How to Write Resume Bullet Points

Start with a verb that says what you did, name what you did it to, and end with the result. A weak bullet often stops after the second part.

Here is one bullet split into those parts: "Cut first-response time on support tickets from 2 days to 6 hours by setting up a daily triage rota." The numbers are illustrative.

Not every bullet needs a number. Aim to put one in about half of your bullets, including the first bullet under each job. The guide to quantifying achievements shows how to find numbers when nobody tracked your work.

The numbers below are illustrations. Use your own, and make sure you can explain where each one comes from. The same three parts work for a project entry, as the projects section guide shows.

The opening verb tells the reader how much of the work was yours. "Assisted with" says you supported someone else. "Built" or "Delivered" says you did the work. "Led" says other people worked under your direction. Use the strongest verb that is accurate, because an interviewer can ask what you did and your answer needs to match it.

Openers such as "Worked on", "Helped", "Responsible for" and "Used" describe your connection to the work instead of the work. Replace them with what you did.

The STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Result) is designed for interview answers. On a resume, keep the Action and the Result and cut the rest. Keep the situation only when it is what makes the result impressive, such as a hard deadline.

Passive voice leaves out who did the action, and on your resume that person is you. Look for a form of "to be" (was, were, been) followed by a verb such as "rebuilt" or "provided": "The system was rebuilt", "Training was provided".

Passive voice fits when someone else made the decision and that is what you want to show, as in "Selected as one of 4 engineers from a team of 60".

Keep each bullet to one or two lines, roughly 15 to 30 words. If a bullet runs longer, cut the explanation of why the work was needed and keep the action and the result. The ATS checker flags bullets over 34 words. It also warns when more than a third of your bullets are under six words, since a bullet that short rarely has room for both an action and a result.

Remove "I", "my" and "we", filler such as "successfully" or "was able to", and a trailing "etc.". The pre-submission checklist includes these and the other checks to make before you apply.

Give recent and relevant jobs more bullets and older jobs fewer. If a job produced one achievement worth listing, write one bullet for it instead of three weaker ones.

The ATS checker flags any job with more than seven bullets. If several of your jobs involved similar work, describe the difference in scale or results. The builder's Duplicate Detector flags bullets that are nearly identical. The sections around your bullets, such as the summary and skills, each have a guide in the guide library.

The Bullet Improver checks each bullet for 28 weak-verb and filler patterns, a list of 30 overused phrases, passive voice, first-person pronouns and a missing number. When a fix only needs different wording, such as a stronger opening verb, it rewrites the bullet. When the fix needs a fact only you know, such as the size of a result, it gives you a template with a blank and leaves the number to you.