To write resume accomplishments, your bullet point achievements need to contain three things: an action verb, the task or project (what you did), and the metric or result (what the benefit was).
3 years ago • 8 min read
“Why should we hire you?”
Even if they don’t ask it, all hiring managers are thinking it, even as early as the resume stage. Your resume should aim to answer that question, and the best way to do that is by focusing on your past accomplishments — at work, in education, or even in volunteer roles or personal projects.
There’s a big difference between accomplishments and responsibilities, and you always want to make sure you’re focusing on the former. How can you tell the difference? If your sounds like it could fit into a job description, it’s probably a responsibility rather than an accomplishment.
“Oversaw team's performance and provided leadership to all business functions in divisions.”
Why does it matter? Responsibilities tell employers a lot about your job, but very little about you. Consider the statement above. It explains what you did, but not how well you did it — and that’s the most important part. It also sounds like it could have been pulled straight from a job posting, which makes it far too generic to belong on your resume.
“Launched Miami office with lead Director and recruited and managed a new team of 10 employees. Grew office revenue by 200% in the first nine months (representing 20% of company revenue).”
In contrast, the statement above does several things right. It’s specific about what you achieved in the role, it focuses on the end benefit to the company, and it uses numbers and metrics to explicitly quantify that achievement.
Hiring managers primarily want to know how you're likely to perform in the role, which is where past accomplishments come in. Focusing on resume accomplishments (vs responsibilities) is the best way of showing what you actually achieved in your previous positions. The fact that you’ve worked in sales for 10 years doesn’t tell a recruiter much, other than how long you’ve been in the workforce. The fact that you increased your customer base 30% through cold calls and pulled in 150% of expected revenue in the past three quarters gives them a much better idea of the skills and potential outcomes you’d be bringing to the table.
How do you ensure your resume is focused on accomplishments, not responsibilities? Follow this step-by-step guide:
Your bullet point achievements need to contain three things: an action verb, the task or project (what you did), and the metric or result (what the benefit was). This is a pretty simple formula, but it can be applied to any accomplishment.
Always start with the action verb — this keeps the focus on your specific contribution and frames the achievement in a proactive light. Depending on the accomplishment, you can list either the task or the result first, but make sure each bullet point you write contains all three elements.
Following the action verb with the task or project is a good structure for most achievements, as it clearly illustrates what you did. Following that up with a metric or result provides context for the scale of the achievement.
Including the metric or result directly after the action verb allows you to focus on the end result of your achievement. Describing the task or project afterward explains exactly what you did to achieve it.
Here are some examples of strong resume accomplishments that you can use on your resume.
The most effective way to highlight your accomplishments is to make sure each bullet point contains an action verb, task, and metric. These elements help to show recruiters the job you did and how effectively you did it. If you’re not sure if your resume has enough uses of these elements, upload your resume to the tool below — it’ll let you know if your resume has enough uses of power verbs and quantifiable achievements.
The most surefire way to transform a responsibility into an accomplishment is by adding specific numbers or metrics. This way, you aren’t just saying what you did (created a performance recording template), you’re demonstrating how effectively you did it (reduced preparation time by 80%). Not only do metrics like this help you stand out from other candidates with similar experience, they provide an objective measure of your performance and allow hiring managers to more clearly imagine how you would perform in the new role. For more examples of how to include metrics in your accomplishments, check out our list of 50+ metrics you can use on your resume.
One of the worst mistakes you can make on your resume is being vague or generic. Metrics can help with that, but you need to make sure you’re also being specific when you talk about your actions. An accomplishment like “implemented strategy that increased customer base by 1000+ customers” sounds impressive on the surface, but while the numbers are specific, what you actually did remains undefined. Don’t leave hiring managers wondering about how you did something (or whether you were even responsible for the result in the first place).
Describe your actions! For example, “designed and launched customer affiliate program, which led to 1000+ new customers in 6 months and 40% reduced cost-per-acquisition” is specific not just about the end result, but about how you achieved it and what skills you used to do so.
If you’re a current student or recent graduate, you still use accomplishments from your studies. Generally, you don’t want to fill your resume up with coursework, but things like university or personal projects, extracurricular activities, internships, and student organizations can all work. It’s okay that these aren’t strictly in a professional context — the trick is to treat them the same way, by pulling out what you’ve accomplished and adding numbers or metrics where you can.
Internships demonstrate your skills and experience in a professional environment. List internships on your resume the same way you would paid experience — focus on the exact accomplishments you achieved, and not just your responsibilities.
Involvement in student organizations and other extracurricular activities can be used to highlight soft skills like leadership, organization, and initiative. Focus on your specific contributions and add metrics to illustrate their impact.
Yes — just not in your bullet points! If you want to add more context for a previous company or role, you can add a short blurb underneath your job title to give a brief high-level overview of your main responsibilities. Your bullet points for each role should always focus on your accomplishments, however.
Including a short blurb (within around 50 words) to explain 1-2 of your main responsibilities can provide context for a previous role and allow you to focus on accomplishments in your bullet points.
