To truly market yourself in your CV you need to list your achievements or accomplishments. You need to demonstrate that you have the skills that you claim, and that you have used these skills (and your initiative) to solve a problem in a workplace.
Many of my clients say that they can't think of any achievements to put on their CV. They also quite commonly say that they hate talking about how good they are! Women in particular seem to dislike 'boasting' about their accomplishments. However, if you want to get an interview, you need to have achievements on your CV.
So here are 3 simple steps to an achievements-based resume:
1. Brainstorm
Jot down any achievements that you can think of. They can be from your current role, previous roles, volunteer work or even from your university or school days (depending on how long ago it was).
If you are stuck, ponder these questions. Have you ever:
Fixed a process to make it more efficient?
Identified a problem and fixed it?
Managed or contributed to a project or team successfully?
Achieved a work outcome that added some value to the organisation?
Grown an area of your organisation?
Been recognised (formally or informally) for your achievements by your boss or peers (could be winning an award, being promoted, praised)?
Negotiated and resolved an issue?
Presented your work to your colleagues/peers/external stakeholders?
Managed, trained or mentored people?
2. Flesh them out using the SAR method
Once you have your achievements, you need to describe them using the SAR method (sometimes called the STAR, PAR or SAO method!) :
Situation: What was the situation or problem. What was your role?
Action: What did you do to resolve the situation or problem. Result: What was the outcome?
3. Pimp them
Once you have your achievements written as SAR, you need to add a few things to make them sound even more impressive:
Add figures: Now you need to add some figures to your Result to show how it impacted the organisation. Adding $ or % makes make more of an impact.
Add powerful verbs and adverbs: Use some powerful action verbs at the start of your achievement statement. For example: Achieved; Increased; Successfully implemented; Trained; Project managed.