Capturing Impact

Two formats for telling the story of what you did — one short, one detailed.

Try It

The cadences on Reflection Practice tell you what to write about. These two formats are how to actually write it, when the goal is telling the story of what you did.

1

SBI (Situation-Behavior-Impact)

Originally built for giving feedback, but works just as well for telling your own story — the quick, interview-ready version of an accomplishment. Think of the moment someone asks "tell me about a time you..." and you have thirty seconds to answer well:

  • Situation — set the scene in one sentence: what was going on?
  • Behavior — what did you specifically do? Own it — "I," not "we."
  • Impact — why did it matter, to the outcome, the team, or the business?
2

STARR (Situation-Task-Action-Result-Reflection)

An extension of the classic STAR interview format, with a Reflection step added — useful for documenting your own accomplishments with enough detail to actually be useful later:

  • Situation — what was the context?
  • Task — what were you responsible for?
  • Action — what did you specifically do?
  • Result — what happened because of it? Be specific — numbers, outcomes, who noticed.
  • Reflection — what would you do differently, or what did this teach you?

Try It

Paste this into ChatGPT, Claude, or whatever AI tool you use:

Help me turn something I accomplished into a quick SBI story — Situation, Behavior, Impact — I can tell out loud in under thirty seconds. Then help me expand the same accomplishment into a more detailed STARR write-up — Situation, Task, Action, Result, Reflection — I can save for later. Ask me what happened first.