If It's Concrete, It Counts

So far in this series on refreshing your resume, we’ve talked about finding the right structure for your situation, building a bank of your past accomplishments, and focusing your on your professional “superpower.” In this post, we’ll tackle a challenge you may face as you flesh out the details of your resume.

If you search for resume-writing guidance online, you’ll likely encounter the advice to use hard numbers when describing your key contributions. Inevitably, the examples the experts provide seem to come from the context of a large business: “Increased revenues 25% by implementing a new goat management system,” “Landed 75 new clients in one month with my innovative goat marketing techniques,” “Saved my company $50,000 by consolidating our goat inventory,” and so on. 

What if your contributions on the job aren’t so easy to quantify? After all, not everyone works in the commercial sector, and not every act of value can be counted or measured. If that’s your situation, let me encourage you to focus on writing concretely, with specificity-- whether or not that means using numbers.

Let’s say, for instance, you’ve written, “Coordinated logistics for my company’s annual conference.” A reviewer might be interested in some countable, measurable elements of that accomplishment: How many people attended? How large was the budget? How many new clients did your company pick up as a result?

But there are plenty of qualitative details that would be of interest, too: What was the subject matter of the conference? What kinds of people attended? How complex was the programming? Were there any particular challenges with managing this kind of event?

Aiming for concrete, specific detail, you might rewrite your key contribution as, “Coordinated logistics, including accommodations, food and beverage, plenary speakers, and concurrent sessions for my company’s annual conference on artisanal goat products. 90% of the 300 goat-based creatives in attendance rated their event experience as ‘Excellent,’ and several personally expressed appreciation for my inclusion of goat yoga in the evening activity options.” This version incorporates some notable quantitative data, but it also tells your reviewer that you can handle complex projects with multiple moving parts, and that your events include a personal touch.

Numbers provide important context for reviewers, so use them where it makes sense-- but don’t be discouraged if you can’t count or measure your most important achievements. You can still let your experience shine by painting a vivid, detailed picture for your reviewers.

Stay tuned for the final post in this series on the art of resume writing— and if you’d like help finding the right words to describe what you’ve achieved on the job, contact me.