Reading this article will provide you with insight on the components of a CV and the ordeal surrounding ineligible CVs. You will surely have gained some information after being done with this article.
Table of Contents
Spelling and grammatical errors
Formatting errors and lack of consistency
Sending Resumes instead of CVs and vice versa
Sending the same CV everywhere
Exaggerating and lying on the CVs
Short Statement, Personal Statement or Career Objective
Furnishing a CV or Curriculum Vitae which lands you the job interview if not the job is not a task to be taken lightly. Gone are the days when you would just scramble a few words on Microsoft Word Processor and send in your CV and await the ultimate phone call. The competition is ever-growing and the race for job procurement has escalated to an advanced level.
“I know why I did not receive any call. There were tons of other candidates. There is a lot of saturation in the market dude!”
“I kept my CV short specifically so the recruiters would not be bored. And guess why they rejected me? They said my CV barely listed anything!”
Sure, there are plenty of reasons why you may not have secured the job you were so earnestly yearning for but if you want a critical analysis of yourself, start with your CV.
Before any potential employer meets with the prospective employee face to face to conduct a live interview, they examine the prospective employee via the CV. So before you go on to scrutinise your own personality and shortcomings which you feel are perhaps the reason you are not landing any job interviews, you should start with scrutinizing your CV.
If you belong to the same category of people lost is disarray regarding their CVs, reading this article shall definitely bear some fruits for you in the form of an appealing CV.
The title Curriculum Vitae is derived from the Latin phrase ‘course of life’. The expression only implies that the purpose of a CV is to give an overall outlook on your academic and professional achievements which you can utilize for either employment purposes and maybe for submitting a profile of yours in general.
CVs are also widely used in the procurement of research-based positions generally in academia. Professors and people, in general, most probably prepare and submit their CVs before starting with writing a dissertation proposal for their doctorate studies.
With the moving times, the format of the CV has transitioned slightly and nowadays we often come across creative CVs as well which boast of illustrations and graphics too.
There is no single key to perfecting a CV. However, there are a few essentials that a person must be familiar with in order to furnish a CV which acquires approval and is deemed ‘appealing’.
Humans are vulnerable to mistakes and it is only through failures that we learn but a repetition of mistakes only stunts our progress in life. Similarly, a majority of the aspiring candidates are not aware of the shortcomings present in their CVs which is most probably the leading factor which does not land them interviews.
Before learning on the necessary details for making an appealing CV, it is better to acquaint yourself with the common mistakes majority of the people make while crafting their CVs. Chances are that you are also making one of the mistakes listed below.
Such common mistakes include:
One of the biggest blunders a person can commit while crafting their CVs is not proofreading their CVs for spelling errors. This exudes carelessness to the highest extent and immediately has a negative impact on the recruiting personnel. Such slight errors can cost you a great deal so proofreading CVs is an indispensable act.
A CV with congested wordings and no consistency whether it pertains to the spacing and margins or the content immediately finds itself in the ‘Rejected’ pile. Why? It was simply excruciating to read. Your CV cannot be a pile of swarming ants or a primary student’s homework filled with inconsistency. The tidier the CV; the higher the chances of it captivating the recruiter.
Your CV needs to be informative and comprehensive but you need to draw the line when you feel that it too elongated. Recruiters generally spend around seventy-five seconds on reviewing every CV and accordingly, they will not spare any additional time on reading your CV. Similarly, you need to keep in mind that a CV should not be too short either, otherwise the recruiter might get the impression that you do not have much to share for example experiences, qualifications or skills.
One misconception which exists even today is that people often mistake Resumes for CVs. Resume was first used by the father of Palaeontology, Leonardo da Vinci and translates from French to ‘to sum up’. Thus, resumes are brief and short as compared to CVs and vary a great deal as well. Resumes are mostly one-pagers with the necessary details listed as per the organizational requirements.
Tailoring a CV according to the organizational requirements and nature is nowadays deemed as necessary since every industry has its own requirements. Your CV can be extremely creative and colourful but might not appeal to a law firm, or your CV can be plain text and might not appeal to an advertising agency. Thus, modifying CV as per the job post and organizational nature is vital.
Employers and recruiters are day by day growing much more cautious and critical when it comes to verifying the details listed on a candidate’s CV. They can contact the previous organisations to confirm whether or not you were employed there and they can determine your mentioned skills in the interview via a series of tests. So only mention details which you are highly confident of.
Now that I have imparted to you the common mistakes to avoid while making your CVs, I can explain to you the components of a CV and how you can enhance them for your advantage.
Like every other document, CVs have their own formatting which should be followed to produce an accepted output. The key components and sections are listed in the chronological order to be followed:
The topmost section should be listing your Name which is highlighted amongst all the other information present in the CV. You can choose whether or not to write Curriculum Vitae but make sure to write your name and format it for highlighting.
Immediately after your name, your contact details must be mentioned. You can either create a section which comprises all of your Personal Information at the beginning or the end, however, the contact details should be written just after the title bearing your name. The purpose of this is so that any recruiter reviewing your CV does not have to skim through the whole CV in order to contact you.
Considering how social media has earned an edge in the world overall, having a LinkedIn Profile can reap you plenty of benefits in the sense that the recruiter will check your profile link to verify the information listed on the CV plus also determine how much effort you put in maintaining an online presence. Other portfolio links such as in graphic designing or content writing should be mentioned so that the employer can get a general idea on the skills and expertise of the person.
Residential addresses can be or cannot be listed upon the person’s discretion. Recruiters can determine the commuting distance between the workplace and the residence.
Marital Status is usually not mentioned in CVs but can be listed as per the preferences. A mother may mention that she is married and to tend to her children.
Place of Birth is also not usually mentioned except in cases when the person is applying out of city or overseas.
Condensing your aims and goals into a single statement and paragraph can work towards giving a good impression on the recruiter. It encapsulates how you wish to move forward in your professional life and how you can add value to the organization with your existing skills and expertise.
A personalized statement or objective in the form of a paragraph can consist of your work experience, qualifications and skills. If you do not have any prior work experience, you can highlight your qualifications to leverage the void.
Employers and recruiters tend to be critical of such statements in ascertaining the seriousness of the prospective employee.
For example,
"An ardent copywriter with 5+ years in the advertising industry, looking forward to enhancing my existing skills in an environment which allows me to grow further."
As the name suggests, a CV summary basically abridges your years of experience into a paragraph so that the recruiter can get insight before plunging into the detailed CV. Other than that, a CV Summary may prove beneficial in careers which do not have detailed job descriptions such as in graphic designing. You could be working hard providing online assignment writing service but in the end, you cannot elongate the job description.
The alpha section of all, the work experience section. Your work experience ought to list down all the places you have worked at with sufficient job descriptions to demonstrate your toil, whether it amounts to years or a month in reverse chronological order; starting from the most recent to the first job. Internships and voluntary based positions are also favourable since they establish you as someone who has not wasted their time and gained experience wherever possible.
Your work experience and the time period during which your work experience was gained is something which does not escape the eyes of the recruiter. In fact, your years of experience may prove much more beneficial than your qualifications. Your experience gained working for freelance dissertation writing services may earn you an academic writing or content writing job, who knows?
A pro tip for your advantage; mention a “Key Achievements” section at the end of every job you have mentioned. This validates your major work duties and what contributions you were able to make to the organization.
Right after your work experience section, the paramount highlight of your CV is your qualifications. In case you do not possess any former work experience, you can extend your qualifications sections to cover for the gap. You can do this by mentioning your area of qualifications such as subjects and disciples, grades and GPA (if above average), short term courses and diplomas and even seminars and workshops as well. If you were the best assignment writer in class and earned exceptional grades, be sure to mention those grades.
Skills consist of two types; hard skills and soft skills. Hard skills refer to technical skills such as copywriting or bookkeeping while soft skills refer to impalpable skills such as leadership skills or communication skills. In the current era, both skills are equally important.
If you are proficient at constructing marketing strategies but lack the communication skills required to convey your ideas, you may not able to pitch your ideas whatsoever. Be sure to list down all skills that you are confident of, whether it is designing a social media post or interpreting another language. You may be well versed with academic research from browsing through dissertation topics, if you are confident then list them!
I wrote it at the beginning of the article and I will write it again to advise everyone, do not take your CV for granted. It is the first step in the procurement of employment so before finalizing your CV and submitting it, it is best to get feedback from a professional from the relevant industry or from online services available. It is up to you how you carry on with life, learn from the previous mistakes and correct them for the future. If your CV was not perfect before, work hard on perfecting it now!