The USAJOBS resume builder has around 40 fields spread across multiple sections. Some are obvious. Some look optional but will tank your application if you skip them. And a few have formatting quirks that trip up even veterans who have been applying to federal jobs for months.

I know because I spent 1.5 years after separating from the Navy filling out these fields wrong. Zero callbacks. When I finally figured out what each field actually needed — and what the staffing specialists on the other end were looking at — I started getting referred. Then interviewed. Then hired. Then hired again across five more federal career fields.

This walkthrough covers every section of the USAJOBS resume builder, field by field, with specific guidance on what to enter, what format to use, and which mistakes will keep your application from surfacing. If you want a broader look at the full application process, check out our complete guide to applying on USAJOBS. This article goes deeper on the resume builder itself.

And if you are wondering whether the USAJOBS builder is even the right tool for you, we break down the USAJOBS resume builder vs BMR comparison in a separate article. This one assumes you are using the builder and need to fill it out correctly.

How Does the USAJOBS Resume Builder Actually Work?

The USAJOBS resume builder is a structured form, not a document editor. You do not paste in a formatted resume. You fill out individual fields — job title, employer, start and end dates, duties, hours per week, salary — and the system assembles them into a standardized document that feeds directly into USA Staffing.

That standardized format is both the advantage and the limitation. The advantage: staffing specialists can compare candidates in a consistent layout. The limitation: you lose control over formatting, visual hierarchy, and how your experience reads at a glance. Every applicant looks the same structurally, which means the actual text you put into each field carries all the weight.

The builder has five main sections: Personal Information, Work Experience, Education, References, and Other (which covers languages, affiliations, publications, and additional info). Each section has its own set of required and optional fields. I am going to walk through every one of them.

What Goes in the Personal Information Section?

This section is mostly straightforward, but there are two fields that veterans consistently get wrong.

Contact Information

Name, address, phone, email. Use a professional email — not your .mil address (it will stop working after separation) and not anything with a nickname. A simple [email protected] works. Make sure the phone number you enter is one you actually answer. Staffing specialists and hiring managers will call, sometimes from blocked or unfamiliar numbers.

Country of Citizenship and Veterans Preference

Citizenship is required for most federal positions. Select accordingly. For veterans preference, you will see options like 5-point, 10-point, and CPS (Compensable Service-Connected Disability). Select what matches your DD-214 and VA documentation. If you are not sure which preference category you fall into, check your DD-214 member copy 4 — the separation code and narrative reason will tell you.

Do not guess on veterans preference. If you claim 10-point preference but cannot provide the SF-15 and supporting VA letter when asked, your application will be flagged. Claim only what you can document.

Federal Employee Information

If you are a current or former federal employee, this is where you enter your highest grade held, the series, and whether you have reinstatement eligibility. Former feds: your SF-50 (Notification of Personnel Action) will have your series, grade, and step. If you have been out of federal service for more than three years, reinstatement eligibility may have expired — but some hiring authorities extend that window for veterans.

Your Federal Resume
Should Look Like This

We built OPM data directly into our AI so your federal resume goes beyond just matching the job announcement. It pulls in the right competencies, KSAs, and specialized experience details that get you referred — formatted in the 2-page federal layout USAJOBS expects.

OPM data built in — goes beyond the job announcement Full 2-page federal format for USAJOBS Tailored to every GS position you apply for

Build Your Resume Free

2 free resumes — no credit card required

How Should You Fill Out the Work Experience Section?

This is where applications live or die. The work experience section is the core of your federal resume, and every field matters.

Job Title

Use your actual title if it translates clearly. If your military title is something like "Operations Specialist" or "Logistics Coordinator," it works as-is. If your title is "E-6 / Work Center Supervisor" or "NDT Level III," you need to translate. The job title field is one of the first things a staffing specialist reads, and it needs to make sense to someone who has never served.

For military experience, a pattern that works: [Translated Title] — [Branch] [Rank]. Example: "Dive Operations Supervisor — USN, First Class Petty Officer." This gives the civilian context up front while preserving your military identity.

Employer Name and Address

For military service, use "United States [Branch]" as the employer. "United States Navy," "United States Army," etc. For the address, use the address of your last duty station or command. You do not need to list every duty station — just the primary location for that assignment.

Start and End Dates

Month and year format. If you held multiple roles during one enlistment, break them into separate experience entries by assignment or billet. Do not lump eight years of service into one block with one set of duties. A GS-12 contracting officer and a GS-12 environmental specialist see very different things as relevant — and if your eight years of experience reads as one undifferentiated block, neither of them will find what they need.

Hours Per Week

This field trips up more veterans than almost any other. Federal HR uses hours per week to verify whether your experience qualifies as full-time. If you leave it blank or enter something vague, your experience may not count toward the minimum qualifications — even if you clearly worked full-time.

For active duty military, enter 40. Yes, you worked more than 40 hours a week. Probably a lot more. But 40 is the standard full-time designation that HR needs to see. Entering 60 or 80 will not help — it just looks odd in the system. For a detailed breakdown, read our guide on calculating hours per week for federal resumes.

Salary

Enter your base pay for the position. For military, this is your base pay for your rank and time in service, not BAH or BAS or special duty pay. You can find historical military pay charts on DFAS.mil. If you do not remember exactly, a reasonable approximation is fine — HR uses this field for context, not as a hard verification.

Supervisor Name and Phone Number

For military positions, list your direct supervisor (division officer, department head, or chief). Include their name and a phone number where they can be reached. If you have lost contact, enter the command quarterdeck number. The key rule: never leave this blank. A missing supervisor field signals incomplete information, and some staffing specialists will flag it. Our supervisor contact info guide covers what to do when you genuinely cannot track someone down.

May We Contact Your Supervisor?

For current employers, you can select "No" if you have not told them you are job searching. For past military supervisors, select "Yes" unless there is a specific reason not to. Selecting "No" on a past position can raise questions.

Duties, Accomplishments, and Related Skills — The Big Field

This is the most important field in the entire builder. It is a free-text box where you describe what you did, what you accomplished, and what skills you used. Everything rides on this field.

Federal resumes require more detail than civilian resumes. You need to describe your duties with enough specificity that a staffing specialist — who may know nothing about your military job — can determine whether you meet the qualification requirements for the announcement. That means writing out what you did, how you did it, who you did it for, and what the measurable results were.

For real examples of what strong duties descriptions look like, check our federal resume examples for veterans.

What About the Education Section?

The education section covers degrees, relevant coursework, and military training. Here is what each field needs.

Degrees and Schools

Enter every degree you hold — associate, bachelor, master, or higher. Include the school name, city and state, your major, and your graduation date (or expected graduation date). If you have a degree in progress, select "Some college coursework completed" and note the expected completion.

For veterans using the GI Bill, include the degree even if it is in progress. A partially completed bachelor's degree in Business Administration from a regionally accredited school still counts toward education requirements. Some GS-5 and GS-7 positions accept a combination of education and experience — your in-progress degree may cover the education portion.

Military Training and Certifications

This is where many veterans leave value on the table. Military training schools — A-school, C-school, NCOES, PME, MOS-specific courses — can count as education for some positions. The trick is how you present them.

Enter significant training courses with the school name (e.g., "Naval Diving and Salvage Training Center"), the location, and the completion date. For the "degree" type, select "Some college coursework completed" or "Technical or occupational certificate" depending on the course. List credit hours if you have them from your JST (Joint Services Transcript) or SMART transcript.

Do not list every two-hour online training you completed. Focus on courses that lasted a week or longer and are relevant to the job you are applying for.

GPA — When to Include It

Only include your GPA if the job announcement specifically asks for it or if it is above 3.0. A 2.7 GPA with a relevant degree is still better than no degree, but advertising a mediocre GPA does not help your case. If the announcement requires a specific GPA threshold, include it regardless.

How Do You Handle the References Section?

USAJOBS asks for references with name, employer, title, phone, and email. Most announcements ask for 3-5 professional references.

For veterans, the strongest references come from people who supervised your work directly. A former division officer who can speak to your project management experience is more valuable than a peer who will say you were a great teammate. Hiring managers want to hear specifics about your work quality, reliability, and technical competence.

Two practical tips. First, ask your references before listing them — a surprised reference is a bad reference. Second, brief them on the job you are applying for. "I am applying for a GS-11 contract specialist position, and the key qualifications are X and Y. Could you speak to my experience in those areas?" That kind of heads-up turns a generic reference into a targeted one.

What Goes in the "Other" Sections?

The "Other" category in the USAJOBS builder covers several fields that many applicants skip entirely. Some of them matter more than you think.

Languages

If you speak, read, or write any language other than English, list it here with your proficiency level. For positions with DHS, State Department, or intelligence agencies, language skills can push your application above otherwise identical candidates. Even conversational proficiency is worth listing if the position involves working with international partners or communities.

Affiliations and Professional Memberships

List memberships in professional organizations relevant to the job. If you are applying for an environmental management position and you are a member of the National Association of Environmental Professionals, include it. Skip social clubs or organizations that are not relevant to the role.

Publications and Presentations

If you have published research, written technical reports that were distributed beyond your command, or presented at conferences, include them. For most enlisted veterans, this field will be blank — that is perfectly fine. Do not pad it with routine reports or command briefs.

Additional Information — The Most Underused Field

This free-text field is where you can add anything that does not fit elsewhere. Here is what belongs here:

• Security clearances: Active or expired, level and investigation type (e.g., "Secret clearance, SSBI, last investigated March 2022")
• Awards and decorations: List military awards with the full name and a one-line description if the award is not self-explanatory
• Volunteer experience: If relevant to the position
• Special qualifications: CDL, HAZMAT certification, or other credentials not captured in education

This field is your overflow space. Use it, but keep it organized. A wall of text with no structure is worse than a shorter, clean list.

What Are the Biggest Mistakes Veterans Make in the Builder?

After building BMR and working with over 15,000 veterans on their federal applications, I see the same mistakes on repeat. These are the ones that actually cost people referrals.

Copying and Pasting a Civilian Resume

The USAJOBS builder is not designed for your two-page private sector resume. If you paste civilian resume bullets into the duties field without adding federal-specific details — hours per week, supervisor info, detailed scope of responsibilities — the staffing specialist cannot determine whether you meet the qualifications. A civilian resume says "Managed logistics operations." A federal resume needs to say who you managed them for, how many people were involved, what dollar value of equipment or supplies, what systems you used, and what the outcome was.

Leaving Fields Blank

Every blank field is a missed opportunity or a potential disqualification. Hours per week blank? Your full-time experience might not count. Supervisor phone blank? Signals an incomplete application. Salary blank? Less context for the staffing specialist to assess your current level. Fill in every field. If you genuinely do not have the information, note why (e.g., "Supervisor retired; command quarterdeck: 555-123-4567").

Not Tailoring to the Specific Announcement

This is the single biggest killer. One generic resume submitted to 50 different announcements will get referred to approximately zero of them. Each federal job announcement has specific qualification requirements, specialized experience criteria, and keywords in the duties section. Your resume needs to match each one. That means editing the duties field — at minimum — for every application. If you want tips on the overall tailoring strategy, our 15 federal resume tips for getting referred breaks it down.

Ignoring the Questionnaire Connection

After you submit your resume, most announcements also require you to complete an occupational questionnaire. Your resume and your questionnaire answers need to match. If you rate yourself as "Expert" on a skill in the questionnaire but your resume does not mention that skill at all, your application can be flagged for inflation and your scores may be adjusted down. Make sure your duties field supports every claim you make in the questionnaire. Our USAJOBS questionnaire guide explains this in detail.

How Should You Write a Federal Resume Summary?

The USAJOBS builder does not have a dedicated "summary" field, but you can add a professional summary at the top of your first work experience entry or in the Additional Information section. Should you?

For most veterans applying to GS-7 through GS-12 positions, a brief summary at the top of your Additional Information section works well. Keep it to 2-4 sentences. State your background, your total years of relevant experience, your security clearance status, and one or two key qualifications that match the announcement.

Example: "Navy veteran with 8 years of experience in logistics operations, supply chain management, and contract administration. Held Secret clearance (last investigated 2023). Supervised teams of 12-18 personnel and managed equipment inventories valued at $4.2M."

That summary gives the staffing specialist your headline. It does not replace the detailed duties field — it frames it. For more on writing effective summaries, see our federal resume summary statement guide.

What Happens After You Submit?

Once you finish filling out the builder and submit your application, your resume enters USA Staffing (or whatever HR system the agency uses). A staffing specialist reviews it against the qualification requirements in the announcement. They are checking whether your documented experience — the text you typed into those fields — meets the specialized experience criteria at the target grade level.

If your resume demonstrates that you meet the minimum qualifications AND your questionnaire scores are competitive, you get referred to the hiring manager. If not, you get the "Not Referred" status. There is no partial credit. You either demonstrated the experience or you did not.

After referral, the timeline varies wildly. Some agencies contact candidates within two weeks. Others take months. If you have been referred but have not heard anything, our article on what to do when you get ghosted after referral covers your options. And if you want to stay organized across multiple applications, check out our guide on tracking your USAJOBS applications.

What to Do Next

If you are staring at the USAJOBS builder right now, open the job announcement in another tab. Go through it line by line. Identify the specialized experience requirements, the key duties, and the qualification criteria. Then fill out the builder with those specific requirements in mind.

Every field I covered in this walkthrough feeds into how your application gets evaluated. The hours per week, the supervisor info, the detailed duties, the education entries — all of it matters. Skipping fields or writing generic descriptions means your application will sink to the bottom of the pile where nobody scrolls.

If you want a tool that handles the military-to-federal translation and builds your resume with all these fields structured correctly, BMR's Federal Resume Builder was built specifically for this. It pulls the right details from your military experience, matches them against job announcement requirements, and formats everything so staffing specialists can find what they need. I built it because I got tired of watching veterans lose out on federal jobs over formatting and field-level mistakes that are completely fixable.

For a complete template you can reference while filling out the builder, grab our 2026 OPM-compliant federal resume template.