The following is the second part in a series about integrating your career story into cover letters and résumés.
Cover letters are, at most, only half of your application package equation. And, believe it or not, they are not the only place you can use this story-telling technique to appeal to the hiring manager.
“The résumé is the trickiest component in career marketing communication in which to tell stories because the clipped, bulleted format we’ve come to expect of résumés doesn’t lend itself well to storytelling,” said Katharine Hansen, PhD, author of “Tell Me About Yourself: Storytelling to Get Jobs and Propel Your Career.”
Hansen recommends the following guidelines:
1. Include a professional profile. A commonly used section at the top of the résumé, a Professional Profile, provides an excellent vehicle for telling the story of who you are professionally. Imagine that this section begins with the phrase, “I am a(n)...” and let your bullet points tell a story of who you are and how you qualify for this job.
2. Tell stories of accomplishments, not duties and responsibilities. Susan Britton Whitcomb, author of “Résumé Magic,” one of the most highly recommended résumé books on the market, calls accomplishments “the linchpin of a great résumé.” Your résumé should be primarily accomplishments-driven (rather than driven by duties and responsibilities), and accomplishments are best communicated in story form.
Think about what would have been different in each situation without your actions. What would not have happened if you hadn’t been there? How did you leave each organization better than you found it? Remember that accomplishments don’t always have to come from paid employment. College students and new grads can look to class projects, work-study, extra-curriculars, study abroad, sports, volunteer work, Greek organization roles, internships, summer jobs and more for accomplishment stories.
3. Accomplishment stories should include the situation, problem or challenge that contextualizes your achievement; the action you took; and the results you attained. Career experts advise job seekers to use any one of several similar “formulas,” especially in job interviews. In a résumé, however, tell these story in reverse order—results, action and problem/situation/challenge. Why? Because, the employer spends only 2.5 to 20 seconds looking at your résumé. Results need to be listed first for each accomplishment so these outcomes catch the reader’s eye. For example, “[Result:] More than doubled Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI) scores from 40 percent to 88 percent in four months [Action:] by initiating phone campaign [Situation:] to proactively resolve issues.”
4. Brevity is key. Most employers prefer a résumé that is formatted mostly in bullet points, which don’t exactly lend themselves to storytelling. You can tell stories in résumé bullet points, but they must be concise, not wordy. You can go into more detail in your cover letter, and later in your interview.
5. Humanize and personalize your résumé. The trend in résumés has been to avoid personal information and interests. But, this type of human-interest information can work for you as long as you relate it to professional skills. It also helps to reveal more of your story to the employer and portrays you as someone he or she would like to get to know better.
6. Remember, you don’t have to tell the same stories on every résumé you send out. The ideal scenario is to tailor your résumé for every position you apply for so that you can change up your stories, selecting those that are most appropriate for the job at hand.
7. Think about the critical success factors for the type of position you are targeting. Tell a story of what it looks like to succeed in this kind of position. Brainstorm stories of how past employers or your college professors defined you as successful.
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