A Guide to Using Action Verbs

If you want to make your resume stronger or to make boring sentences more impressive, you should certainly try to use more action verbs. These verbs are positive, active, and impactful, which is why they make your resume more interesting for a potential employer. Learn how to use action verbs in writing with this guide at writers-house.com blog.

Learn to Use Action Verbs

1. First, you should understand the purpose of action verbs. Action verbs describe something that has been done. For example, you can use them when talking about your achievements. In business writing, action verbs make sentences easier to understand and more concise.

• You should choose action verbs carefully. Make sure that the chosen verb actually fits your phrase. If you choose the wrong word, you can confuse your readers without giving them a clear understanding of what you’re describing. Make sure that you perfectly understand the meaning of the action verb before you use it in writing.
• There are action verbs, such as “illuminate,” “illustrate,” and “reveal,” which can be used instead of “show.” However, such action verbs as “compare,” “analyze,” and “evaluate,” have different meanings and must be used in the right context.

2. When writing the first draft, you may often use weak or simple verbs, such as “do,” “show,” “think,” etc. These verbs are clear but if you use them too often, your writing will look generic. In addition, these words are not strong enough to describe achievements and credentials. We recommend that you replace these weak verbs with action verbs to make your writing more persuasive. Employers will certainly appreciate a resume that highlights your strong sides in a concise and informative manner. For example, you can say “coordinated timelines and schedules” instead of “put together timelines and schedules,” or “supervised and organized the service” instead of “ran the service.”

3. Action verbs can help you avoid using the passive voice. When you use the passive voice, the subject is being acted upon instead of performing the action. The passive voice implies using such weak verbs as “had” or “was.” In addition, objects and subjects are flipped in passive sentences. The passive voice is grammatically correct but it makes you sound weak and too formal. Active verbs can help you change passive sentences. For instance, instead of saying “a poll was conducted by me,” you can say “I created and conducted a poll.”

Use Action Verbs

1. Add action verbs to your resume. List your abilities and skills using simple words, then read this list and replace them with action verbs. For example, you may replace such words as “completed,” “worked,” “talked” with “responded,” “coordinated,” “processed,” “communicated,” “balanced,” etc.

2. Choose skill specific verbs. Different skills will benefit from different verbs. Here are some useful examples:

• when describing communication skills, you may use the following words:
  interpreted, negotiated, advocated, coordinated, clarified;
• when describing service skills, use these words:
  performed, trained, facilitated, volunteered, assisted;
• when describing your technical skills, use the following verbs:
  engineered, designed, assembled, programmed, calculated;
• when describing creative skills, use these verbs:
  presented, composed, introduced, established, created;
• when describing research skills, use the following words:
  collected, examined, surveyed, identified, measured, analyzed;
• when describing leadership and management skills, use these words:
  implemented, attained, supervised, motivated, achieved, managed, organized.

3. Use action verbs to avoid passive language. Read your paper and identify the sections that contain the passive voice. Look for such words as “was,” “has been,” and “had.” Quite often, they are used in passive phrases.