Blow Your Horns

Blow your own horns because no one will do it for you.

One of the most important items in your career management arsenal is a bank of quantified success stories that describe your skills and accomplishments in brief, one-line statements. Let’s call them “power stories.”

A lot of people struggle with this concept. It is often difficult to describe talent and skills and how they are used to help a company’s success. Sometimes modesty or insecurity gets in the way. People will say something like, “Well, I’m just an accountant and this is something every accountant does every single day. This is no big deal. I'm just doing my job.”

Encouragement from a Christmas Story
If you get stuck in this mode, here are two things to consider.

First, watch the James Stewart movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

It’s a classic Christmas story about a man who sees what happens if he was never born. It is a great plot and will help you think about how your life can make a positive contribution to someone or – from a career management perspective - a previous employer.

Second, consider these success stories as statements of fact. It is simple reporting of actions and results. It should not be considered bragging or arrogance.

Look at it this way: You were there. You made that contribution. This is your success story. Don’t be afraid to blow your own horn, because no one will do it for you.

The Core of Everything
These statements are the core of every stage and every element of career management. These power stories are used to make powerful bullet points in your resume, your LinkedIn, beBee and other social media profiles, your face to face meetings, your executive biography and- with a little bit of tweaking - can be used as responses during interviews.

Your mission is to create positive examples that let everyone know who you are, what you do and why you are an expert at something.

Testing and Assessing
Let’s put this idea into practice. Take a look at your resume. As you examine each of the accomplishments with previous employers, check to see whether or not they sound more like “job descriptions” or “job opportunities” or “responsibilities” rather than true accomplishment statements. Are the results of your actions missing, or are the results quantified and include evidence to validate the statement? Are they specific or vague, leaving the reader to guess what you are trying to say?

Fixing and Optimizing
Career management experts, such as Martin Yate (Knock Em Dead), Bob McIntosh and Greg Johnson stress the importance of using keywords and phrases as well as creating brief and quantified power stories that include three elements.

1. Problem: Describe a problem or a challenge the company or client faced.

2. Action: What skills you used to solve the problem or issue. (Martin Yate calls this your “solution.”)

3. Result: Quantified results for the company or client. This is best described in terms companies and employers want to report, such as saving time or money or increasing efficiency or profit.

Working it Out
Here’s an exercise that will help you to create your list of power stories. Make a tally sheet with three columns for each of the elements (Problem, Action, Result). Then, using an existing resume, fill in each column for each resume statement. Most of the time, one or more parts are missing. This “three-part approach” helps the thinking process and empty columns can be filled in as the facts pop into your head.

Next, create powerful and quantified one-liners for each statement. Sometimes starting with the result is more powerful. Here are some examples:

Before: Helped students improve writing ability. (What skills? Improve by how much?)
After: Tutored English as Second Language (ESL) students to improve their grammar, punctuation and spelling to improve the matriculation success rate by 14 percent.

Before: Reduced company printing costs. (Reduced by how much? How was this done?)
After: Slashed printing and production costs more than 30 percent by effectively editing, re-writing and revising catalog product descriptions.

Before: Increased product line profit. (How much more? How was this done?)
After: Increased gross margins 37 percent by creating unique, value-added, multi-function products.

Can you see the difference?

To enhance these statements even further, choose the words carefully to enhance search engine optimization (SEO). Use terms that are understood by your targeted industry or your function.

Moving Forward and Making More
Once the resume is broken down into the three elements, and each statement is optimized, make more power stories to add to your accomplishments portfolio. But where do these stories come from?

Everyone receives an “atta boy” or “atta gal” message once in a while. Whether from a boss, co-worker or customer, these are all great starting points to transform into power stories. Recall the details that led to that praise. Create a one-line summary about the event, and include all three elements.

One of the best sources of success story fodder is past performance reviews. Turn them into one line power stories that can be easily backed up by the person writing your review. By the way, performance reviews are excellent resources for letters of recommendation.

This is Hard Work
This is a lot of work for most people. But struggling through this exercise will help you understand yourself in a whole new way. And by knowing yourself, your expertise and your worth, you will be able to answer the toughest interview questions, like “Why should I hire you?” and “Tell me about yourself” and “What makes you different from the 14 other candidates I am interviewing for this position?”

Power stories are used in every stage of the career management process. These powerful, memorable and brief statements will help people remember who you are, what you do and what makes you stand out compared to others. Practice saying them so they come out naturally. Use them at every opportunity so they become part of your repertoire when you meet someone at a networking event. Include them in cover letters and all of your social media profiles. And, of course, these one line zingers will be very useful at your next job interview.

Do you have any other suggestions or examples of how these statements helped you through the interview process? Share some of your success stories and let us know what happened.

You may also like this post about transferable skills: https://www.bebee.com/producer/@wayne-yoshida/re-inventing-yourself-got-transferable-skills

About Wayne Yoshida
 

Wayne Yoshida is a technical writer and education advocate with sales management experience. Wayne currently works in the alternative fuel vehicle (AFV) industry and has worked for a wide variety of high technology companies, including aerospace and defense, photonics, lasers and opto-mechanics, two-way radio, telecommunications and a non-profit, educational organization. His personal passion for electronics and Amateur Radioopened many doors to some very interesting personal and professional experiences. Working as a ham radio consultant for the NASA Johnson Space Center during Space Shuttle mission STS-9 is his most memorable experience. Connect with him onLinkedIn and beBee, and for a look into his personal passions, follow his blog.

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