The lack of powerful accomplishment statements is the most common resume shortcoming. If a candidate does not include relevant and compelling accomplishments on his resume, his chances of earning interviews are diminished. A hiring employer may receive hundreds of resumes. The resumes lacking accomplishments will be cast aside. In most cases, the resume is the one shot you get to capture the hiring employer’s attention and earn the interview.

Elizabeth wrote today asking for help. A recruiter told her that she needed to “beef-up” her accomplishments. The following are two examples of bullets from Elizabeth’s first draft resume. Below each of Elizabeth’s examples, I have crafted a new accomplishment statement that really sells Elizabeth as a project leader worthy of an interview.

Before:

“For Cap International, reengineered their entire planning process. What was a static, rear view mirror process that was monthly, was reengineered into a weekly process with a dynamic, forward looking focus. This helped them take actions in time to make a difference in amount of rework necessary.”

After:

Reduced rework by 50% to save Cap International $47,000. Reengineered planning process to replace static monthly report with weekly forward-looking analysis.

Before:

“For Farriday Company, in the spare parts division, completed an item classification by type of use (e.g. an oil filter that is needed regularly vs an engine), determined an inventory strategy (an oil filter at every dealer vs an Engine shipped overnight from one central warehouse), and a matching demand planning strategy (e.g. oil filter using regular demand planning methods vs engine blocks as a percentage of car population based on historical records), and implemented that using a combination of custom built solutions and Manugistics. This considerably reduced the cash they had tied up in inventory.”

After:

Improved cash flow and reduced inventory on hand 37% by planning and leading implementation of custom-built demand planning system to forecast and track inventory needs, expenses, and delivery time for every item.

The major changes made to Elizabeth’s resume were the following:

• Streamlined the information so the reader can quickly absorb the information.
• Started each bulleted line with a verb.
• Arranged the statement to lead with the result. (i.e., the cost savings or improvement).
• Uncovered and included measurements for the results when possible.

Try these same strategies on your resume. If you would like a helping hand when crafting your accomplishment statements on your resume, contact me. Every week I help candidates who think they do not have any accomplishments dig deeper to recall noteworthy achievements.