Page 100 - Marky Stein - Get a Great Job When You Don't Have a Job-McGraw-Hill (2009)

Fearless Résumés

How
Why
How much

As in any good story, you want your readers to both be able to
clearly picture, in their minds, what you’re talking about and
have an emotional reaction to what you’re saying. Let’s look at
some comparisons between Q statements and phrases that indi-
cate “regular” job duties.

Comparison of Q Statements and Job Duties

PAIR 1. SKILL WORD: LED
Job duty: Led a successful team.
Q statement: Led a team of 12 computer software engineers to
develop a new program that resulted in $1.6 mil-
lion in profits after the first year of its launch.

PAIR 2. SKILL WORD: (TO) RUN
Job duty: Ran an office.
Q statement: Ran and kept detailed records for a busy dental
office seeing more than 45 patients per day.

PAIR 3. SKILL WORD: COACH
Job duty: Coached a sports team.
Q statement: Coached a basketball team, using mind-body visu-
alization techniques, that went from number 32 in
the state to number 1 in a period of one year.

Did the first statement (job duty) in each of the pairs cause you
to have a strong sense of what the writer did or how she might
contribute to your company? How about the second account (Q
statement)?
If you were reading one résumé that was full of statements of
job duties and another résumé that was replete with Q state-
ments, which of the two people would you want to interview?
Remember, both the first and second statements represent the
same skill. Which is more believable? Which is more compelling?
Why?

87