deep-six: transitive verb: slang: to discard or throw overboard
One of the common requests I have during the early stages of my client engagements is their need for a compelling résumé and a LinkedIn Profile to match. From fresh graduates to CEOs the common refrain is that they do not know how to present their sizzling, forward-looking message in a light that differentiates them from others. Although I am not a résumé writer I work with my clients to help them with it by first shifting their mindset about their work.
Mindset Shift
This mindset shift is about moving away from merely listing what they have done to embracing who they are by articulating it with a powerful verbal brand. Most write their résumés with bullets that read more like they are cut and pasted from the respective job descriptions with their tense changed from present to past. This approach inevitably results in a tired, fusty résumé message, rather than one that is soulful, fresh, and forward-looking.
So, if one item in the job description for a project manager reads: Must know how to prepare consolidated schedule and show milestones, the corresponding prosaic résumé bullet will read: Prepared consolidated schedule showing milestones. I call a message thus compiled a Jurassic résumé; dry as dust and devoid of any soul! More creative writers often sprinkle some numbers to make these statements more impressive and personal: Prepared consolidated schedules for 12 different projects, each with 10 or more milestones.
Instead, there is a different résumé writing approach that is worth considering: without creating a laundry list of each task or assignment in their job as a bullet, write it as a concise story to showcase their leadership and why they did what they did. Ergo, each bullet must be a story that speaks to the soul of their leadership in how they completed their task. Over the years, I have developed a structure and a template to make this easy for my clients. To bring sizzle to this story another requirement is that each story thus presented must have an Aha! and intrigue to it, otherwise it is not a story worth telling!
Accomplishments NOT Experience!
Presenting your résumé this way allows you to showcase your accomplishments, not just your experience. It also allows the reader to see beyond what you have done; it provides them a glimpse of who you are! Since my specialty is client re-invention this approach to résumé writing helps clients position themselves to pursue new vistas because employers now see them in a different light. This re-invention approach works not just for changing jobs, but even for shifting careers.
Some might say, Oh, but that is just listing your transferable skills. At its heart, this approach captures how you deal with critical problems and not just document how your skills can transfer into another job. That is why I call this an Inductive résumé. Much like Inductive logic, it persuades the reader to make a leap of faith about what the candidate can do for them, even though they may not have done that exact job before. In my own case I have used this approach throughout to get to my fifth career as a career coach. So, storytelling can be central to creating a compelling message!
This storytelling idea immediately results in my clients’ recoiling at the thought of the effort involved and at their own inability to come up with enough Aha! stories needed to make their résumé shine. Others complain that such stories can take too much space to fit into two pages. So, regardless of the obvious, ostensible objections, depending on the job they are after and the level they are seeking, each story must present a different leadership thread with the import of that story reflecting the level at which they exercised their leadership to accomplish that task.
Therein lies the rub!
Engaging Your Genius
Most approach their task or challenge at hand as a transactional assignment, rather than as something that they can conquer through their ingenuity, grit, and resourcefulness. If you truly engage your genius—and we all have that—in a task, you are bound to create that needed Aha! in what you accomplish. Others do engage these factors in what they do, but are unable to tap into themselves to flesh out the full story that makes for a good read. Either way, each type struggles to figure out what they really did in their jobs and how to tell it in a way that puts them in a good light! Thus, they are unable to move the reader from what they have done to who they are.
Now, why is that?
I think that there are two reasons why this happens: For one, some professionals are engaged in their jobs as order-takers, looking up to their boss to tell them what they need to do to stay out of trouble; and second, which is even more pervasive and troubling, most cannot write a good story if their life depended on it, even when they do have a great story to tell! In a way, it is writing paralysis.
So, here are my suggestions for anyone attempting to present themselves through a compelling résumé message: First, dig through your Aha! stories from the past and learn how to tell those in a written narrative that is concise and compelling. Regardless of how many clients told me at the outset that they have NO Aha! stories to tell, we were able to round up enough of them to make them realize what they had truly accomplished, even though they did not look at them that way at the outset.
Second, good writing skill is a sine qua non in any professional activity. This is a learned skill and no one is exempt from it, not even software programmers! And, third—and the most important—if you did not attend to your job or assignments as something about which a story needs to be told, then from now on, every task or job you do must be looked at from the vantage point of this story-telling perspective. When you take this view of your ongoing tasks under your charge you will work on them differently, and when completed, you’ll have one heck of a story to tell for many of your tasks.
An inescapable bonus of this approach is that it allows you to extract your genius from these Aha! stories and to present it in your résumé as your powerful verbal brand. This is now a unique differentiator.
Illustrative Example
As I end this blog let me illustrate my point with an actual client story in the Before/After format:
Before: As Western Regional Sales Manager improved sales productivity 30% and increased sales 50%.
After: After taking charge as Western RSM recognized that star players produced twice as much as the rest—even more during downturns—and with increased account penetration, while competitors were losing ground. Quickly met with the stars and uncovered their secret, codifying the learning for new success guidelines. Laggards responded to mentoring after working out the diehards. Within a year productivity soared 30%, and sales 50%.
The “intrigue” in this story: What was the secret? The reader can only find out by calling you after reading your résumé!
I hope that you are able to learn how to tell a story in your next résumé and see its power for yourself!
Good luck!
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