Contextualize everything!

TalentGeist Newsletter

Immediately-actionable career insights for ambitious individuals.

Read time: 2-3 minutes

Kicking off the newsletter with one of the highest ROI (return-on-investment) things you can do to improve your comms — contextualize everything.

What I mean by this — for most achievements in your academic / professional life, you need to provide a clear benchmark for others to understand the true magnitude. Let’s take the following statement:

“I increased the company’s revenue by 10%.”

Well…..did you do a good job?

It might sound positive, but we don’t know for sure. It depends.

😶 For example, if all your predecessors or peers managed to increase the revenue by, say, 15%, what you’ve done might not be that impressive.

😊 Vice versa — if you’re the only person in the company’s recent history to bring the revenue up this much, perhaps you are a superstar……and deserve that promotion.

The simple logic applies to the vast majority of statements. “I got a B+ in math class” — did everyone else make lower than you (in which case even a B+ can be interpreted to be 'impressive’), or were you the bottom of the class?

Here are some examples where you can immediately apply this concept:

1) In your job candidacy profile (resume, interviews, networking chats, etc.)

❌ GPA: 3.2 / 4.0

✅ GPA: 3.2 / 4.0 (top 5% of cohort; First Class Honours)

❌ Won Harvard Leadership Award

✅ Won Harvard Leadership Award (top 1% of cohort in leadership impact)

❌ Earned Goldman Sachs return offer

✅ Earned Goldman Sachs return offer (2 of 10 interns receive offer)

❌ Increased Product X adoption by 10% year-on-year

✅ Increased Product X adoption by 10% year-on-year (the highest single-year increase in Product X history)

2) In your work presentations / conversations

❌ Hey boss……our stock price dropped by 8% in the past quarter…..are we screwed?

 ✅ Hey boss…..our stock price dropped by 8% in the past quarter, which actually makes us better off vs. the market overall (10% drop), and our other Big Tech competitors (11% drop).

❌ We closed the quarter at $10M revenue.

 ✅ We closed the quarter at $10M revenue, which is 20% above target (the highest surpassing of target in recent history).

Action item: don’t just read and forget. Take 60 seconds to think about 1-2 places in your own life (whether it’s your resume, work presentation, etc.) where you can actively apply this concept to make your argumentation stronger, and communication better.

Subscribe 💪, or forward this to 1 friend/colleague who will thank you. 5 forwards, and I buy you coffee (plus you get a 1-on-1 with me :))

Until next time,

Vincent (LinkedIn)