Context and Accomplishments: Resume Essentials

When initially screening your resume, recruiters quickly assess a number of items, including your current employer, title, and responsibilities; your career history and trajectory; number of employers; dates; and degrees and licenses. While there are several essential components to building a successful resume, the two most often neglected or all together omitted are context and accomplishments.

Titles and responsibilities are important, but they can be misleading. A Vice President of Communications role at one organization may be completely different from a role with the same title at another organization. They may have similar responsibilities, but the scope and complexity could be worlds apart. This is why context and accomplishments are so important.

Your resume needs to make an impression and it needs to be informative. Including a list of responsibilities or skills is helpful, but what do they really mean in the context of your specific organization? How large is your company or organization? Do you manage staff? How many and what type/level? To whom do you report? Are you responsible for a budget? If so, what size? Providing details like these help the reader to better understand your role.

In addition to context, recruiters want to see real results. Again, responsibilities and skills are helpful, but they are often vague and/or subjective. Providing measurable accomplishments shows the reader what you have actually achieved. Be specific and provide concrete data to support your statements. Stay away from subjective language such as “significantly” improved, or “proactively” led.

Most recruiters are not going to read every word in your resume, start to finish, at least not on the initial screen. This is why it’s crucial to be efficient and provide meaningful information.  Show the reader the scope of your experience and what you have actually accomplished. Be specific!

Context and Accomplishments: Resume Essentials