Your career narrative is the story you tell about your professional journey, your skills, your achievements, and your goals. It can help you showcase your value, connect with your audience, and stand out from the crowd. But how can you craft a career narrative that is authentic, engaging, and relevant? Here are some tips to help you.
Before you start writing your career narrative, you need to have a clear idea of why you are telling it and who you are telling it to. What is the main message you want to convey? What is the context and the goal of your communication? For example, are you writing a resume, a cover letter, a LinkedIn profile, or a personal statement? Who are you addressing and what are their needs and expectations? Knowing your purpose will help you tailor your narrative to fit the situation and the audience.
1. Examine your passions and interests. What activities or topics excite you? What could you spend hours doing without feeling tired or bored? + 2. Your purpose is often intertwined with the values you hold, as it gives your life direction and meaning in alignment with what you find important. 3. Think about the times when you made a positive impact on someone else's life or when you felt like you were truly contributing to a greater good. 4. What are you naturally good at? What skills do you possess that make you stand out? Experiment with different activities, volunteer for causes you're passionate about, and seek new experiences. It may take time, and it's okay to adjust your path along the way.
Your career narrative should not be a chronological list of every job and task you have ever done. Instead, it should highlight the most relevant and meaningful aspects of your career that demonstrate your skills, values, and potential. To do this, you need to choose some themes or categories that organize your narrative and reflect your strengths and interests. For example, you could use themes such as leadership, innovation, collaboration, problem-solving, or social impact. Then, you can select some examples or stories from your career that illustrate these themes and show how you have grown and contributed.
One of the most effective ways to tell a compelling career story is to use the STAR method, which stands for Situation, Task, Action, and Result. This method helps you structure your examples or stories in a way that shows your context, your challenge, your solution, and your outcome. For each theme, you can use the STAR method to describe a specific situation or project that you faced, the task or goal that you had, the action or steps that you took, and the result or impact that you achieved. This way, you can show your skills and achievements in action and provide evidence and details.
Here’s how I differentiated myself to START at a new company without feeling slimy. Build on the STAR framework by adding Testimonials. Use this formula to showcase your work. Our (customer) was experiencing (challenge) They were able to (results achieved) with our help. We (performed these tasks) to enable their results. Here’s what they said (testimonial). Don’t have testimonials? Reconnect with colleagues and customers to get them. Ask these three questions. ?? What did I help the team achieve? ???What was it like working with me? ???What advice do you have for me? Now you can create a shareable case study that highlights the challenge your customer was experiencing and then get specific about how you helped with testimonials.
Your career narrative should be concise and clear, without unnecessary or irrelevant information. You want to capture your audience's attention and interest, not bore or confuse them. To do this, you need to use simple and direct language, avoid jargon and acronyms, and use active verbs and positive words. You also need to edit and proofread your narrative to eliminate any errors or inconsistencies. Ideally, your career narrative should be no longer than one or two paragraphs, depending on the format and the purpose.
What I really like about the structure of this article is the presentation of the STAR story and recognition of its place in the building of a career narrative. But the key here is the fact that the STAR stories are building blocks, in LEGO-brand fashion, from which an overall identities and unique value proposition can be crafted. This, arising as it should from results that no one else can claim via your STAR stories, is how you will stand out.
Your career narrative is not a static or fixed document. It is a dynamic and flexible tool that you can adapt and update according to different situations and opportunities. You don't have to use the same narrative for every application or interaction. You can modify it to suit the specific role, company, or industry that you are targeting. You can also update it to reflect your current situation, goals, and achievements. Your career narrative should evolve as you do and showcase your best self.