If you want your resume to stand out from the crowd your achievement statements need to be the best they possibly can be.
But writing achievement statements for most people is hard.
In this article we will walk you through the process in 10 simple steps to make sure you write killer achievement statements and make your resume stand out from the crowd.
Before we start writing anything we want to just pull together a list of your achievements.
This is not as difficult as you think but does need a little effort on your part.
But writing achievement statements for most people is hard.
In this article we will walk you through the process in 10 simple steps to make sure you write killer achievement statements and make your resume stand out from the crowd.
Before we start writing anything we want to just pull together a list of your achievements.
This is not as difficult as you think but does need a little effort on your part.
- First get a copy of a job Description, ideally the description of the open position or a job description that matches the type of position you interested in.
- Next, if your previous organizations conducted regular performance feedback reviews or appraisals, look through your previous assessments.
- Can you recall times when you received positive feedback or praise about some work you did? Capture what the feedback focused on and the context in which it was given.
- Take time to look back at times when you have felt good about an event or action.
It does not need to have been in a work setting, though they are probably more useful than your non-work accomplishments. - Review each item on your list and insure that what you did describes the action you took, such as negotiated, designed, constructed etc.
Use the strongest action verb you can as this will catch the readers attention. - Make sure you include to what or who, you may also add in here the context to the statement, for example time or money constraints especially if it helps to highlight the level of skill you are describing, and can directly speak to the needs of the open position.
- Now add a result, what impact did you achieve? The strongest achievement statements quantify the impact.
Choose either percentages or numbers depending on which one makes the result more powerful. - Take each statement and refine it, keep tweaking and polishing each statement until you get the final version.
Make sure your sentences start with a powerful action verb.
Do not discard all your other versions, it is quite likely you are going to come up with a number of really good achievement statements, that you can use when you customize your resume for another open position. - Check to make sure your achievement statement describes the skills you have, the positive effect applying those skills had, and how they can be applied to the open position.
They also need to be written with a focus on the open position, this will make it easier for the reader to understand how you will be able to help them, and address the needs they have. - Spell check each one, check for punctuation and grammar, also for correctly spelled words but not the right word.
Now check it again and also give it to a friend to check too, a fresh pair of eyes may see the obvious things we can sometimes miss.