An Easy Way to Express Your Personal Brand in Your Resume

Ready to convey your effectiveness and ROI to employers?

Expressing your personal brand in your resume is easier than you might think.

The trick? Think in terms of headlines.

Headlines, or taglines, in executive resumes are a simple concept that can help you write about yourself, helping steer readers toward notable accomplishments that prove your value.

Try these headline tips to inject your executive resume with a dose of power and confidence:

1 – Add a resume section headline showing your reputation for results.

As shown in this award-winning CFO resume, this headline shows career goals and successes in a single glance:

Senior Executive Team Member Enabling Triple Revenue & Profit Results in 4 Years

You can easily do this for yourself by stringing together your job function (President, IT Director, COO, etc.), along with a short description of your performance (Leading Sales Growth, Delivering On-Time Projects).

After writing your headline, simply place it under your career goal (CFO, in this case) to expand on your worth as a leader, as in these examples:

Managing Director – CEO:  Executive Leader for Multinational Portfolio Companies

Business Development Executive:  Sales Driver Behind Millions in Revenue

2 – Group achievements under an employer-specific headline.

In the same CFO resume, these sentences direct the eye to specific achievements:

Building Pro Plus: CFO Enabling Peak Profitability With Sharply Reduced Costs

Sam’s Club & Wal-Mart: Multi-Divisional CFP Championing Card Portfolio & Cash Improvements

These headlines, unlike the main one described in the first tip, are company-specific and point to the wealth of achievements attained in each position.

Consider grouping a list of success stories for each job under this type of headline, using a similar formula (Company: Job Title and Achievements), as shown in these examples:

Operations Director Stabilizing Manufacturing Plants & Empowering Teams

Hotel GM Delivering 145% EBITDA Increase Through Capital Improvements

3 – Supply a headline for each group of success stories in your career.

Keep on adding headlines to simplify each group of bullets… writing the sentences first, then a headline such as these examples for a senior executive:

Steered Operation to Rapid Profits From Across-The-Board Cost Savings

Set Stage for Growth by Eliciting Excellence in Team Performance

A sales executive who increased market share could add this headline

Displaced Competition in Named Accounts With New Customer Relationships

In other words, keep your headline simple and related to the successes you want to emphasize.

In summary, headlines can be placed in multiple sections of your executive resume to help guide employers to relevant content.

In doing so, you’ll be able to easily highlight a strong personal brand message, help employers navigate your career path, and distinguish yourself as a leadership candidate.