9 Pharmacy Technician Resume Examples & Guide for 2024

Pharmacy technicians face a number of issues when they are updating their resumes. This is a highly skilled job and HR staff need to know if candidates have the right education, work experience, and hard and soft skills.

Detailing this information in a way that clearly demonstrates abilities and accomplishments can be a bit of a challenge for such a highly skilled and precise position.

In this guide for creating a well-formatted pharmacy technician resume, we’ll use real-world examples to help you navigate around the common issues that many pharmacy techs struggle with, such as:

• Demonstrating proficiencies in industry-related software, medication dispensing hardware, and other technical skills that are relevant to the position.
• Showcasing a high level of accuracy and proficiency in filling prescriptions and maintaining customer records.
• Highlighting a firm understanding of Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) regulations and Pharmacy Practice Acts.
• Demonstrating a high level of customer service skills and ability to maintain composure when dealing with anxious or unwell customers.

We’ll show you how to tailor your resume to the job post using the correct format and design and include all relevant skills and education using multiple resume sections.

If this resume guide for a pharmacy technician job does not quite fit your career plans, check out these guides for similar roles:

• Hospital Pharmacist Resume
• Clinical Pharmacist Resume
• Pharmaceutical Sales Rep Resume
• Senior Pharmacy Technician Resume
• Pharmacy Manager Resume

The first step in creating an attention-grabbing resume is to format it in a way that meets industry standards. We’ll cover some formatting tips before we start adding relevant skills, experience, and education.

How to format a pharmacy technician resume

A well-formatted resume is your first chance to make a good impression with recruiting companies and HR staff. Therefore, using the right format is integral to passing applicant tracking systems and ensuring the recruiting team reads it.

The document settings for a resume are the same as those for any new Microsoft Word or Google Doc, so you don’t have to mess with any technical settings.

If you want to give yourself a head start on creating a properly formatted resume, use Enhancv resume builder. Our resume templates allow you to choose a range of styles, and each one has its own benefits:

• Modern: An elegant and stylish two-column design that uses graphics, icons, and colored backgrounds to help you stand out and make a good first impression.
• Traditional: This classic style is the most commonly used and has a full-page plain white background that makes it easy to read.
• Simple: A timeless, well-organized layout that uses a clean, minimalist format. Best for professionals who want to present a straightforward resume that is easily scannable by applicant tracking systems.
• Creative: This style is a bit more unconventional and includes modern features, like QR codes, videos, graphics, and icons. It allows job seekers to show off more of their creative side. This style takes into consideration that most people will be reading the resume online and can click on links and view embedded videos.

Each resume style includes all of the necessary resume sections as well as additional sections to include more of your technical and interpersonal skills and regulatory knowledge. They also come with a wide range of modern fonts, like Exo 2, Lato, Montserrat, Raleway, Rubix, and Volkhov.

Because a pharmacy technician resume needs to display a wide range of technical and interpersonal skills, a modern, two-column resume layout works best. This style allows you to show your experience with Meditech and other industry-related software, automated medication dispensary systems, pharmaceutical counseling, and other hard skills, along with demonstrating positive customer service experiences.

If you want to see how your current pharmacy technician resume stands up to today’s standards, run it through our resume checker for a free analysis.

Here are the main resume sections that we will be covering in this guide.

When you start adding details to each of these sections, keep in mind that recruiters are looking for specific information.

Some other formatting details you should keep in mind:

• Your resume should be at most two pages. Any more than that, and recruiters will stop reading.
• Use a reverse chronological order when listing your education and work experience.
• Save your resume as a PDF document (.pdf).

Now it’s time to start adding your relevant experience, education, and skills in a way that details your accomplishments and successes as a pharmacy technician.

How to write your pharmacy technician resume experience

To begin, we’ll start by adding your relevant work experience. The resume experience section is where you will detail your past experience as a pharmacy technician. This will include any temporary, part-time, or full-time position held at a hospital, pharmacy outlet, long-term care facility, government agency, compounding pharmacy, or other organization.

When listing your work experience, you need to include the following information:

• Job title
• Company name and description
• Location
• Dates of employment
• 4-8 bullet points that detail your experience and accomplishments

When listing your experience, use action verbs to describe your duties. If you increased customer satisfaction scores, dispensing accuracy ratings, or reduced product waste, show that by quantifying your actions.

To give you an idea of what to do and what not to do when listing your work experience, we’ll use a real-world example of a pharmacy technician resume experience.

This example demonstrates the common issues that pharmacy techs struggle with when detailing their past work experience. While it includes the typical duties of a pharmacy technician, it does little to make an impression or describe the effect they have on the company or its customers.

Recruiters know the duties of the job. What they want to see is how you used your skills and knowledge to produce actionable results.  This example uses vague terms and doesn’t quantify any achievements. It also fails to include a company description. While CVS Health is a well-known company, you still want to give a brief description of what they do.

Each bullet point should detail the effects of your actions. Let’s try to improve this by adding some relevant details:

You can see how adding more concise information to each bullet point can clarify your experience and make a big impression.

This example does an excellent job of:

• Detailing their knowledge of pharmacy management systems and their ability to improve efficiency.
• Specifying experience with inventory management software.
• Expressing their knowledge of HIPAA regulations for preparing specialty medications and compounds.
• Highlighting their interpersonal skills and ability to create a positive experience for all customers.
• Including the specific type of certification in the job title.

Later on, we’ll go over the types of experience recruiters like to see from entry-level pharmacy technicians. First, we need to talk more about which metrics you can quantify.

How to quantify impact on your resume

One of the easiest ways to stand out above the hundreds of other resumes HR staff receive for a single position is to include numbers and percentages to detail your job accomplishments. The majority of job seekers don’t quantify their experience, leaving anyone reading the resume with more questions than answers.

Your resume is an introduction to your skills and experience, and you want to do more than just say you have that particular experience.

Writing “Efficiently packaged and labeled medications and streamlined the dispensing process, boosting accuracy rating to 99%” is much more informative than “Effectively packed and labeled medications.”

Here are some examples of how to quantify the most sought-after pharmacy technician metrics:

• Number of prescriptions filled per day: “Filled an average of 80-100 prescriptions per day, with a 100% accuracy rating.”
• The size of inventory managed: “Managed an inventory of 150,000 products using BestRx inventory management system.”
• User ratings with pharmaceutical software: “Calculated medication dosages with 100% accuracy using NexsysADC™ Automated Dispensing Cabinet.”
• Savings achieved through effective inventory management: “Responsible for managing pharmaceutical stock and developed new product tracking strategies that resulted in a $250,000 annual savings.”
• Percentage of error-free prescriptions filled: “Trained and monitored new pharmacy techs on Medacube medication dispensing system, which produced a 99% accuracy rating from all pharmacy technicians.”
• Number of customers assisted each day: “Collaborated with 40 customers per day, handling all inquiries while maintaining a 96% customer satisfaction score.”
• Number of insurance claims processed accurately: “Managed the processing of insurance claims, resulting in a 95% success rate and a 10% reduction in claim processing times.”
• Improvements in patient wait times: “Enacted a new text-message prescription notification system that decreased patient wait time by 30% and increased customer satisfaction by 35%,”

As you can see, you can quantify multiple metrics together and make more of a statement.

Now, let’s turn our attention to those pharmacy techs who are looking for their first job as a technician.

How do I write a pharmacy technician resume with no experience

If you are nervous about applying for your first pharmacy technician job, so is everyone else who once stood on the shores of the First-Timers. You can still apply for a pharmacy technician job even if you don’t have any real-world pharmacy experience.

What kind of work experience do recruiters and HR staff like to see from their first-time pharmacy techs? Focus on those jobs where you have experience in:

• Customer service: Supporting a diverse customer base in person or via phone or telehealth services.
• Research and development: Assisting research scientists in the development of new medications.
• Inventory management: Managing a large inventory of medical supplies, equipment, or medications.
• Technician assistance: Working in a healthcare facility assisting administrative or clinical staff in the care of patients.
• Extracurricular activities: Volunteering at a hospital, mental health treatment center, or senior living community.

If you have a lot of past work experience that you feel relates to a pharmacy technician position, remember to limit the number of jobs you list. You only want to include up to 3 jobs, as any more than that, and you risk going over that two-page limit.

If you feel your resume experience section is lacking, you can make up for it by listing your technical, medical, and interpersonal skills in other resume sections, which we’ll go over in a little bit.

How to list your hard skills and soft skills on your resume

As a pharmacy technician, you have a wide range of hard and soft skills that you rely on to dispense medications, accurately convey medical information, develop compassionate relationships with your customers, and maintain the store inventory.

Hard skills include knowledge of HIPAA regulations, using pharmacy management systems, and developing new medications to help people feel better. You learn these skills through post-secondary education, internships, advanced pharmaceutical training, and real-world experience.

Soft skills are your personal skills and include excellent communication and problem-solving abilites, expressing empathy, adaptability, and cultural sensitivities. You pick up these skills through daily interaction at home, school, work, and play.

Soft skills are equally important as your hard skills, and together, they allow you to be a more efficient and empathetic pharmacy technician.

When it comes to adding your relevant skills, you may have heard a few conflicting stories about adding them and applicant tracking systems. This software looks for keywords entered by HR staff to help them find qualified candidates who have the skills and experience they are looking for.

If the job post states, “Knowledge of Medication Therapy Management,” you want to include those keywords in either the resume experience section, professional statement, or skills section.

Take a look at some of the top hard and soft skills that are the most requested by pharmacies and placement agencies.

Demonstrating your soft skills is crucial for this position, and Enhancv strengths section is a great place to demonstrate some of your soft skills.

The next required section to cover is the education section.

How to list your certifications and education on your resume

Whether you are just out of college or graduated 20 years ago, you still need to include your education. It is a necessary section and shows anyone reading your resume that you have a strong educational background that will back up your experience and know-how.

This is a highly skilled position, and recruiters like to see a bachelor’s degree in pharmaceutical sciences, healthcare administration, or management along with advanced training through certifications and continuing education.

When you list your education, you want to include:

• Degree name and type
• School name and location
• Enrollment dates/graduation date

If you are fresh out of college and looking to gain real-world experience, you can include bullet points that detail your coursework, awards and recognitions, or extracurricular activities.

After getting your bachelor’s degree and gaining some professional experience, you can further your education through pharmacy tech certifications. Check out these certifications if you want to increase your knowledge and earning potential.

The Pharmacy Technician Certification Board (PTCB) and the National Healthcareer Association (NHA) are the top organizations that offer multiple certifications for pharmacy technicians.

When reading the job post, be sure to check for required certifications and additional licensing, as some companies require state-level licensing.

How to write your pharmacy technician resume summary or objective

At the top of your resume, beneath your contact information, is where HR managers will get their first impression of you. Creating a compelling professional statement is your first chance to show off your skills and career objectives or highlights. This section is highly personalized, and the way you write it depends on where you are in your career.

A resume summary allows more experienced pharmacy technicians to summarize their careers to date and quantify specific achievements, like medication dispensing accuracy, superb communication skills, and other professional accomplishments. This section should be a concise, 3-5 sentence blurb that makes a memorable impression on the reader.

A resume objective is for first-time pharmacy technicians and those who have 1-3 years of experience. Since there is no career to summarize, you can list your career objectives and plans for reaching them in 2-4 sentences.

Let’s look at a real-world pharmacy technician resume summary for a technician with over ten years of experience that emphasizes inventory management and customer service skills.

Does this example give you the impression of a “technician with over ten years of experience that emphasizes inventory management and customer service skills?” Not likely.

There’s only a vague description of their experience level and no impressionable details on inventory management or customer service abilities other than “record excellence in customer service.” Plus, the final sentence has a very generic sound to it.

Recruiters want to be impressed. Let’s see if we can make that happen with a few tweaks.

Now, we have an impressive resume summary that provides vital information that the recruiting team is looking for. This example does an excellent job of:

• Specifying experience in industry-related software and tools.
• Demonstrates teamwork and mentoring abilities.
• Quantifies inventory management accomplishments and other metrics.
• Includes additional soft skills that are imperative to the job.

Your resume needs to stand out if you are to get an invitation to interview, and this section is the first shot at getting noticed. Be sure to tailor your personal statement to the job post by focusing on the metrics they list in the job details.

Now, let’s focus on rounding out your resume by adding some relevant details about your pharmacy technician skills and experience.

Additional sections for a pharmacy technician resume

Enhancv offers a number of resume sections to demonstrate more of your skills and knowledge.

Consider adding the following sections to your resume:

• Awards and recognitions: Highlight your accomplishments by listing any awards, like the ASHP Pharmacy Technician Excellence Award or the American Pharmacists Association’s Distinguished Federal Pharmacist Award.
• Volunteer experience: Pharmacists can volunteer at senior living communities, disaster relief efforts, hospitals, or medical centers to demonstrate their commitment to helping others and gain valuable experience and credibility.
• Membership in professional associations: Another way to show your connection to others in the industry is by joining a national organization like the American Association of Pharmacy Technicians (AAPT), the National Healthcareer Association (NHA), or the National Pharmacy Technician Association (NPTA).
• Organizational skills: Recruiters like to see organizational skills to know they can multitask while still keeping accurate records and prescribing the correct dosages for each patient.
• Continuing education: Technicians need to highlight their passion for learning and commitment to staying current with new medications, software, and technologies.

There is one more section that all pharmacy techs should include on their resume to demonstrate their knowledge of various pharmacy technologies.

Including knowledge of industry-related software on your resume

Pharmacy technicians need to be familiar with various software, including cloud-based point-of-sale software, inventory management systems, and pharmacy management software.

You can feature your knowledge of any relevant software in the resume experience section as well as Enhancv technical section.

Be sure to include any required software knowledge mentioned in the job post to create a more targeted resume.

Key takeaways

Qualified pharmacy technicians are in high demand across the country, and companies are eager to find new recruits. In this guide, we discussed how to create a well-formatted resume that addresses the common resume concerns that technicians face and how to avoid them by:

• Creating an attention-grabbing personal statement that quantifies those requirements listed in the job post.
• Detailing past work experience that demonstrates improvements in customer satisfaction scores, medication dispensing, and inventory management.
• Highlights necessary interpersonal skills, along with specific technical skills, showcasing experience in various hardware and software.
• Expressing your commitment to improving customer relationships and improving their overall health.