The 600 Best Strong Action Verbs to Power-up Your Resume (with Examples And Actionable Advice!)

Choices, choices, choices.

You have so many resume bullets and so many resume action verbs to choose from, how do you choose?

Resume action verbs aren’t anything new. In fact, there’s such an overabundance of articles on resume action verb lists that you might wonder what the point of this article even is.

Well, these resume action verb lists harm more than help because they don’t tell you:

1. How to use resume action verbs
2. When to use resume action verbs
3. Which resume action verbs to use

These lists randomly dump words on you and perpetuate the misconception that using fancy, complex resume action verbs will magically fix your resume that isn’t getting you job interviews. This couldn’t be further from the truth and wastes your time on low-value activities.

If you aren’t getting interviews, it’s not because of your resume action verb choice.

More likely, it’s because you aren’t (1) framing your story correctly, (2) expressing your accomplishments and/or professional experience in the right way, or (3) submitting a well-written cover letter. In particular, getting these three aspects right is critical to breaking into highly competitive career fields like investment banking, private equity, asset management, venture capital, hedge funds, and the like.

The goal of this article is to speed up your resume action verb choice so you can focus your time on other, higher-value resume activities like the ones I mentioned above.

Let’s jump in!

Best Practices For Using Resume Action Verbs

Common Mistakes That Tank Your Resume Bullets

When it comes to resume action verbs, I see clients consistently making the following mistakes:

1. Using the same resume action verbs over and over again next to each other.
2. Using complex resume action verbs vs. simpler ones.
3. Using resume action verbs that aren’t found in everyday common language.
4. Using a resume action verb that results in a “responsibility” bullet vs. an “achievement” bullet.
5. Spending too much time tinkering with their resume action verbs.

1. Using The Same Resume Action Verbs Over And Over Again Next To Each Other

Imagine you’re a recruiter for a second.

Scanning down a resume, you see the following:

• Increased annual recurring revenue by 100% by implementing a new distribution channel with the Asian market
• Increased daily active users by 50% through new promotional advertisements through Facebook
• Increased monthly active users by 25% by improving the first-time user experience within the first 100 levels of our flagship mobile game
• Increased our flagship product’s network traffic loads by 10% by signing on two major customers in the Americas
• Increased…

Doesn’t that look odd to you?

To the recruiter, it reads funny because the applicant keeps using the same resume action verb “Increased” repeatedly to begin each resume bullet.

Humans like new things.

We get bored fast. When you keep using the same word / sentence structure / etc., the recruiter will lose focus, and in the reject pile goes your resume. Especially for a resume with the above four impactful bullets, that’s a real shame.

So the solution is simple: Find simple synonyms of the resume action verbs that you’re repeating throughout your resume. A few rules of thumb:

• No consecutive resume bullets should have the exact same resume action verb
• You shouldn’t use the same resume action verb more than twice per page (and since most applicants use a one-page resume, you would only use the same resume action verb twice throughout your whole resume)
• When replacing copies of resume action verbs, remember, Keep It Simple Stupid; don’t turn into a thesaurus

So, taking the four resume bullet points above, I’d rewrite it into something like this:

• Doubled annual recurring revenue by implementing a new distribution channel with the Asian market
• Increased daily active users by 50% through new Facebook advertising campaigns
• Raised monthly active users by 25% by improving the first-time user experience within the first 100 levels of our flagship mobile game
• Expanded our flagship product’s network traffic loads by 10% by signing on two major customers in the Americas

Ah, much better. The bullets read much more naturally, and we’ve improved the general flow of the resume.

If you haven’t already, go back and scan your resume to catch any resume action verb repetition before your recruiter does!

2. Using Complex Resume Action Verbs Vs. Simpler Ones

Following along the lines of the first best practice, another common issue we find with clients is their propensity to use complex resume action verbs over simpler ones.

Less is more.

All else equal, you should always use simpler, shorter resume action verbs over longer, more complex ones. Why?

Because ultimately, what the recruiter cares about is the value you’ve delivered to previous employers (and by extension the value you could deliver to the recruiter’s firm), not how fancy your resume action verbs are.

When you use fancy resume action verbs, the recruiter has to invest more brainpower into parsing your mini-thesaurus of a resume, which distracts the recruiter from absorbing your professional experience and accomplishments.

This misallocation of attention is similar to giving a wrecked car a fresh coat of paint to make it look nicer on the outside vs. repairing the car’s destroyed engine. There’s no point in making your resume appear fancy if the underlying experience and accomplishments aren’t good or clear.

Some clients might argue that the fresh coat of paint / fancy resume action verbs make a good impression on the recruiter, but what it really does is frustrate the recruiter when they can’t understand what you’re trying to say.

Remember, your resume has six seconds to attract the recruiter’s attention. If your recruiter spends even one of those six seconds hung up on what “ameliorated” means, you’ve already shot yourself in the foot.

So again, less is more.

Here’s a comparison list of simple resume action verbs vs. their complex counterparts:

Simple

• Improved
• Scheduled
• Oversaw
• Led
• Assisted
• Rethought
• Launched
• Refreshed

Complex

• Ameliorated
• Calendared
• Officiated
• Coalesced
• Extricated
• Reconceptualized
• Debuted
• Rejuvenated

In our resume action verb database, we label which resume action verbs we find excessively complex or weird using a 1–2–3 weirdness rating system (with “3” the most normal and “1” the weirdest). You’ll want to avoid using any resume action verbs that fall into the “1” bucket.

3. Using Resume Action Verbs That Aren’t Found In Everyday Common Language

This mistake is a variation of the “Using complex resume action verbs vs. simpler ones” mistake above.

In this case, clients use old-timey, outdated resume action verbs that aren’t necessarily long or complex but just sound odd.

The rationale is that either:

1. The unusual resume action verbs will jump out at the recruiter.
2. They’ll look smarter to the recruiter since the resume action verb isn’t used in common, everyday language.

Whenever possible, use resume action verbs that everyday businesspeople use.

I understand the urge to get creative is strong, especially when the job application already limits your ability to stand out.

But where you should stand out is not in your resume action verb choice but rather in your story, professional experience, and accomplishments.

To give you an idea of what’s considered unusual or outdated, here’s a list comparing modern resume action verbs with their unusual and/or outdated counterparts:

Modern

• Joined
• Combined
• Helped
• Informed
• Organized
• Strove
• Resolved
• Launched

Old and/or Unusual

• Married
• Melded
• Abetted
• Apprised
• Codified
• Endeavored
• Harmonized
• Inaugurated

As mentioned above, in our resume action verb database, I mark which resume action verbs we consider are “weird” using a 1–2–3-point scale (with 3 = “Normal” and 1 = “Very Weird”). This scale factors in the modernness of the verb.

4. Using A Resume Action Verb That Results In A “Responsibility” Bullet Vs. An “Achievement” Bullet

As we’re always trying to emphasize to our clients, employers want to know how much money you can make them. You communicate this via your resume that’s filled with resume bullets that emphasize your accomplishments with the “achievement-results-action” format.

Most applicants overstuff their resume with “responsibility” bullet points that don’t tell the recruiter anything about their potential value-add.

And they start by shooting themselves in the foot with resume action verbs that suggest “responsibility” vs. “achievement.”

What do I mean by this?

Take for example the following two action verbs: “Analyzed” vs. “Increased.”

When you analyze something, what do you do?

You perform a specific task or responsibility, right? Such as the following:

• Analyzed marketing conversion rates and reported on large discrepancies daily to the executive team
• Analyzed media client’s asset database, determining total greenfield total addressable market (TAM) size of $500M
• Analyzed private equity client’s expense sheets and discovered cost-saving opportunities in the accounting and sales departments

By using the resume action verb “Analyzed,” you unintentionally confine yourself to a “responsibility-oriented’ resume bullet point format because “Analyzed” implies that you completed a task.

Now, that task itself might have resulted in positive impact, which you might frame in the following way:

• Analyzed marketing conversion rates and reported on large discrepancies daily to the executive team, which resulted in a 3-percentage point increase in return-on-ad spend (ROAS)

But if this is the case, then a better way would be to frame the bullet in this format, which forces you to use an “achievement-oriented” resume action verb:

• Increased return-on-ad-spend (ROAS) by 3-percentage points by analyzing marketing conversion rates and reporting large discrepancies daily to the executive team

Doing so brings your achievement to the front of the bullet, emphasizing the accomplishment vs. the task that you did.

As shown in the above example, using an “achievement-oriented” resume action verb also conditions you to write in such a way that is “results-first.” This method compels you to think about how to write your resume to call out your accomplishments rather than hide them behind tasks.

In our resume action verb database, we categorize the 600 resume action verbs into three categories, in order of positive impact to your resume:

1. Increased Revenue / Decreased Costs / Enhanced User Experience
2. Showed Leadership / Teamwork
3. Performed Analysis / Completed Some Task

You should strive to use resume action verbs that fall into the first bucket (increasing revenue / decreasing costs / enhancing the user experience) because they structure your resume bullets to showcase your impact.

As plenty of roles require demonstrated leadership and teamwork (which you imply with resume bullet points that highlight your impact), you should also sprinkle in some resume action verbs from the second bucket, showing such leadership and teamwork.

Technically, these resume action verbs are “responsibility-oriented,” which doesn’t make them as powerful as resume action verbs from the first bucket, but they can lead to some powerful resume bullets you can use…:

1. …to add some variety in resume bullet point types (rather than having every resume bullet point be impact / ”achievement-oriented”).
2. …as a second-choice when you’re running out of “achievement-oriented” resume bullets to write.

You should avoid choosing resume action verbs from the third bucket, performing analysis and/or completing some task.

While also “responsibility-oriented” resume action verbs like those of the second bucket, they don’t have the added benefit of demonstrating leadership / teamwork that the recruiter will perceive positively.

Clients have argued for the use of resume action verbs in the third bucket. They cite that certain job postings have requirements that call for the specific ability to perform certain tasks; therefore, they need to use these “responsibility-oriented” bullets.

My counter to this argument is: Show, don’t tell.

Rather than explicitly telling the recruiter that you can perform task X as the job posting requires, show the recruiter you can do it by citing the impact you made as a result of performing task X.

Here’s a quick example. Suppose a job posting at Microsoft requires at least intermediate knowledge of SQL. The following resume bullet is what “weaving the task into the impact you made” looks like:

• Increased monthly recurring revenue by 15% by analyzing sales lead times in the CRM database with SQL

Here’s what using just a “Performed Analysis / Completed Some Task” resume action verb looks like:

• Used SQL to analyze sales lead times in the CRM database

Can you feel the difference? I can guarantee you that the first version made a far better impression on the recruiter than the second version.

So, to summarize, prioritize using the resume action verbs in our database below in the following bucket order:

1. Increased Revenue / Decreased Costs / Enhanced User Experience
2. Showed Leadership / Teamwork
3. Performed Analysis / Completed Some Task

5. Spending Too Much Time Tinkering With Their Resume Action Verbs

OK, so we’ve talked quite a lot about the resume action verb mistakes you should avoid, but we haven’t talked about the biggest one of all.

Spending too much time tinkering with resume action verbs.

Don’t spend too much time in this department. Realistically, there’s a shortlist of 20–30 resume action verbs you should use, with the majority of them falling into the “Increased Revenue / Decreased Costs / Enhanced User Experience” and “Showed Leadership / Teamwork” categories.

To begin, in our database below, start by filtering for “3”-rated Impact and Weirdness resume action verbs and remove verbs that fall into the “Performed Analysis / Completed Some Task” bucket. If you’d like, you can try exploring some resume action verbs that are “more creative” by filtering for the resume action verbs with a “2” rating in either the Impact or Weirdness categories. But avoid anything rated a “1.”

If you find yourself spending more than an hour or two tinkering with resume action verbs, you’ve spent too much time here. Pick a resume action verb from the ~20 out of 600 verbs that are rated “3” in both Impact and Weirdness and that also don’t fall into the “Performed Analysis / Completed Some Task” bucket, and move on.

Here’s What You Should Be Doing

Now that we’ve covered common resume action verb mistakes, here’s a quick summary of what you should do:

1. DO vary the resume action verbs you use in your resume.
2. DO use simpler resume action verbs vs. complex ones.
3. DO use modern resume action verbs vs. outdated ones.
4. DO use “achievement-oriented” resume action verbs vs. “responsibility-oriented” ones.
5. DO spend only an hour or two on fixing the action verbs in your resume, then move on.

Examples of Resume Action Verbs In Action!

To really drive this point home, I’ve included below two lists with ten examples each, one with great resume action verb usage and one with poor resume action verb usage. For each example, I’ve bolded the resume action verb.

Based on what we discussed above, see if you can spot what makes each of the 20 resume bullets below a great vs. poor example of resume action verb usage!

Ten Examples of Great Resume Action Verb Usage

1. Accelerated feature deployment timelines by 26% by transitioning to an Agile process and implementing retrospectives and sprint planning
2. Increased overall annual revenue by $300K by launching a partnership feature with a major organic foods brand
3. Drove 200K incremental daily active users within the first 30 days of launch by managing the development of the mobile version of our flagship game
4. Decreased cost of goods sold by 15% by exploring new supply chains in the Asian and Eastern European markets
5. Achieved a tripling of network traffic in the Asian markets by managing the launch of three variants of our cloud products
6. Led a team of 5 product managers to build our cloud product portfolio to expand into the South American markets, which resulted in first-year revenues of $100M
7. Raised $10K in donor funds for the American Red Cross through the annual Cross Drivers fundraising event
8. Headed the China product team, launching 35+ new features that increased revenues by $50M in the past year
9. Founded an online real estate investment platform that generated first-year investment volume of $100K with 1K+ DAU
10. Elevated monthly customers served by 25% after launching 6 API integrations that expanded us into 2 new verticals

Ten Examples of Poor Resume Action Verb Usage

1. Ameliorated tensions between the design and product teams by scheduling weekly alignment meetings to resolve differences
2. Instilled Agile development processes within the engineering team that led to significantly faster development times
3. Bestowed 3 mentees with training in Excel and PowerPoint; all 3 interns eventually received return offers
4. Diminished meeting time across the team by 30% by implementing meeting-free Fridays and forcing meeting organizers to create agendas for each meeting
5. Teamed up with 30 engineers to build the product MVP that captured 100 customer sign-ups in the first day of launch
6. Slashed marketing spend by 10% while maintaining return-on-ad-spend at normal levels by reallocating spend toward only the highest ROI campaigns
7. Debugged issues in the client related to implementation of interstitial ads and reconceptualized backlog prioritization with a prioritization framework
8. Audited 50 clients’ financial statements and discovered discrepancies for 30 clients, which helped them avoid IRS audits
9. Repositioned the African division’s go-to-market strategy from company size-focused to vertical-focused based on evidence from analyzing proprietary data suggesting additional granularity needs
10. Tabulated over 350K inventory items into product categories that sped up delivery times and optimized the main site’s search engine optimization

VarsityResumes’s 600-word Resume Action Verb Database

Below, you can find our comprehensive database of 600 resume action verbs. I’ve categorized the verbs using the following criteria:

1. Impact (1–3, 3 = Best): A measure that describes how much the resume action verb highlights your value-add. Recall that the right resume action verb structures whether your resume bullet will become “responsibility-oriented” or “achievement-oriented.” Ideally, only select resume action verbs that are a “3” for impact.
2. Weirdness (1–3, 3 = Best): A measure that describes how commonly used the resume action verb is. You want to select resume action verbs that everyday businesspeople use, i.e., verbs that won’t distract your recruiter from absorbing your accomplishments. Ideally, only select resume action verbs that are a “3” for weirdness (least weird).
3. Type: I’ve labeled the resume action verbs as either task-based, leadership-based, or revenue/cost/other metric-based. Start your resume bullets mostly with resume action verbs that are revenue/cost/other metric-based as they’ll highlight your achievements the best. Sprinkle in some leadership-based resume action verbs to add some diversity to your resume bullets. Minimize your use of task-based resume action verbs as they don’t add highlight your value-add.

To use the database, simply filter using the dropdowns across Impact, Weirdness, and Type, and the table below will update automatically.

Click HERE to access the database on our website!

Final Thoughts

Picking the right resume action verb can make or break your resume bullet points. They’re the first word your recruiter reads for each bullet, and they signal whether the resume bullet will be “responsibility-oriented” or “accomplishment-oriented.”

With that said, the best practices for choosing the right resume action verbs aren’t complex. Follow these guidelines:

1. DO vary the resume action verbs you use in your resume.
2. DO use simpler resume action verbs vs. complex ones.
3. DO use modern resume action verbs vs. outdated ones.
4. DO use “achievement-oriented” resume action verbs vs. “responsibility-oriented” ones.
5. DO spend only an hour or two on fixing the action verbs in your resume, then move on.

Shortlist the best resume action verbs using our database and quickly replace weak verbs. Then, move on to the higher impact items for improving your resume, such as honing your story, gaining relevant experience, and increasing the impact of your accomplishments.

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