Applying for jobs can feel like an endless road with rejections at every turn. But one way to try and make yourself stand out from the crowd is a good CV.
It can be hard to know what employers are looking for, so here are a handful of tips to help make your CV the best it can be.
Necessary information
Employers have hundreds of CV’s, so they don’t want to hear your life story. If it looks like there is too much irrelevant information on your CV, it may just be thrown in the bin.
We are all proud of our acheivements but adding them all will only be a hinderance on your application. Only write down skills and qualifications that are relevant to the specific job you are applying for.
You can even adapt your CV for each job you apply for, taking out irrelevant information.
Layout
Make your CV look simple yet professional. Recruiters spend about 6-8 seconds looking at your CV, so you need to make it stand out. If you are perfect for the job, then you need to get your qualifications right in their faces. Hence, make that text large and near the top.
Bottom line, keep it simple and readable. You need to stand out for the right reasons.
Keywords
Many employers look for keywords in your CV that are relevant to the job offered. Whether that is as simple as ‘punctual’ or as complex as ’trained on all Microsoft programs’, you need to make sure that whatever skills you write down are the most important ones.
If you are unsure about what keywords to use, have a look at what words were used in the job advertisement and simply adopt them.
Include links
You can include links to previous examples of your work or even websites. If you don’t have any published work online, you can create a LinkedIn account and include a link to that on your CV.
This will allow employers to get a better sense of your previous work and what kind of person you are. A CV just tempts them in and then they can look into you more if they so wish.
Label your CV
Many applications are done online now, so you will not need to print your CV off.
Employers will receive many CV’s online and if they are not titled correctly and orderly, then they simply will not open it.
Imagine you receive 50 CV’s and they are all titled ‘My CV’ or ‘CV 2’. This would make it so much harder to distinguish each applicant.
The easiest way to avoid getting lost in the pile is to title your CV as your name. It really is that simple.