HOW TO WRITE A SUCCESSFUL CV

Another name for a CV is a resume.

What is a CV?
Curriculum Vitae: an outline of a person's educational and professional history, usually prepared for job applications (L, lit.: the course of one's life).

A CV is the most flexible and convenient way to make applications. It can convey your personal details in the way that presents you in the best possible light and can be used to make multiple applications to employers in a specific career area. For this reason, many large graduate recruiters will not accept CVs and instead use their own application form.

An application form is designed to bring out the essential information and the personal qualities that the employer requires and does not allow you to gloss over your weaker points as a CV does. In addition, the time needed to fill out these forms is seen as a reflection of your commitment to the career and the company.


There is no "one best way" to construct a CV; it is your document and can be structured and presented as you wish within the basic framework set out below. It can be set out on paper or on-line or even on a T-shirt (a gimmicky approach that might work for "creative" jobs but is not generally advised!).

When should a CV be used?


When an employer asks for applications to be received in this format
When an employer simply states "apply to ..." without specifying the format
When making speculative applications (when writing to an employer who has not advertised a vacancy but who you hope my have one)


What information should a CV include?


Personal details

Normally these would be your name, address, date of birth (although with age discrimination laws now in force this isn't essential), telephone number and email.

Education and qualifications

Your degree subject and university, plus A levels and GCSEs or equivalents. Mention grades unless poor!

Work experience

Use action words such as developed, planned and organized
Even work in a shop, bar or restaurant will involve working in a team, providing a quality service to customers, and dealing tactful with complaints. Don't mention the routine, non-people tasks (cleaning the tables) unless you are applying for a casual summer job in a restaurant or similar.
Try to relate the skills to the job. A finance job will involve numeric, analytical and problem solving skills so focus on these whereas for a marketing role you would place a bit more emphasis on persuading and negotiating skills.
Interests and achievements
Keep this section short and to the point.
Bullets can be used to separate interests into different types: sporting, creative etc.
Don't use the old boring clichés here: "socializing with friends".
Don't put too many passive, solitary hobbies (reading, watching TV, stamp collecting) or you may be perceived as lacking people skills.
Show a range of interests to avoid coming across as narrow : if everything centers around sport they may wonder if you could hold a conversation with a client who wasn't interested in sport.
Hobbies that are a little out of the ordinary can help you to stand out from the crowd: skydiving or mountaineering can show a sense of wanting to stretch yourself and an ability to rely on yourself in demanding situations
Any interests relevant to the job are worth mentioning: current affairs if you wish to be a journalist, a fantasy share portfolio such as Bull bearings if you want to work in finance.
Any evidence of leadership is important to mention: captain or coach of a sports team, course representative, chair of a student society, scout leader.
Anything showing evidence of employability skills such as team working, organizing, planning, persuading, negotiating etc.

Skills

The usual ones to mention are languages (good conversational French, basic Spanish), computing (e.g. "good working knowledge of MS Access and Excel, plus basic web page design skills" and driving ("full current clean driving license").
If you are a mature candidate or have lots of relevant skills to offer, a skills-based CV may work for you

Referees

Normally two referees are sufficient: one academic (perhaps your tutor or a project supervisor) and one from an employer (perhaps your last part-time or summer job). See our page on Choosing and Using Referees for more help with this.




The order in which you present these, and the emphasis which you give to each one, will depend on what you are applying for and what you have to offer. For example, the example media CV lists the candidate's relevant work experience first.

If you are applying for more than one type of work, you should have a different CV tailored to each career area, highlighting different aspects of your skills and experience.

A personal profile at the start of the CV can sometimes be effective for jobs in competitive industries such as the media or advertising, to help you to stand out from the crowd. If used, it needs to be original and well written. Don’t just use the usual hackneyed expressions: “I am an excellent communicator who works well in a team…… “

You will also need a Covering Letter to accompany your CV.

What makes a good CV?

There is no single "correct" way to write and present a CV but the following general rules apply:
It is targeted on the specific job or career area for which you are applying and brings out the relevant skills you have to offer
It is carefully and clearly laid out: logically ordered, easy to read and not cramped
It is informative but concise
It is accurate in content, spelling and grammar
How long should a CV be?
There are no absolute rules but, in general, a new graduate's CV should cover no more than two sides of A4 paper.

If you can summarize your career history comfortably on a single side, this is fine and has advantages when you are making speculative applications and need to put yourself across concisely. However, you should not leave out important items, or crowd your text too closely together in order to fit it onto that single side. Academic and technical CVs may be much longer: up to 4 or 5 sides.

Tips on presentation
Your CV should be carefully and clearly laid out - not too cramped but not with large empty spaces either. Use bold and italic typefaces for headings and important information
Never back a CV - each page should be on a separate sheet of paper. It's a good idea to put your name in the footer area so that it appears on each sheet.
Be concise - a CV is an appetizer and should not give the reader indigestion. Don't feel that you have to list every exam you have ever taken, or every activity you have ever been involved in - consider which are the most relevant and/or impressive.
Be positive - put yourself over confidently and highlight your strong points. For example, when listing your A-levels, put your highest grade first.
Be honest - although a CV does allow you to omit details (such as exam resist) which you would prefer the employer not to know about, you should never give inaccurate or misleading information.
The sweet spot of a CV is the area selectors tend to pay most attention to: this is typically around the upper middle of the first page, so make sure that this area contains essential information.
If you are posting your CV, don't fold it - put it in a full-size A4 envelope so that it doesn't arrive creased.
Research by forum3 (recruitment and volunteering for the not-for-profit sector) suggested:
Graduates sent out 25 letters per interview gained.
The average graduate will send out about 70 CVs when looking for their first graduate job. Of these, the average number of responses will be 7 including 3 to 4 polite rejections and the remainder inviting the graduate to interview or further contact.
There was a direct link between the number of CVs sent out and the number of interviews gained: the more CVs you send out the more interviews you will get.
Applicants who included a covering letter with their CV were 10% more likely to get a reply.
60% of CVs are mailed to the wrong person: usually the managing director. Applicants who addressed their application to the correct named person were 15% more likely to get a letter of acknowledgement and 5% more likely to get an interview
Applicants sending CVs and letters without spelling mistakes are 61% more likely to get a reply and 26% more likely to get an interview. "In the age of the spell checker, there is no excuse for spelling mistakes". The most common mistakes to not show up in a spell check were: fro instead of for, grate instead of great, liased instead of liaised and stationary instead of stationery.
Other turn-offs include:
Misspelling the name of the company or the addressee,
Not having a reply address on the CV
Trying to be amusing.
Why you need to use a spell checker
I am a perfectionist
Proven ability to track down and correct errors.
I have good written communication skills.
Lurnt Word Perfect computer and spreadsheet pogroms.
Develop an annual operating expense budget…
And why you must read it carefully as well

Extra Circular Activities

At secondary school I was a prefix
In my spare time I enjoy hiding my horse
I hope to hear from you shortly
I am a conscious individual.
Reason for leaving last job: maturity leave
I have a desire to work with commuters
Dear Madman (instead of Madam)
My hobbits include - instead of 'hobbies'
I am sicking and entry-level position
Oversight of an entire department
Restaurant skills: Severing customers
In charge of sock control - instead of 'stock control'
I’m an accurate and rabid typist
Ability to meet deadlines while maintaining my composer
Instrumental in ruining an entire operation for a chain operator
Received a plague for salesman of the year."
Suspected to graduate early next year
For a PR job: I have a long term interest in pubic relations
I want experience in a big sex practice
Vox pox for BBC Radio, which enhanced my ability to analyze and synthesize information
A ' full shit system’ instead of ‘a full shift system’
Enthusiasm was needed in order to communicate information in an interesting manor.
I own and maintain a volts wagon beetle.
On an application to work with teenagers – I am experienced in teaching marital arts
Relevant work experience’: followed by ‘Irrelevant work experience’
My role included typing in details of accounts, customer liaison and money-laundering duties.


Fonts

Times New Roman is the standard windows "serif" font. A safe bet - law firms seem to like it! A more interesting serif font might be Georgia.
Arial is the standard windows "sans" font. Sans fonts don't have the curly bits on letters. As you can see it's cleaner and more modern than Times and also looks larger in the same "point" size (the point size is simply how big the letters are on the page.) However Arial and Times Roman are so common that they're a little boring to the eye.
A more classy choice might be Verdana or Geneva - these are both common sans fonts.
FONT SIZE is normally 12 points for the normal font with larger sizes for subheadings and headings.
or 10 points. My favorite CV font is 10 point Verdana with 12 or 14 points for sub headings.

14 points is too big - wastes space and looks crude.
and 8 or 9 points too small to be easily readable by everyone, especially in Times New Roman.
Although many people use 12 points, some research on this suggested that smaller point size CVs were perceived as more intellectual!
Different Types of CV
Chronological - outlining your career history in date order, normally beginning with the most recent items (reverse chronological) . This is the "conventional" approach and the easiest to prepare. It is detailed, comprehensive and biographical and usually works well for "traditional" students with a good all-round mixture of education and work experience. Mature students, however, may not benefit from this approach, which does emphasize your age, any career breaks and work experience which has little surface relevance to the posts you are applying for now. See an example chronological CV here
Skills-based: highly-focused CVs which relate your skills and abilities to a specific job or career area by highlighting these skills and your major achievements. The factual, chronological details of your education and work history are subordinate. These works well for mature graduates and for anybody whose degree subject and work experience is not directly relevant to their application. Skills-based CVs should be closely targeted to a specific job. See an example skills-based CV here
If you are applying for posts outside the UK, remember that employers in other countries are likely to have different expectations of what a CV should include and how it should be laid out. The "Global Resume and CV Handbook" (available from Reception) and the Prospects website will help you prepare CVs for overseas employment. See our work abroad page.

Targeting your CV


If your CV is to be sent to an individual employer which has requested applications in this format, you should research the organization and the position carefully.

If your CV is to be used for speculative applications, it is still important to target it - at the very least, on the general career area in which you want to work. Use the Careers Information Room or general careers websites such as www.prospects.ac.uk to get an idea of what the work involves and what skills and personal qualities are needed to do it successfully. This will enable you to tailor the CV to the work and to bring out your own relevant experience.

Even if you are using the same CV for a number of employers, you should personalize the covering letter - e.g. by putting in a paragraph on why you want to work for that organization.

For example CVs, application forms and covering letters see www.kent.ac.uk/careers/cv/cvexamples.htm with notes highlighting points relating to the content and style.

Emailed CVs and Web CVs

Many employers who accept applications in CV format are happy for you to send your CV as an attachment to an email.
Put your covering letter as the body of your email. It's probably wise to format it as plain text (use the format heading on Outlook Express to do this), as then it can be read by any email reader.
Your CV is then sent as an attachment. This is normally in MS Word (.doc) format, but Rich Text Format (.rtf) and html (web page format) are acceptable alternatives. Also say you'll send a printed CV if required. PDF (portable document format) also quite widely used and you can download a PDF converter such as Cute PDF www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp for free: you install it and then "print" the document to a folder on your PC. If in doubt send your CV in several formats.
Email it back to yourself first to check it.
Web CVs and Electronically Scanned CVs
Web CVs use HTML format. You can include the web address in an email or letter to an employer. They have the advantage that you can easily use graphics, color, hyperlinks and even sound, animation and video. The basic rules still apply however - make it look professional. They can be very effective if you are going for multimedia, web design or computer games jobs where they can demonstrate your technical skills along with your portfolio.

Electronically scanned CVs have been used by Nortel, Ford and others. Resumix is the main package used for this. The system has artificial intelligence which reads the text and extracts important information such as work, education, skills. For more information on this see www.kent.ac.uk/careers/onlineapps.htm