5 steps to successfully implementing the CAR model
Category: Tips and Advice
Publish date: 05/01/2022
To help think through what you offer a civilian employer, we recommend spending some time exploring your past achievements in detail. In doing so you’ll gain a more detailed insight into your transferable skills, and be able to market them and your experiences more effectively to recruiters and employers.
Here are 5 steps to creating an impactful CAR story:
1. Identify the challenge Write 2 or 3 lines introducing the specific situation or problem. What were you asked to do? What needed to be done? What did you want to change or improve?
2. List your actions Identify all the things you did to meet the challenge. Start at the beginning and think about everything you did, no matter how simple it seemed to you – the more detail, the better.
3. Identify your skills Think about the skills that you used in each of your actions. Whether you needed to listen to your colleagues, analyse a situation or motivate team members – remember that soft skills are highly sought after and should be highlighted.
4. Establish the result Write down a summary of what happened because of all the actions you took and think about what determined their success – i.e. saving money or time, making improvements, developing cohesive teams, and being adaptable to changing situations. Where possible, quantify your results: how much did you save, how big was the improvement, how effective were your team, and how quickly did you adapt?
5. Reflect on your actions Write down what you would do differently in that situation now or what you now do in a different way as a result. This will showcase what you learnt from the situation and how you’re able to adapt your way of working to the ever-changing civilian environment.
It’s important that you use tangible and quantifiable information throughout your CV to highlight the impact you’ve had while serving; remembering that many of the skills you’ll be showcasing will be transferable to the role you’re applying for. And the CAR model is a great place to demonstrate the impact of those skills.