Writing Your CV
Your CV is the most important document when you are searching for a new role. You need to ensure that it is clear, concise and up to date with all your information.
Below we have listed several things that we believe massive Do’s and Don’ts when it comes to writing your CV.
Do’s –
- Name / Contact (email & number) / Address
- Your first & last name need to be clearly shown at the top, and, if required, pronouns/title
- Email & telephone number are vital for agencies / potential employers – you must have this clearly shown at the top of your CV
- Address or town & postcode help companies know where you are located, and if an agency spots you, they can place you with jobs in the right location
- Small paragraph profiling yourself
- This should be about 50-100 words on yourself, who you are as a person, what you feel you excel in or are proud of. It can be whether you work well in a team or have so many years’ experience in one area. Best idea is to start by writing a few ideas down and then forming them into a paragraph.
- Bullet points of your key skills picked up through all your roles
- Unlike the profile paragraph, this needs to be to the point and specific to detail. What do you have experience in, what systems / machines have you worked with.
- Jobs listed most recent to oldest
- Your current or most recent job should be listed at the top, under your profile and keys skills. This is so employers / agencies can see what your most recent experience is in.
- Clearly state Employer/company, Job title, dates worked
- When laying out your work experience, list the dates you have worked there / the job title you held / the company name.
- If you had different roles within one company list them chronologically with the most recent at the top.
- Bullet point your responsibilities whilst at this role – try to give as much description as possible
- Detail your responsibilities as bullet points, not as a written paragraph. List out everything you did in the company; the machines / systems you worked with, the tasks you had to complete daily/weekly/monthly.
- Try to achieve 5-8 bullet points for each position if some are the same as other roles copy those over.
- Education & Prof. training at bottom – basic description & dates provided
- If you have received any professional training since working, list the dates and qualifications you have earnt.
- List your school & college with the dates you attended and the qualifications you achieved whilst there at the bottom.
Don’ts –
- Write all the information into different text boxes (if it goes onto multiple pages that is fine – 2-3 pages is average)
- If you CV looks too busy or is too complicated to copy the information from, it will go against you. List your basic information at the top and work your way down your page. If you go over three pages, reduce your first few jobs to date / title / company, but have the information saved somewhere so it’s available on request.
- Do different fonts sizes (try to use one font for it all)
- Try to keep the same font throughout the whole document, using a larger size for the titles.
- If you feel your titles are not standing out, utilise the bold font to make it stand out.
- Leave unchecked (update your CV as often as you can / make sure you spell check)
- Always double check your CV, if you can, send it to someone else so there’s a fresh pair of eyes reading over it.
- Spell check the document and look at any grammar that may need amending
- Any errors will count against you, not necessarily the mistake itself but it shows that you haven’t double checked your work.
- Be afraid to show off (you need to show your skills, list all the responsibilities, even if they’re tiny, most especially machines / systems you have worked on)
- This is one of the few times when you absolutely must sell yourself. Big up everything that you have done, put everything down in the CV. If it is not relevant it can be taken off but if it’s not there, future employers may dismiss you, and you’ll miss out!
- Include reference details (put ‘references available on request’)
- Don’t include all the reference details, keep a note of them somewhere and put the sentence ‘reference’s available on request’. Then you aren’t clogging up the document with unnecessary words.
We hope this helps, below is a link to a word document that is a template we have put together for a basic CV.
Our team is always willing to help, so if you require assistance or want to ask a question when creating your CV, don’t be afraid to get in touch!
Just remember – make it clear and concise and sell yourself!!
