What You Learned: Moving Up
Stop just reporting tasks. Start showing the Business Result of what you did by measuring the impact of every success.
Make your pitch about being the Solution to the company's specific problems, not just listing your past roles.
Instead of avoiding tough spots, show you are a Strong Leader who can handle confusion and learned important lessons from tricky decisions.
Be a Future Planner, not just someone who tells history. Group your experience into three main areas of value that show you consistently do great work.
The best people focus on their direction. End every work story by linking your past successes to the Future Success you will bring to the listener.
The Important Goal
The High-Stakes Goal is key to staying valuable in today's job market. Most people get stuck in the Trap of Just Reading Their Resume. They talk about what they already did instead of showing what they will do. They think a list of past jobs is the same as showing a path to future success. This is a mistake. It shows you are not in control of your career; you are just watching it happen.
Great careers grow in three steps. First, you need to show Proof You Can Do the Job, proving you can handle the basic tasks.
Next, you move to Proof You Made a Difference, where you focus on the money made or the problems solved.
The highest level is Building Your Influence. Here, your worth isn't just what you do personally. It's about using your power and knowledge to guide the company through market changes. You aren't just reporting on your work; you are deciding the company's direction.
To get better than the usual way, you must change from someone who just does tasks to a smart checker of value.
Checking Your Professional Story: From Reading Your Resume to Leading the Business
This check helps serious professionals see if their story is stuck in The Past (just reporting what happened) or if they have reached Top Level Skill (shaping the future). Top leaders know their real value isn't just what they did, but the power they built inside the company.
| What You Focus On | Warning Sign (Level 1-2) | Good Sign (Top Level) |
|---|---|---|
| Focusing on Volume: | How You Show Success Listing finished projects, how many people you managed, or busy-work numbers that show activity, not real results. | Making the Company Stronger & More Flexible Numbers that prove you made the company luckier—making it cheaper to fail, faster to change direction, or harder for others to compete against. |
| Just Working with Others: | Your Connections Talking about your contacts as just people you needed to get your tasks approved inside your own small area. | Connecting Different Teams Showing you are the middle person who connects powerful groups (like Sales and Legal). You solve arguments between teams before they cost money. |
| Relying on Too Much Detail: | How You Talk Explaining too much about the technical details ("the how") to prove you're safe to hire. This makes you sound like an operator who needs constant managing. | Simplifying Big Ideas & Hard Choices Boiling down complex issues into simple choices. You stop explaining how the device works and start explaining what time it is for the industry, showing your way is the only way forward. |
| Just Following the Plan: | Long-Term Plans Making your career sound like you just did what other people told you to do. You prove you're a great passenger, but not the driver. | Your Plan for the Market's Future Showing your career moves were smart guesses about where the industry was headed. You don't just get jobs; you put yourself where success will happen, showing you saw the shift early. |
What Your Story Means
- Easily Replaced Asset If your story has many Warning Signs: You are seen as an Easily Replaced Asset. You are hired for the time you spend working, meaning you will always be competing on salary and risk burning out.
- Key Company Structure If your story matches the Good Signs: You are seen as Key Company Structure. You are being kept on, not just hired. The company isn't buying your time; they are buying your good judgment and your ability to handle risks they haven't even worried about yet.
The Basics (Starting Out to Junior Roles)
When you are starting out, telling your story isn't about being creative; it's about following rules. Success is about Following Directions. You must meet the Basic Requirements of professional talk. At this level, your story either fits the structure and is accepted, or it's messy and rejected. There's no room for style until the basic structure is proven.
Rule: Stick to the Order
Use the strict Sequence: What was the Situation, what did you Do, and what was the Result (SAR). Check: Was there a clear cause and effect? The rules require a clear link between what happened and the outcome.
Rule: Remove Opinions
Take out words like "excited" or "expert." Replace them with specific tools and how long you used them (e.g., "Used Python for 12 months"). Check: Can this be proven? Stories that can't be checked are seen as low-quality.
Rule: Keep it Under One Minute
Your main professional summary must take less than a minute to say without leaving out key technical facts. Check: Do people lose interest? If you take too long, you fail the test.
The Pro (Mid-Level to Senior)
Now, your story needs to change from just doing the work to managing the process. Being good at your job is the minimum requirement. To stand out as a Pro, you must show you clearly see the company's internal problems—the hidden things that slow down progress—and how you fix them to solve big business issues. You aren't just doing tasks; you are guiding through tough situations.
Business Result: What's the Point?
Your story shouldn't just list projects; it must explain the financial or strategic result of your actions. Talk about your success in terms of saving money, making money, or helping the company's position in the market.
Work Skill: Building Systems, Not Just Fixing Fires
Pros don't just fix problems; they stop them from happening again. Your story should focus on how you found a repeating "pain point" (a recurring issue) and put in the rules or process fixes to prevent it from coming back. This moves the company from guessing to planning ahead.
Teamwork Context: Being the Connector
A mid-level to senior leader knows that departments don't work alone. Your story must show you can understand what other departments (Sales, Product, Finance) want and get them to work toward the same thing. This shows you know the hidden company politics and can work through them.
Mastery (Lead to Top Executive)
At the top level, your story must go beyond just doing specific jobs. The Board and the highest leaders don't care about your official duties; they care about your Return on Investment (ROI) and the strength of your Company Connections. Your story is no longer about what you manage, but what you create. You are moving from telling stories about your own work to stories about guiding the whole company and positioning it in the market.
Using Political Power Wisely
Tell stories about the "Hidden Wins." Talk about how you managed difficult people and got different groups to agree. Explain how you used your standing to solve major arguments before they cost the company money.
Balancing Growth and Safety
Top stories show you know when the economy is good or bad. Change your story between Growing Fast (pushing forward) and Defending (handling risks). Your past should show smart moves: "When things were unstable, I protected the main business; when things were stable, I expanded into new areas."
Making Your Impact Last
The best sign is proving your work will continue after you leave. Focus on the structures and the people you trained (your "multipliers"). Show how you built expertise into the company's foundation, proving you left behind lasting value.
Get Better at Storytelling: How to Build Your Professional Story with Cruit
For Proof and Recent Events Journaling Tool
A coach powered by AI to help you write down your successes as they happen, creating a history of your professional life you can search.
For Showing Real Impact Resume Tool
An interactive guide to help you find numbers that prove your results and format your stories into strong, action-focused points.
For How You Deliver It Interview Practice Tool
Use models like STAR to structure your stories and practice talking to an AI coach to make sure you sound very clear.
Handling the Story Change
If my job doesn't track sales numbers, how can I show "Evidence of Impact"?
Impact doesn't always mean money; it means getting rid of roadblocks. If you can't show revenue growth, check your "efficiency return." Show how you made things run smoother, fixed old technical problems, or got teams working together better. When you talk about the problem you fixed instead of just the task you finished, you change from being a cost to being a source of value. Without big company numbers, your "Evidence of Impact" is the clear change from the mess you started with to the order you created.
Won't recruiters be confused if I don't give them a clear timeline of my past jobs?
You aren't erasing your history; you are organizing it differently. Recruiters don't want a script of your old duties; they want a prediction of your future success. By changing from a step-by-step list of what you did to a clear plan of your skills, impact, and influence, you give them the "High-Stakes Goal" they really need. You aren't making it harder for them to see the past; you are making it easier for them to see what you can do next.
Is the "Building Influence" stage only for CEOs and top executives?
Influence is a way of thinking, not just a title. Even people in middle management need to show they can handle company politics and manage people with power to be considered for promotion. If your story stays at the basic "Can I do the job?" level, you'll be treated like a standard hire. By using the "Building Influence" ideas early—focusing on how your work fits market trends and the company's long-term worth—you show you are already ready for the next step. You stop being someone who just "manages" the idea and start being someone who helps "guide" it.
From Asking for a Job to Leading the Way
To escape just summarizing your past jobs, you must treat your work history as something to analyze for the future. Changing from someone who just waits to be approved to a Leader requires a big change in how you see things. You are no longer just writing down the past; you are building a line of value that proves you can lower risks, fix problems, and lead important people.
By accepting The High-Stakes Goal, you stop just watching your career and start designing it. You move past just trying to be "good enough" and reach a point where you are "needed," connecting your skills not to what happened, but to where the market is going.
