How to Use Metrics to Strengthen Your Resume

How to Use Metrics to Strengthen Your Resume When it comes to resume writing, we’re all very careful to craft a summary of our accomplishments that’s both informative and succinct. And while you can certainly accomplish this goal with words, you might find it’s even more impactful to convey your value with metrics. For starters, metrics are faster to read. If you’re able to provide figures representative of your accomplishments, the recruiter scanning your resume will see them right away. To that end, metrics also give your statements context. In other words, you can write that you promoted growth, or you can quantify just how much you boosted your company’s gains. They can also show how much you’ve done to improve the role in comparison to your predecessors. This process is why metrics are known to strengthen resumes. Here are five ways to take advantage of it. 1. Growth To effectively add growth-related figures to your resume, think back on accomplishments and feedback sessions with your boss. Which numbers did they highlight as areas in which you excelled? These statistics are the very ones your resume should highlight. Another way to gauge metric-usage for growth is to check out LinkedIn profiles for professionals already in the role you want. See what numbers they include, and post yours so that you have the same easy-to-read accomplishments on your resume. Depending on your role, you might include the following figures to paint a clearer picture of your value: Number of website visits or social media follows Count of new hires you made Amount of revenue you brought in Number of partnerships you fostered 2. Firsts In this category, the figure in question will be the same no matter what you accomplished. If you had a career or company first while on the job, be sure to include that on your resume. Your team may have achieved firsts as well â€"  were you the first business to put out a particular product or service? That’s worth noting too. 3. Frequency How often are you given a specific task? Whats your position in the job-completion timeline? The rate with which you perform a particular to-do will show a hiring manager that youre capable of handling a high-intensity or high-capacity role, so don’t be too shy to include just how productive you are on a day-to-day basis. To that end, it’s okay to use a range if your output isn’t exactly the same Monday through Friday. Copy editors, for example, could use frequency on a resume to show that they’re in charge of the final grammatical edits on a website’s content. To make that responsibility appear as great as it is, they should include how many articles are published per week that have to go through them first. When you’re brainstorming the frequency with which you completed essential tasks, be sure to compare your resume to the job posting and the responsibilities sought by your potential employers. If there’s a must-have in which you’re experienced, don’t just say you do that on a day-to-day basis â€"  quantify it so that it’s clear just how much of an expert you are in this subject area. 4. Savings As nice as it is to add to a company’s bottom line, it’s equally as admirable to cut the excess. Your resume should also include anything you’ve done to streamline processes or otherwise operate more efficiently. The most obvious example is time. For instance, if you revolutionized the work pipeline, that’s an ideal bullet point to include. If you made it 25 percent faster to file expense reports with a new online platform, your contribution will be even clearer, as will your innovative spirit. Some other areas in which you might’ve contributed to savings include: Budget or departmental spending Turnover in employees or clients Website bounce rate, meaning people stayed on your website for more time than before Discounts negotiated 5. Reach Your work has likely brought you into contact with a wealth of different people. It’s natural to look at the clients or customers you’ve served and the skills you’ve honed by working with them. Quantifying just how many you’ve touched with your work is an impressive statistic to include on your resume, along with a strong verb to really paint the picture of how hard you worked. You should also look inward though. The teams you work with, as well as the stakeholders you report to, are also quantifiable metrics to make the impact of your work more tangible. Here are some examples of how you might include your reach on your resume: Number of accounts or clients you managed How many shareholders were affected by your project The number of employees you served in an in-house role, such as human resources How many team members you led through a project The number of customers you served while you worked in your position Make Metrics Work for You Even the least numbers-centric job will have quantifiable facets. The above are just five areas in which you might find the metrics you can and should include in your resume. Once you add the easy-to-understand figures that represent your impact and worth, your resume will stand out from the word-centric pack. Do you want more work-related tips and tricks to make the path to career success smoother? Subscribe to our newsletter and never miss a post. Get everything you need to build a career you love by signing up for the newsletter.