What specific return on investment does your candidacy offer to employers and why should they hire you? The idea behind the term “Why-Buy-ROI” was coined by branding expert Deb Dib and represents a simple formula you can use to showcase your career brand succinctly and powerfully in all facets of your executive job search, including your resume, Executive Bio, and Linkedin Profile.

Why Buy

The first step is to consider why an employer should hire you and this question requires a well-though-out answer, not a vague one. You must be specific in your answer, so specific that your response couldn’t possibly be the same as most, if any other applicants for the job in question. The key is to focus on your personality, values, and intangibles that make you the right fit for the job and demonstrate how you will achieve the results in the second part of the formula.

For example, rather than saying that you are a turnaround specialist (much too generic), you could say that you:

I leverage the 3 Ps (processes, people, and productivity) to strategize and drive performance turnarounds in the technology space.

ROI

In many ways this is the easy part of the formula because it’s all about the numbers or quantifiable impacts your career has had on the employers you’ve worked for. How have you influenced sales, revenue, or profitability? How have you improved productivity or efficiency? How much money have you saved or how much in costs have you averted? What problems does your industry face and how have you solved them?

The goal here is not to include all of these details, that’s what your resume is for. Your Why-Buy-ROI is but one small element of your brand, although a critical piece of the overall pie. What you want to achieve in the ROI portion is to hone in on your single strongest and best impact. Your signature impact. And you will want to showcase this impact in its most powerful form.

For instance, if your strongest impact is that you have turned around profitability from -$400M to +$1.5B, you could say:

I propel $400M operational losses to $1B+ in profitability.

Now let’s put the Why-Buy-ROI together into one powerful statement:

I propel $400M operational losses to $1B+ in profitability by leveraging the 3 Ps (processes, people, and productivity) to strategize and drive performance turnarounds in the technology space.

How much more powerful is a statement like this one when compared with the generic “I’m a turnaround specialist” your fellow candidates will have on their resume, executive bio, or LinkedIn profile?