Resumes: Resume Writing Tips: Feature / Accomplishment / Benefit Resumes

FAB Presentation

In presenting you to prospective employers it is our objective to have you stand above the other candidates. We want to give the employer as many reasons as possible to want to interview and hire you...not reasons to reject you. Since MRI started in business in 1957, we've learned a lot about why an employer will interview or reject a candidate. One of the things we've learned is that a resume, more often than not, results in more rejections than interviews. Because of this we seldom send a resume to a prospective employer.

When we present your background and experience to an employer, we want to show how your employment will benefit both the organization and the employer as an individual. We want to demonstrate how you can help improve profits, reduce costs and simply make things run better.

MRI has developed the Feature/Accomplishment/
Benefit presentation - (FAB for short) - to use in presenting your background and experience to an employer. In some instances we will send it to a prospective employer in place of a resume. The FAB presentation does several important things. It shows specifically what you can do for the employer - how you will benefit him/her and the organization. It details what you have accomplished in your current and previous jobs. Finally, it highlights your unique features and experiences. It is completely job related and does not contain information that, all too frequently, is used to disqualify a candidate.

To do a good job on the FAB presentation you will want to block out a couple of hours of uninterrupted work time. This will allow you to develop a FAB presentation you can use to present to prospective employers. The return on investment time will be significant. It will help obtain the right career opportunity.

How do you prepare a FAB presentation? Let's start first by defining some terms:

Feature - A fact about yourself.

For example: 8 years supervisory experience; Licensed Engineer in California; BS in Accounting and an MBA in Finance. It's the experience you have. Features are factual and objective.

Accomplishment - A significant result you obtained for your current or past employers. Accomplishments are stated in very specific language and include quantitative measures and time frames.

For example: Reduced scrap by 15% in 6 months through improved raw material inspection; Increased sales by 18% in 1 year by reopening inactive accounts; Increased profits by 22% in 1 year through better utilization of existing equipment and labor.

Benefit - Concrete examples of what you can do for a new employer.

For example: Reduce turnover by 10%; Increase sales by 20%; Increase new account by 10%; Be able to contribute almost immediately because you don't require a long training period. Your features and accomplishments are the proof you can deliver on the promised benefits to the new employer.