Curriculum Vitae

[fuzzy]

As of now, I am at a place in my career where I can give a months notice and not effect my pension.

It is not my intention to retire yet but, one never knows what could happen in the world. I am therefore now of the opinion that writing my CV may be wise.

I am of the pre CV generation, all my jobs to date were via application form but lots of places now like to see a CV.

What should a good CV include and how should it be formatted?

I have looked on line and there are thousands of examples so I am a bit confuddled.

Thanks,

[Jurek]

Fuzzy, I reckon the best advice you are likely to get will be someone who currently spends a lot of their time looking at CV's for a living.
I reworked my CV after advice from someone just like that, OTP.
It worked. It got me a job.
When he saw my previous attempts at CVs, his comments were more or less along the lines of 'You're having a laugh, aren't you?'
This was after months and months and months and months of working and re-working my CV, following advice from 'trainers' and 'advisers' and 'enablers' - none of whom are likely to have ever looked at a CV, with a view to employing someone.

As you say - there's a mine full of advice out there - I question how useful some of it is.
G'luck.

[TimC]

Fuzzy.

Cycles. A lot.

Wozza rozzer.

Questions?

[mrcharly-YHT]

You've had a fairly simple career so it shouldn't be too difficult.

Front page:
name, address, dob, phone, email

Skillset summary:
Make it easy to scan read. People looking at CVs often have to look at hundreds; I had a contract where I was one of the main interviewers/hirers. I literally had *hundreds* of CVs to go through.

Employment history in reverse chronological order. Dates, position title and brief summary of responsibilities for each job.

IME, most recruitment agencies try to rewrite your cv. They are utterly shit at it. I've nearly missed out on jobs because they submitted an edited copy of my CV. I usually rang the company and checked; if it was an edited copy, I insisted on sending the original.

[Lady Cavendish]

I work for a specialist telco recruitment agency, not one of the Reed/high street type ones so I'm not 100% sure how things are done at agencies like those.

We do indeed reformat everyones CV- this is at the request of the client. And also, because they have to fit the role, and these are technical people, not CV writers, and the important/relevant experience is often hidden in the abyss of drivel. If we were to send their original CVs over, in most cases, they quite simply would not get the role.

I'd be more than happy to look at your CV, I look at hundreds every day, and place people in roles day in day out. However, it sounds like I will be 'utterly shit' at it, and you're better off doing it yourself.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Sorry, LadyC, it's just been my experience.
To be fair, I've only dealt with a few specialist agencies and they have been better.

[Kathy]

The most useful advice I had was not to have "a" CV: have many. Tailor your CV for each application, expanding on your skills/experience which are most relevant to the vacancy you are applying for. Read the job ad carefully and repeat key words and phrases - so if the advert calls for someone with "excellent risk analysis skills", make sure you have the words "risk" and "analysis" somewhere obvious. Don't expect the person reading your cv to infer *anything*.

[Jaded]

wot Kathy said.

[T42]

Remembering a CV I once received, if you include foreign languages don't put the same one twice.

[ian]

Mostly what Kathy says. It's should not simply be list of your life. I read a lot of CVs and I mostly don't get through the first couple of lines, so make them count. I've a got big pile of CVs to read and I want to go to the pub. I can detect a generic CV with a glance. Mean time to bin is usually about 165 ms.

I'm not a big fan of re-formatted CVs, it's not necessarily that recruiters mess them up, but there's a lot you can glean from just the way an applicant has laid out their CV. Good presentations say a lot about how someone handles information. So does 7pt single-spaced Comic Sans and a 5 mm margin.

So, make it neat, attractive, and to the point of the job your are applying. And yeah, don't start it with 'an aggressive professional' (I just read that one) or a list of where you went to school three decades ago (several that I read today). Seriously, one CV took a page and half to tell me where she was working now (and I only got that far out of a morbid curiosity and the fact I was on a train).

[Dibdib]

All this is good advice IMO, especially the point about tailoring your CV for each role.

If it helps, Fuzzy, my generic CV is here. To anyone else, feel free to criticise

[David Martin]

Give your CV to a friend to read. Take it off them about 15 seconds later. If it hasn't got the blindingly obvious information that you have the skills that the job requires over in that time then it is not fit for purpose. I like to have the main thing at the start of the paragraph and at the start of the sentences.

'In my role as a chief under intelligence gathering operative I had many important functions'

Well that is5 seconds of your fifteen that you may as well throw away.

 'I was responsible for meeting strict deadlines where life and property were at stake. I am used to being shot at by those who disagree with my presence on this planet.' 'I delivered results n adverse conditions and under time pressure'

'Communication skills: I found a loaded weapon a useful tool in persuading others to my point of view. I presented evidence, much of it factual, in formal court situations. I communicate well in group meetings where I had to persuade colleagues and superiors of why I should not be the scapegoat for failed operations.

[Ivo]

Mostly what Kathy says. It's should not simply be list of your life. I read a lot of CVs and I mostly don't get through the first couple of lines, so make them count. I've a got big pile of CVs to read and I want to go to the pub. I can detect a generic CV with a glance. Mean time to bin is usually about 165 ms.

Have one or more eye-catchers in the first half of the first page. The sort of thing when people are reading their CV in your presence will cause them to look up to you and start firing questions in a positive way .
Just as personal example, for me that are the 3 weeks I spent in the Balkans during the war, as a reconstruction volunteer and a thesis research in Lithuania in the earlie 90-ies. Last month I got a new job and half the interview was about these 3 weeks in the Balkans.
Some interesting but weird skills are a good eye-catcher too.

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

Remembering a CV I once received, if you include foreign languages don't put the same one twice.

Double Dutch?

[tatanab]

Mid 90s I interviewed about 20 people and consequently saw a much larger number of CVs.  I quickly became cynical and detuned the CVs for 30% BS - these are technical people I was interviewing.  If I assume other interviewers do the same then this could be a real problem for people like me who write a straight and honest CV.  Possibly age comes into this, all the CVs I saw were from people in their 20s or early 30s. 

Both on CV and in interview I really hated "we did this" describing group or company activity, and I always asked "but what did YOU do".  Employment history, as noted above it is in reverse chronological order and the detail gets less the further back you go - who cares much what I did in my first job in 1970.  Education, once out of your 20s there is no point in listing your school exam subjects and grades, just put 9 "O" Levels.  Modern thinking seems to say your CV should not include your age or marital status, I disagree with that - depending on the job being applied for.

[perpetual dan]

As above really:
CVs and application forms are the same thing: a way of getting the data needed to make a shortlist with the least possible effort on the reader's part. I read more CVs than I send, and once you've done the name, address, O level basket weaving, sequence of jobs stuff the thing I need is to tick off the points on the person spec that don't fall out of those facts.

I have a CV that is my record of what I've done - a list of facts. It never gets sent to anyone. What other people get are the selection of facts that are relevant to the job applied for - it's an application form for that employer. They just haven't sent me a crappy pre-formatted form for word that they use for everyone from cleaners to big boss.

[Rhys W]

Sorry, LadyC, it's just been my experience.
To be fair, I've only dealt with a few specialist agencies and they have been better.

I've seen my CV butchered by agencies, and they've been "specialist agencies" as well (in quotes because often they have no clue about the industry they claim to specialise in.) On more than one occasion I've got myself an interview with the company after the agency told me I wasn't suitable or the job was "gone".

[Charlotte]

There's some great advice here Fuzzy - and I'm going to add mine.

As Proposals Manager for my firm, I spend a lot of my time going through our peoples' CVs and getting them ready to go out to our clients as part of bid books for very large projects.  In fairness, this isn't like going out on the employment market -  it's contracting.  Reviewing CVs is one of my least favourite jobs, mainly because even when the author is massively employable and hugely experienced, a lot of people seem almost incapable of selling themselves.

Here's my take on writing CVs:

• Get the important stuff on page one,  but don't bother with a photo, date of birth or any more contact information than your email address and maybe your phone number.  It eats up space you need for other things.
• By the end of page one, the reader should know who you are and what you currently do - as well as what you're best at and what you want to do next.
• Format it to look good.  If you're not an expert with Word / Open Office then find someone who is.  Or get a good template.  We use one main narrow column down the middle, with breakout boxes to the left for 'headline' information (e.g. "12 years managerial experience") and on the right for qualifications.
• Send PDFs, not native files.  You want to be sure that what you're send ing is what they're reading.  This also stops agencies dicking with it without totally retyping it (something that they're less likely to do).
• Don't say what you were / are paid, either on your CV or verbally.  Instead, if you're asked, talk about your 'salary expectations'.
• A section on who you are outside work is hugely, massively important.  Once they know you can do the job that they're recruiting for, employers want to know what sort of a person you are, so tell them some stuff about yourself that lets them know you'll fit in well with everyone else there.  Just saying "books, cinema, cooking and surfing the internet' isn't nearly enough. Find something that'll stick in their heads.
• If you've had a long and varied career history, don't be afraid to summarise it in a small table at the back.  Employers aren't that interested in what you were doing fifteen years ago unless it substantially impacts on the job you're applying for.  So front concentrate the detail on your most recent roles and load that detail at the start of the CV.
• Don't go over three pages unless you're Michael Bloomberg or Warren Buffett.

Chances are, Lady C has more skills in this area than I do, but  if you want me to spend half an hour kicking yours into shape (both aesthetically and in terms of the content) drop me a PM - I'd be happy to help.

[Bledlow]

Sorry, LadyC, it's just been my experience.
To be fair, I've only dealt with a few specialist agencies and they have been better.

I've seen my CV butchered by agencies, and they've been "specialist agencies" as well (in quotes because often they have no clue about the industry they claim to specialise in.) On more than one occasion I've got myself an interview with the company after the agency told me I wasn't suitable or the job was "gone".

I've seen my CV embellished by 'specialist' agencies, to the point where I once had an interview on the basis of my CV for a job I was not qualified for & would not have applied for if I'd been given a more accurate picture of it. This became obvious to everyone present a very few minutes into the interview.

I gave the interviewers a copy of my real CV, & we spent a little while comparing it with the one from the agency & marvelling at how different they were. They asked if they could keep it in case they had a suitable vacancy in the near future, but nothing came of it.

[Canardly]

A slightly different take on the above. As a recruiter from time to time I am often amazed at how poor CVs can be. I recently wanted a technical specialist and was bombarded with CVs including ex bankers etc. A complete waste of everybody's time. The people seeking applications for a job want to fill it believe it or not, but they do not want to spend hours leafing through dross. They just want to find candidates with the requisite background experience and quals. After that, it becomes a case of will they fit in, what kind of person are they etc as said above.  Don't ever lie! Commercial puff is one thing lying is another and you will soon be caught out. If you are invited to interview do your homework. And don't ever slag off your old employer. All the best.

[contango]

It's been a while since I looked over CVs to hire people but a few low-lights from my experience.

One guy described his work placement that gave him a "comprehensive understanding of the role of accountancy firms in the financial sector". This turned out to have been a two-week placement over a holiday while he was at university. It's one thing to play things up a little but there are limits.

Another person mentioned astronomy among their leisure interests. Which was all well and good, but they then wrote a long paragraph detailing exactly what equipment they used. Another person listed "surf the internet" and "send an email" among their skills.

It's also good to indicate your achievements rather than responsibilities. Things like "I was responsible for development schedules and delivering systems to specification on time" sounds good but doesn't say whether or not you actually achieved anything.

[fuzzy]

Thanks for the info folks. I have just thrown together a rough draft and will contact Charlotte and Lady C for their views

[Eccentrica Gallumbits]

Remembering a CV I once received, if you include foreign languages don't put the same one twice.

Similarly, if your CV mentions you worked in Middlesborough, expect it to be binned.

[Quisling]

Given your long career for one organisation (type) ensure you highlight transferable skills and their relevance to the role you're applying for, e.g. Communication, conflict resolution, excellent observation skills and record keeping, ability to cause people to fall down the stairs during questioning etc.

Good luck.
C

[rogerzilla]

Never lie or gild the lily at all.  70% of people do, apparently, but the one thing HR drones are good at is catching you out.  If you say your interest is in reading Anais Nin novels, some smart-arse will ask you who the heroine is in A Spy In The House Of Love.  if your interest is in medieval history, someone might ask who came before Richard III.