buy-in, you’ll have a tough sell. For a hiring manager, your resume is that first impression. Don’t let your career stagnate. Craft a finance manager resume that elicits trust in your skills and gets you a step closer to that great new job. 

Resume guide for a finance manager resume

Budget for success with Resume.io. Our bank of guides and resume examples cover more than  500 professions. Combined with our resume builder, you’ll have all the tools you need to smoothly craft a dynamic resume.

This resume guide and the embedded finance manager resume example will cover the following:

• How to write a finance manager resume
• Choosing the right resume format for a finance manager
• How to add your contact information
• Using summaries to the best effect
• Highlighting your finance manager experience
• Listing education and relevant experience
• Picking the right resume design/layout
• What the finance manager market looks like and what salary you can expect

How to write a finance manager resume

Before you begin writing your finance manager resume, you need to know how to structure it. Your resume should contain the following key sections:

• The resume header
• The resume summary (aka profile or personal statement)
• The employment history section
• The resume skills section
• The education section

Applying for a job equates to selling your financial budget. How will your ideas translate into higher revenue for the company? In other words, what value will it bring in the short and long term? This is what an employer wants to know about you. What value will you bring? To answer that question, research the company and its culture to direct your resume squarely at the needs and style of each firm.

These points will help you make the most of your assets:

• Fill your resume with accomplishments, not responsibilities.The hiring manager doesn’t need to read a job description, they write them. They want to know what you brought to the tasks you completed.
• Speak to each employer individually. The title “finance manager” encompasses a broad array of responsibilities, different for each company. Make sure your summary and work history reflect the job at hand and the culture of the company.
• Choose a resume template that conveys an air of trustworthiness and professionalism without tilting over into staid or stuffy.
• Increase your targeted approach when applying online. Insert keywords and phrases that will help you slip through the ATS screening software.

Choosing the right resume format for a finance manager

Trustworthy, organized and flexible—these are traits of a great finance manager. Reflect them in the design of your resume.

If you’ve taken a linear career path, the best format for your finance manager resume is reverse chronological, because it allows you to create the story of your career’s forward progress. Your employment history section begins with your most recent job and proceeds in reverse chronological order. Below is an example of this format.

If you are moving from an assistant finance manager resume and looking for a promotion, seeking your first job, or have made a career shift, consider a functional or hybrid format. This format gives the flexibility to highlight skills over your employment history.

Our resume builder contains dozens of templates. Choose the format that best suits your situation. You can also view any of the three formats as completed resume examples.

A finance manager resume design should be clear and organized. We recommend a professional layout that makes it easy for the hiring manager to easily find all the information they seek.

Include your contact information

Just as your business card contains everything needed to reach out to you, so should the header of your finance manager resume. Secondarily, the header gives you some space to express yourself visually.

First, however, make sure all you information is accessible and professionally presented.

• Full name and title. Present your first and last name in a noticeable font. Use the title of the role you are pursuing, matching it exactly to the job listing.
• Professional email address. Use a clean format like firstname.lastname@gmail.com. Don’t use your work email address.
• Phone number. List a number where you can be readily contacted, with a professional voicemail greeting.
• Location. List only your city and state. Don’t list street address or zip code. No need to put too much personal information out there, plus tt’s outdated. Add 'Willing to Relocate' here if it’s true.
• LinkedIn. If your LinkedIn profile is active, relevant, and shows your business network, include it here.

Don’t include:

• Date of birth: Not necessary and could potentially lead to age discrimination.
• Personal details: Marital status, social security number, passport number, etc.

Create a summary that shines

How do you introduce yourself in a friendly manner while letting new contacts know where your expertise lies? The way you present your credentials can lend gravitas to your financial opinions. You want them to trust your knowledge and accept your ideas.

The summary of your finance manager resume performs the same function. Briefly—using no more than 3 sentences—tell the employer how your financial prowess will improve cash flow, increase revenue and insulate them from economic downturns. The best summaries make a strong case for your value add.

Write with active verbs such as accounted, analyzed, assessed, recommended, or presented and follow them up with what your actions achieved. 

Use the first sentence of your summary to crystalize your overall career success. No need to repeat information found in your work history. Space is at a premium. Instead aim to showcase the unique combination of skills and attributes that make you a great finance manager. For example: “Forward-thinking finance manager accomplished at driving financial strategies and optimizing operational efficiencies to maximize profitability and mitigate risks within home construction industry.”

Here you have the opportunity to craft the image you want the hiring manager to see. Are you detail-oriented? A big picture thinker? An expert at financial regulations or tax mitigation strategies? Highlight the aspects of your professional personality that best mesh with the company’s requirements.

You can find adaptable finance manager resume examples summary below:

Outline your finance manager work experience: gain high interest

Beginning with your most recent position, the employment history section of your resume takes the hiring manager through the story of your career, achievement by achievement. Stick with relevant jobs and go back only 10-15 years.

Each bullet point lists a contribution you have made to your employers during your career. Follow this formula for developing your items:

• Begin with a strong action verb
• Follow it up with the problem you tackled
• Quantify your results

Eliminate extraneous words such as “I was responsible for” or “I was tasked with” and get right to the point.

A resume job description sounds like the job ad is unlikely to impress a recruiter. Review the bullet items:

• “Analyzed financial data.”
• “Made budgeting recommendations.”
• “Mentored a finance team of five people.”

These barebones items fail to pique a company’s interest by telling them what you will bring to the accounting and finance department. These sound generic and don’t give the hiring manager any idea of what the candidate is capable of. 

Details and data make all the difference. What ideas did you put forward after analyzing the data and how did they improve the bottom line? What atmosphere did you promote within your team? That’s what the hiring manager wants to know.

Check out these revamped bullet items:

• “Spearheaded a cost optimization project, implementing solutions to inefficiencies that generated $500,000 in annual savings.”
• “Managed a team of five analyzing budget performance and market trends to create  accurate and realistic budget forecasts, resulting in a 95% accuracy rate.”
• “Mentored and supported all team members leading to several promotions and professional development opportunities within the department.”

Take a look at the finance manager employment history resume sample below:

How to write a finance manager resume with no experience

No one starts their finance career as a manager, but you may not have direct management experience. How do you craft a resume that will get you that promotion to manager without having been one?

Consider any committees or projects you have led that had tangible success. Were there times you acted as second-in-command or performed the manager’s duties when she was on vacation? These demonstrate your ability to lead.

Add any management courses you have taken that provided you with foundational skills or internships in which you used skills such as communication or collaboration that will transfer to the role you desire.

Demonstrating that you have the skills necessary to manage even if you have not had the title will show recruiters that you are ready even with no direct experience on your resume.

Include the relevant key skills that make you a great finance manager

A well-crafted skills list gives recruiters a picture of your professional expertise and style – all within a few carefully chosen words. In your finance manager resume skills list, craft a blend of the best of your hard and soft skills to demonstrate your overarching financial expertise. 

Put hard skills like forecasting and budgeting, data analysis, financial software proficiency, and specific industry knowledge front and center since they form the basis of your career. 

All finance professionals need soft skills such as strong communication, adaptability, honesty, and integrity as well.

Our resume builder suggests pre-written key skills that you can opt for, or write in your own skills. Add your proficiency level to complete the picture. 

Here’s what the skills box looks like in our finance manager resume template. 

While the skills section provides the bones of your expertise, your entire finance manager resume fleshes it out with quantifiable examples and successes. Thread your skills throughout each section of your resume.

For example, your work history and summary sections can highlight your

• Strategic thinking by detailing a cost-savings plan you recommended and implemented that also increased profitability and operational efficiency
• Risk management by revealing a time when you pointed out to upper management the downside risk in a strategic plan and your suggested solution
• Collaboration by describing your budgeting forecast and how you communicate with each department to understand their needs.

Analyze the job listing to make the best choices of skills to highlight. 

Detail your education & relevant finance manager certifications (200)

The education section of your resume lists all your academic degrees. Finance managers typically need at least a bachelor’s degree in business, finance, economics, or another related field. If you have extensive training, an MBA, or other post-graduate degree, you may drop your high school diploma from this section.

Formal education is not the only way to gain financial knowledge. You may add:

• Training and certifications. Any certificates in financial planning or analysis such as the Financial Modeling & Valuation Analyst (FMVA) Certification from the Corporate Finance Institute add to your candidacy.
• Internships. If you completed an internship as part of your MBA, or are looking for your first job in finance management, internships add transferable skills to your repertoire.
• Professional development. Belonging to industry or finance organizations like the National Financial Managers Society demonstrates your desire to keep learning.

Consider a functional format if your education section is more compelling than your work history. This format provides you with expanded room to highlight your learning.

Pick the right resume layout and design for a finance manager resume 

When you’re ready to present your forecasting deck, you need to have the art department (aka the PowerPoint whiz) finesse its looks to back up your stellar ideas. If the first impression the finance chiefs get of your analysis is a confusing batch of numbers, you’ll have lost them before you begin. 

The design of your finance manager resume serves the same purpose. To get the hiring manager to read through your carefully crafted resume, you first need to attract them with an eye-catching layout that’s clean, organized, and reader-friendly. This will also help them remember your application as they turn to the next ones in their pile.

Finance is a fairly conservative profession, so avoid gimmicks and graphics, and think carefully about any use of color. If you do choose color, opt for a muted or dark tone and choose a font color that contrasts for easy reading.

For finance managers, try bold display type to signal authority. Use clean lines with clearly distinct sections.

Developing a compelling resume from scratch can’t be done in haste, but our field-tested resume templates offer a shortcut. They remove the formatting and designing barriers so you can focus on the content and enter the job market more quickly.

Finance manager text-only resume example

Finance manager job market and outlook

As more and more data becomes available to companies, they need experts to manage and analyze that data. That means more jobs for finance managers in the future.

What type of salary you can expect in finance management

The median salary for finance managers in 2022 was $139,790, with a typical range of $104,150-$203,720. Finance managers in New York and San Francisco earn the highest average incomes, at $230,200 and $223,270.

Key takeaways for building a finance manager resume

Finance management is a career in high demand and an excellent resume can open many doors. Showcasing forethought, analytical skills, and leadership abilities along with an assurance of trustworthiness throughout your application document and with a professional-looking design will elevate your candidacy.

Streamline the application process and avoid the trouble of formatting with our online resume builder to get your job hunt going more quickly.