A Curriculum Vitae (CV) is a concise document that briefly explains your past and current professional skills, educational qualifications, proficiency, and work experience. A CV will demonstrate the necessary skills required for yo to get an interview in the first instance and then hopefully a job offer.
CVs must be clearly formatted and perfect, so the recruiter can quickly go through it and decide if you are eligible for the role you are applying.
Creating a perfect CV can be time-consuming but is essential for landing that dream role!
Certain tips for building a great CV are described below.
• Understand the difference between a Skill-based CV and a Work-focussed CV. A Skill-based CV demonstrates the professional skills the applicant has and the gaps in the work history and is useful for people who are looking for career changes. A Work-focussed CV demonstrates the work experience that helps the applicant to grow their career path to the next stage.
• Research about the company, their needs from the employees, skills required for the particular job. Add any specific information the company might want the applicant to be included in their CV. Scrutinise the job advert, use similar language and pick up on skills mentioned.
• Choosing the right font for the CV is an important step. Always go for the standard font styles like Sans-serif types (Arial, Helvetica, Tahoma) or Serif fonts (Times New Roman, Bookman Old Style).
• Make sure to include Personal List Details of the applicant at the top of the CV. Personal Details include Name, Email, Phone Number, and Communication Address. You don’t need to say where you live unless the job involves you being based from a specific location for a specific role.
• A Personal Statement is an essential part of a CV. It must explain who you are, what you are, what are you looking for, and what can you offer to the company.
• Include all the relevant work experience with the most recent one, along with the company’s name, title of the role, job description, and key responsibilities.
• Achievements should be listed and make sure you have documents to back up statements if anyone inquires.
• Educational qualifications should be listed along with the time, name of the institution, and name of the degree.
• List your professional and technical skills.
• Include hobbies and pastimes if you think you can talk about them at an interview – but be careful what kind of information you divulge – not everyone supports Chelsea or Liverpool or Manchester United or follows football at all. But your interviewer might want to talk to you about it if there are a lot of candidates with very similar experience and qualifications. You could say cooking but be prepared to talk about your favourite dishes and ingredients and how you make these, not just eating them!