Use or Utilize —
This post is more for the professional crowd. I may have mentioned that I worked as a headhunter for more than thirty years. During that time, I got a lot of résumés — more than twelve thousand of them. One thing that used to jump out at me was how people tried so hard to use two-dollar words when fifty-cent words would do. And no word was more prevalent than people using utilize instead of use. So let’s take a look at when to use “use or utilize.”
When you are facing the option of which word to insert into your résumé — ”use or utilize” — use is almost always the right choice.
Is There a Difference?
A lot of people think use and utilize are interchangeable. Sometimes they are, but there is a difference, subtle as it may seem. You can usually substitute use for utilize but the reverse is not necessarily true. Let’s take a closer look.
Use means to make use of, to employ for some purpose. An example might be:
- He used the pen to write his book.
- You can use that ladder if you need to get on the roof.
- Can I use your car to go to the airport?
Utilize typically means to put something to use for other than it’s intended purpose. An example might be:
- He utilized a dime as a makeshift screwdriver.
- She utilized the umbrella as a walking stick when she hurt her ankle.
- He utilized duct tape to patch the leaky pipe.
In the three sentences above, you could have substituted used and it would have been fine, but utilized works because you’re speaking of making use of something for a different purpose; you’re using a dime as a screwdriver, an umbrella as a walking stick, and duct tape to fix a leaky pipe; however, in the three previous sentences, utilized would not have worked as well because each item mentioned was used in the manner it was meant to be used.
Why Is Utilize so Often Misused?
The reasons are simple. The biggest reason is that many people do not understand the subtle differences, and when you combine that with a person’s overwhelming desire to impress someone with their vocabulary, disaster strikes. Far too often, the word is used as fluff, an attempt to make the writer sound important or knowledgeable. Ironically, the result is usually the opposite. The reader is left bewildered and unimpressed.
I see this misuse most often on résumés but also with new writers. Usually, editors will catch misuses like that, but sometimes the writer doesn’t pay attention to the editor. New writers often think that the more big words they use, the better they’ll sound, but it doesn’t work that way. The problem with using big words is that the people who understand them will know if you’re using them wrong.
Examples
Below are a few examples I randomly selected from my stacks of résumés. It shows the correct way to use use or utilize.
- Designed specialized measurement instrumentation and fixtures utilized in the manufacturing and test of inertial navigation components.
- A challenging senior/lead engineering position in which my analog & digital skills can be utilized to meet timely goals of R&D and engineering teams.
- Utilized engineering techniques, such as statistical analysis & FMEA, to assess product performance.
In each case, used would have been the preferred choice. I only checked thirty-four résumés that had the word “utilize”, but in every instance, it was used wrong.
Summary
The next time you’re writing a résumé or a blog or a book, make sure if you use utilize that you’re using it the right way. In almost all cases, the word use is more acceptable. If you understand the differences and want to substitute utilize, go ahead and do it, but then you stand the chance of it being read by someone who doesn’t understand the difference. They may think you’re misusing it in an attempt to impress.
The bottom line is that you will likely never be questioned for using “use,” but you may be second-guessed if you substitute “utilize.”
One of the problems with language, especially learning a new language, is that a lot of people learn through context, so when you say something like “he utilized a dime to remove the screw, they may interpret that as used a dime and assume that “utilize” means use. Then they continue to use utilize as use and the cycle goes on.
If you want more information on misused words or grammar in general, check out my No Mistakes Grammar books or the No Mistakes Grammar Bites series. You can find them at all major retailers online or get the links here.
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Giacomo Giammatteo is the author of gritty crime dramas about murder, mystery, and family. And he also writes nonfiction books including the No Mistakes Careers series as well as books about grammar, publishing., and children’s fiction and nonfiction.
When Giacomo isn’t writing, he’s helping his wife take care of the animals on their sanctuary. At last count, they had forty animals — seven dogs, one horse, six cats, and twenty-five pigs.
Oh, and one crazy — and very large — wild boar, who used to take walks with Giacomo every day.
He lives in Texas where he and his wife have an animal sanctuary with forty loving “friends.”
I discussed something similar a few years ago. You can find it here. You can find links to any of my books here.
Originally published at nomistakes.org on February 25, 2019.