How to Say You Trained Someone on Your Resume

Every job in every industry will have a method for making sure staff knows how to perform the functions of their role. If you've overseen the training of another person, it should show up on your resume.

Training others may be something that's required in your next job. You might question whether you should include training, coaching, and mentoring other staff members on your resume if the word “Trainer” wasn't in your title. The answer is an emphatic “yes!”

Even if it isn't specifically requested, you should include it in your resume simply because it's a great way to showcase several soft skills, including communication, leadership, patience, and resiliency.

Training, coaching, and mentoring new and existing staff can be challenging. Learning curves vary from person to person. Sometimes you have to train someone differently than you train others just to ensure the knowledge you're trying to pass on is retained.

How you say that you trained someone on your resume is critical to imparting relevant skills.

What does it mean to train someone?

Training another person could encompass working one-on-one with that individual to ensure they know how to perform their job. You could also work with a group of people. Other times you may simply coach a person through a single situation or mentor a group of new hires.

Training others could involve no actual contact with people. Perhaps you were appointed by some leader to create a training curriculum or build some learning materials for people to use. Anything that you do to advance the career success of someone else falls under the training umbrella.

Before you write “I trained others” on your resume, read the job description

It can be tempting to add a bullet on your resume that mentions training employees, but you should avoid doing that before reading the job description for the new job you want. You have to root out whether the new company wants you to onboard new staff members or revamp existing training protocols. Once you discover their needs, you can inject the appropriate keywords into your resume so you can get past the Applicant Tracking System.

Where to put training experience on your resume

It doesn't matter if you're writing a reverse-chronological or a hybrid resume; it should contain at least these five sections:

Contact information
Professional summary
Skills
Work history
Education

You can indicate a history of training employees in four of the five sections. As you write the text, remember to show action and achievement–you want to come across as an achiever, not simply a doer.

Talk about training others in your professional summary

The professional summary can consist of up to three parts, depending on the type of resume: your title, branding statement, and a summary paragraph. Generally, an executive resume will have a branding statement, while non-executive resumes exclude this part. Either way, you could incorporate text about training, coaching, and mentoring staff in the branding statement or in the paragraph.

Every sentence in the summary paragraph begins with an assumptive “I.” So, to ensure grammatical correctness, start the sentences with a verb that fits within the first person, present tense. For example:

“Taught 15 new hires the processes and procedures surrounding order entry, reducing their time to the floor by 33%.”

In alignment with resume best practices, you want to include at least one measurable achievement in the summary paragraph of your resume. This sentence would fit that bill.

List your ability to train staff in the skills section

The skills section, sometimes called “Core Competencies,” is a list of things you know how to do in alignment with what the new company seeks. It should contain no more than 12-15 skill sets. Here are some examples of phrases you could use to insert training staff into your skills section:

Team Training | Learning Management | Staff Development | New Hire Onboarding

This is the simplest place to add training experience, which means you shouldn't only add it here. Adding the skill to a list of other skills is a missed opportunity to show action.

Write bullets about training employees in your work history

The best place to expound on your ability to train other employees is in the work history section. You can put multiple bullets about things you accomplished that stewarded the career success of others. Again, start each bullet with an action verb and mention a result.

PRO TIP: Use the STAR method when writing bullets in the experience section of your resume just like you would when answering behavioral interview questions.

Here are some sample bullets you might include to describe your experience training employees:

Trained a group of 25 procurement analysts on inventory management controls, reducing SKU rationalization errors by 68%.
Coached a 16-person project management team to analyze requests for proposals (RFPs), stewarding the promotion of three to higher roles.
Mentored 5 interns on workflows and company policy, resulting in all being onboarded to permanent positions.
Reviewed existing training documentation to identify inefficiencies and revamped 3 onboarding systems to shorten the learning curve of new hires.
Defined performance standards and built 5 new reports standardizing the employee review process.

Include training certifications and professional development in the education section

Perhaps you have a limited history of training staff or working on learning materials, but you've completed coursework that allowed you to gain knowledge of how to do these things. That's okay. Everyone has to start somewhere. Including coursework and certifications in your education section allows hiring managers to know you just need a little practice.

In conclusion

Even if you didn't possess the title of Trainer in a previous role, you can still talk about your ability to train employees on your resume. Always use action and results so that hiring managers know what you will bring to their company.

TopResume understands that talking about achievements can be difficult. No one wants to be seen as boastful. Reach out to our expert team of resume writers to help build your achievement-based resume.