What level of detail should you include in your resume achievements?

Here's your strategy for listing achievements in your resume or LinkedIn profile: 1. Have 3 achievement bullets for each role (Your top 3 all time achievements go in an Achievements section towards the top of your LinkedIn About Section). 2. Use expressive action verbs like "drove", "spearheaded", "led", "piloted", "guided", etc. 3. Show impact with numbers. Use: - Percentages and "X times" when the base of the numbers is more modest and the increase is more impressive. - Raw numbers or "X millions" if the increase is more modest but the base is bigger and more impressive. 4. Cut out the adjectives and start each bullet point with an action verb.

Achievements matter a lot on your Resume, becasue in the end it all boils down to “So what” question. So what that you were working on certain project? That’s talking about your responsibility. How did your involvement in this project helped the organization achieve their goals? That’s talking about results and achievements. See the difference?

It's all about relevance. Step back from what you have in your CV and ensure it's tailored to the job you are applying for. Ensure your list of achievements matches that job spec or the amount of how many achievements you have mentioned could be irrelevant!

We all love big numbers and percentages of overachievement and we love to highlight them on our CV's to support the track record. However for me it's equally important, if not more, to read about one's less spectacular actions but with a greater impact on the individual work, team, organisation or a particular client. Doing something out of the scope which brings surprising result. Innovative idea to help the team synergise better. A new logo won against all odds - how and why it turned to be such a success. Those stories and examples ring true and help the individual stand out in an authentic and unique way.

Resume is one pager life story that you can explain to employer. While hiring, employers look for someone who can show how the person will be contributing in their business. So you should be including the achievements relevant to the business. Something that will prove them that you are the best choice.

This is also another way to validate your transferable skills if you are a career or industry changer! Going from a teacher to product manager & helped minimize the morning drop off time by working with your principal to bring improvements? Sounds like you know how to remove friction from the user experience to me!

Choosing which achievements to showcase all starts with having clarity on your branding and positioning and ensuring that the achievements selected serve to support strategic elements of the brand, namely: -Demonstrating prior success stories in undertaking a similar project or solving a similar challenge -Showcasing what sets us apart and how our specific skills or combination of skills add value -Showcasing soft skills and how they allow us to add value in a given role It's also important to keep in mind that "positioning" is about understanding the specific needs and challenges of a given role and tailoring what we present about ourselves and our achievements to what is specifically relevant to the role.

Remember that hirers only spend 5 seconds to see decide if they will bring you into the interview. Look at the key words, responsibilities and requirements and use the exact same words in your experience and achievements at the beginning of your CV and cover letter to keep them interested in looking at the rest of your experience.

I advocate for selecting (and properly showcasing) achievements that speak not just to what you did, but to the impact you had in doing so.

It can be daunting to list accomplishments in a resume especially when you're trying to bring out your best but within a certain number of pages. It is recommended to use the STAR format to identify your quantified achievements. S - what was the 'Situation'? T - what 'Task' were you given? A - what 'Action' did you take? R - what was the 'Result'? This approach will always fetch you numbers!

Specifics are important to build credibility. Catch all achievements or extremely high numbers may reduce credibility as they lack substance and can seem far-fetched. It's best to describe a single achievement and provide details that make it tangible than to be too self-congratulatory. For example, talking about how you leveraged specific soft skills to tackle a major roadblock that comprised the delivery of a project and managed to overcome the issues and deliver on time will be much more powerful than a generic "Consistently delivering on-time" claim. Added bonus, it enables you to showcase soft skills as well. Avoid generalisations and self-congratulatory statements and focus on specific examples to build credibility with facts.

Yes to the SMART framework as much as you can. There will be some roles, especially older ones, where you may not have that level of context anymore. Also, please don’t share achievements for every job that say you were the freaking best at everything you did because you got 10x results on everything. We all have wins - some are home runs and some get out teammate to the next base. No one hits a home run every single time at bat ??

Don't forget to include data, %. Data can be as easy as managing a team of 7 people. It just helps to understand the environment. It's not the same task managing a team of 7 people and a team of 90 people.

I also love to add a project achievement section for the achievements that you are really proud of if there is room on the resume. This helps you provide additional context on the tools used, methodology followed, etc. without putting too many details under each role.

Use your own voice. As simple as this may seem, a lot of professionals tend to use dense and complicated sentences in their resume or they fail to give enough context for the achievement to be well understood and make full impact. With my clients, I often have them describe their achievement in separate questionnaires where the instruction is to just write what comes to their mind. You'd be surprised of how much more impact and information there is in those responses and how writing with their own voice amplifies the impact of the achievements.

Provide specific examples of achievements and responsibilities in your work experience, quantify results when possible, and emphasize skills applicable to the job. Keep it clear, concise, and focused on demonstrating your suitability for the role.

Overall, slow down when making your resume. Work on the overhaul over a few days. Walk away and look at it with a fresh set of eyes. Have friends or your network review and provide feedback. Once you get too close to it, it’s easy to miss mistakes someone else may easily spot.

To add power to your achievements, consider the concept of "social proofing" by building the testimonial section of your LinkedIn profile. You can increase the credibility of the achievements you include in your resume when the testimonials confirm your claims.

Less is more. When sharing your RELEVANT achievments you want to paint a picture in maximum 2 sentences. The first sentence tells the story of a RELEVANT pain point. The second sentence tells the story of the Relevant result. If the hiring manager wants to know HOW you did it. They have to call you in for an interview. Which is the point of the resume.

Follow the RELEVANCE rule. When deciding which achievemnts to include in your Resume, take time to identify what truly matters in the job you are applying for. Then go to your Resume and include those achievements that are most relevant to the job.

A resume isn't supposed to list all your past achievements. It's supposed to make the hiring team want to invite you to an interview to learn more about it. Like a trailer does to a movie.