Resume Metrics for Everyone
Hi friend,
Your resume needs metrics! Heard that before? If you’re in sales or a similar numbers-oriented job, it’s probably easy to guess what metrics to include and find them if you don’t already have them. But a lot of jobs aren’t “metrics” based or have very few. Then what? Don’t worry! Everyone has metrics that they can add to their resume.
What counts as a resume metric?
The most simple definition of a metric is a unit of measurement. In business there are some universal metrics (i.e. Profitability) and lots of industry-standard metrics (i.e. Time-to-Hire); that’s usually what you’d think of when you look for metrics to add to your resume, but it doesn’t have to be. Anything that helps the person on the other side measure what you’ve done counts.
Why is it common advice to include metrics on resumes?
It comes down to two things, primarily: believability and context. A distant secondary reason is a kind of professional maturity— after a certain point in your career, you should be proactively identifying and tracking metrics to measure your effectiveness if they aren’t handed to you.
Let’s look at an example bullet point that lacks metrics in every sense of the word:
Led public speaking functions.
As a recruiter, here are the questions that would immediately come to my mind: What type of public speaking has this person done? What is involved with it? What does “leading” it mean— do they oversee a team or work on their own? With so little information, I can’t help but wonder if it’s just resume padding!
Led public speaking functions, including researching and writing speeches for executive team members and board members, providing speech coaching to members of the executive team, and overseeing the Public Relations department.
This is a lot more information— I have a clearer idea of what this person did! But I still have some questions: How often did this person write speeches? What type of speeches did they usually cover? How many executives and board members did they work with on a regular basis? How big is the PR department? There is a big difference between these responsibilities at a Fortune 500 company vs. at a small company where the PR department is a team of one (yourself) and the two-member executive team is also the board.
Led public speaking functions, including: researching and writing 1-3 press conference, keynote, or shareholder addresses per week for team of 12 executives and 8 board members; holding weekly speech coaching meetings with new executives for their first year and providing ad hoc rehearsal support for other executives as needed; and managing a Public Relations department of 6 full time employees and 2 interns.
Whew! This person is busy! None of these things are conventional “metrics”. There is no percentage increase in profitability or efficiency. Nonetheless, the context provided enables us to measure the quantity and frequency of this person’s work, and compare that to what our imaginary job might entail. The specificity provided also makes their claim very believable.
How can you add metrics to your resume?
Go back through your resume content list and make sure you write down the answer to the following questions for each bullet point:
Who was it for or with?
How many? (it can be a range, such as “over 200” if you don’t have a specific count)
How often?
How long?
What type?
What did it include/what examples can you give?
Now your resume content should be much stronger! You can take your notes and start turning them into full-fledged bullet points. Next week we’ll cover language to look out for and general writing strategies to strengthen the presentation of your content.
See you next week,
Karissa
