How To Highlight Your Accomplishments On Your Resume

If you were a hiring manager looking at resumes, which of the following statements would impress you more?

I wrote news releases.
I was responsible for writing 25 news releases within a three-week period under daily deadlines.

Clearly the second statement carries more meaning. Why? It uses numbers to quantify the writer's accomplishments by giving it a context that helps the interviewer understand the degree of difficulty involved in the task.

Numbers are a powerful tool on a resume that will help your accomplishments get the attention they deserve from prospective employers. You can find effective ways to quantify your success on your resume. Here are a few suggestions:

Think About The Money

Organizations will always be concerned about money. As you contemplate your accomplishments and present them on your resume, think about ways you have saved, earned or managed money within your internships, part-time jobs and extracurricular activities. A few possibilities that might appear on a resume;

Identify, research and recommend a new internet service provider and cut the company's online cost,
Write a prospect letter that brings in $25,000 in donations,
Managing a student organization budget of $7,000.

Think About The Time

Time is money and it is true. Companies and organizations are looking for ways to save time and do things more efficiently. They are concerned about meeting deadlines, both internal and external. Whatever you can do on your resume to show that you can save, make or manage time will grab your reader's immediate attention. Here are some time-oriented entries that might appear on a typical resume;

Assisting with twice-monthly payroll activities while ensuring employees were paid as expected,
Suggesting procedures that decreased the average of order-processing time from ten minutes down to five minutes.

Think In Terms Of Amounts

It is easy to neglect mentioning how much you have produced. There is a tendency instead to simply pluralize your accomplishments without including important specifics or developing lesson plans for two classes of 20 students each.

Do not fall into the trap of excluding numbers. Instead include amounts like these;

Recruiting 25 members for a new student environmental organization,
Training five new employees on restaurant operational procedures,
Creating a process that bolstered production 25 percent.

The more you focus on money, time and amount in relation to your accomplishments, the better you will present your successes and highlight your potential, the more you will realize just how much you have to offer prospective employers. You will see that playing the numbers game is yet another way to convince employers that you should be a part of their equation for success.