How to List Accomplishments in a Resume | Academic, Work & Personal Examples

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Your resume is a representation of what you can offer when you apply to a specific position. You can use it to describe your skills and qualifications in a manner that presents them as valuable as possible. It can be helpful to list some of your professional accomplishments, including any that are academic, work-related or personal. Learn how to list accomplishments in a resume and discover some academic, work and personal examples you can use as a reference.

What is an accomplishment?

Before you can start listing accomplishments on your resume, it’s important to understand exactly what an accomplishment is from a professional perspective. Put simply, a duty is something you did, while an accomplishment is how well you did it. The same can be applied to academics. If you won awards while earning your degree, you can describe the award rather than simply mentioning the degree you hold.

How to list work accomplishments

Including accomplishments in your resume can help you make it different from the competition. Generally, there are two approaches to adding accomplishments. You can create a separate list for your accomplishments or you can include them within other sections of your resume like work experience and education. Since a detailed resume is easily cluttered, it’s typically more useful to include them in other sections to enhance your duties and academic experience rather than create a separate section.

Work accomplishments are likely going to be the most relevant for whatever position you’re applying for. 

Here are some steps you can follow to list work accomplishments on your resume:

1. First, choose what accomplishments to include

A work accomplishment can range from awards and accolades to exceeding established goals or quotas. Saving your company money is a popular accomplishment because no matter what your field, every business is interested in the bottom line. 

2. Second, use specific numbers to showcase your accomplishments

Saying that you cut costs by implementing a social media management software program as a marketing specialist isn’t as impactful as saying that you saved the company $14,000 a year by implementing a social media management program.

3. Third, use your job duties as accomplishments on your resume

Unless you worked a niche position that is widely unknown, any recruiter is already going to have a general understanding of a job’s duties. For example, if you’re a graphic designer, they’re going to know that you designed graphics for clients, so offer them new information by describing your accomplishments. Instead of merely stating that you design graphics, you can describe your accomplishment of designing graphics for multiple Fortune 500 companies. The same would apply if you were a project manager. Instead of listing your duty as managing a particular project, you could describe how your successful management of a particular project led to a 6% increase in profit for that year.

How to list academic accomplishments

Academic accomplishments can be just as important as work-related accomplishments, and they’re especially useful if you don’t have any prior work experience to put on your resume. 

Here are some steps you can follow to list academic accomplishments on your resume:

1. First, decide which accomplishments are most relevant

Relevant accomplishments can date back to high school depending on the position you’re applying for, so be sure to consider any awards you may have won or organizations you were a part of. The trick is recognizing which accomplishments are actually valuable to recruiters. Generally, they’ll only be interested in accomplishments related to how you would perform as a worker. For example, winning a talent contest won’t mean much to recruiters, but winning a science fair might.

2. Then, decide where to include them on your resume

When listing academic accomplishments, it’s typically best to include them in the education section of your resume. For example, your resume may detail the name of your high school and the years you attended. Instead of mentioning Central High School 2003-2007, you could mention you went to Central High School 2003-2007, were named to the honor roll and were a member of the National Honor Society. The scope and significance of those accomplishments are self-evident to recruiters, but if your accomplishment is a bit more unknown such as winning an obscure award, be sure to detail the scope and rarity of the award in addition to its purpose.

When to list personal accomplishments

Personal accomplishments are outside of your typical work and academic achievements. Since the point of a resume is to capture what you’re like as a person, it can be beneficial to include these accomplishments, especially if you don’t have any work experience to reference. That doesn’t mean, however, that they deserve their own section. Like their work and academic counterparts, they’re best integrated into other sections. Personal accomplishments best fit in the skills section of your resume.

Remember that any personal accomplishments you list still need to be relevant to the job you’re applying for. By relating them to the skills useful for the position, you simultaneously offer reinforcement for your skills as well as insight into you as a person. For example, you may have backpacked across Europe. That would be relevant to include if you’re applying for a position involving international relations or education, as it highlights your worldly experience. Similarly, you could include something like winning a poker tournament if you’re applying for a trader job at an investment bank. Of course, some personal accomplishments are fairly easy to work in. If you’re trying to get hired as a personal trainer, mentioning that you’ve run several marathons is also relevant.