When you first sit down to work on your resume, it can be downright painful. Putting your education, training, and work experience in neat little bullet points designed to convey competence, experience, and dedication may seem a monumental task. Here are a few tips on resume action words that can get you going and help you break down that task into manageable, bite-sized pieces.
You may have heard you should use action verbs to describe your work experiences – to show a prospective employer what you’ve done (action) previously. Telling an employer you “validated corporate data” sounds better than saying, “in charge of checking database.” Slight changes in the words you use can make a huge difference when someone sits down to review your resume. With that in mind, here are just a few action words you may want to consider using on your resume. There are many, many more – these are just to get you started:
Communicating with Customers |
Administrative Duties |
Support Services / Duties |
Finance-related Duties |
|---|---|---|---|
| addressed | organized | assisted | calculated |
| responded | prepared | coached | analyzed |
| corresponded | systematized | facilitated | allocated |
| published | approved | demonstrated | audited |
| promoted | compiled | guided | budgeted |
| negotiated | generated | enabled | managed |
| persuaded | processed | referred | balanced |
When working on these action-focused bullet points for your resume, think about what you did for your former employer. What actions did you take? Of those, what do you want to highlight as demonstrating your value to a prospective employer? Following this line of thinking will help you pull out the most significant items and disregard the mundane.
Finally, when it comes time to review what you’ve come up with, two tactics may be helpful. First, have others look it over. Are you in school? Perhaps a career counselor is available to proofread and give resume advice. Even if you don’t have a career professional at your disposal, asking a trusted adult to review your resume will be helpful. Second, read over your resume as if you were a business owner. Try to put yourself in the employer’s ‘shoes’ and imagine what you would be looking for in a potential employee if the tables were turned. Changing perspectives like that can help you catch less-than-stellar phrases and replace them with those that are more powerful and convincing.
