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50 Ways to Identify Achievements for Your Resume
Without a doubt, work related accomplishments are the most important information you can have on your resume. Past accomplishments provide a good indicator of future performance and they enable a recruiter or hiring manager to gauge whether you will achieve established performance goals and be successful in your job. Accomplishments show how well you have done your job and employers use this to determine your drive, suitability and fit for their jobs. In addition, quantifiable accomplishments provide tangible evidence of your talents and capabilities, allowing prospective employers to see the value of hiring you.
We have provided a number of questions to help you identify your accomplishments or pinpoint any contributions you have made to your employers. Review each point thoroughly—you would be surprised to recognize that you have contributed much more to your employers than you thought. Additionally, using these pointers will help you source valuable details for the development of your resume, which otherwise may not be feasible.
Think through each position you have held or experience carefully and ask yourself these questions:
- In performing your job, how did your employer or department benefit?
- Did you increase revenue? If so, by how much? Quantify or qualify the results.
- Did you bring in new customers? If so, who were they? How big were the accounts?
- Did you reduce risks? If so, by what means?
- Did you save time or money? If so, by how much? Quantify using numbers or dollars whenever possible.
- Did you make work easier or more efficiency? If so, how easy, how efficient? Quantify.
- Did you improve processes or develop any new procedures or policies? If so, what types and how have they helped your department or company?
- Did you improve service standard? If so, by how much? Quantify the benefit using numbers or percentage.
- Did you avoid a decline in revenue or service quality? If so, by how much? Quantify your result.
- Did you retain customer base? If so, by what percent? Quantify.
- Did you improve customer satisfaction level? If so, by how much? Use numbers or percentage to quantify the benefit received.
- Did you reduce costs for your department? If so, by how much? Use dollar amount to quantity the savings.
- Did you ensure complete compliance with regulatory requirements to avoid non-conformance issues? If so, how?
- Were they any specific challenges you overcame to the benefit of your team or department? If so, what were they?
- Were you a key player or instrumental in any project or initiative that resulted in significant benefit to your team or department? If so, in what ways or how did you contribute?
- Did you develop a new venture or business opportunity for your company? If so, what type and how did it benefit your company?
- Did you save on costs or free up valuable resources by doing more with less? If so, by doing what or how?
- Did you secure new relationships or opportunities for your employer? If so, with whom or what?
- Did you leverage your previous relationships, contacts or network to fuel the growth of your company, a product or a brand? If so, what was the result?
- Did you out perform performance expectations? If so, in what areas and by how much? Quantify.
- Did you secure any new contract for your company? If so, how much revenue did you bring in? Quantify.
- Did you improve employee morale and productivity? If so, by what means and by what percentage? Quantify.
- Did you foster a high performing and inclusive culture across the organization? If so, how did you achieve this?
- Did you come under budget while maintaining operating efficiency across all business functions? If so, by how much or what percentage?
- Did you maximize return on investment for your company? If so, by how much and by doing what?
- Did you reduce cost per hire, time to hire and overall labour costs? If so, what measures were taken and what were the results? Quantify in dollars, numbers or percentage.
- Did you build highly effective sales teams? If so, how?
- Did you leverage technology to improve business processes and build better reporting capabilities? If so, what were the outcomes? Quantify.
- Did you over-achieve your target? If so, by how much? Quantity.
- Did you turnaround a struggling department, division or product line? If so, how did you do it and what were the results? Quantify.
- Did you introduce a new process or system? If so, what were the results? Quantify.
What did you gain or how did you benefit from performing your job exceptionally well—beyond company expectation.
- What did you get in return for your hard work, contribution and dedication?
- Awards, recognition, trips
- Cash bonus
- A salary increase
- Stock options
- A promotion
- Perks and Incentives—what?
- Recognition from the top—whom?
- Career / professional development paid for by the company
- Promotion to executive office
- Job Satisfaction
- Learned new skills
- MBA paid for by company
- Selected to head a major project
- Special assignment
- Employee of The Year Award
- President’s Gold Club
- Top Producer of the Year Award
- Special training paid for by company
- A seat on the “Board”
- Member of the senior executive team
- Two-fold increase in vacation time
