Maximising impact with your early career CV
Brought to you by CV Writers in association with Guardian Jobs
Maximising impact with your early career CV
Whether you are a student, fresh graduate or just started out in work, it can sometimes be challenging to know how to write and structure a CV. With little work experience behind you, it is important to draw on other aspects of your life to demonstrate the skills required for a role. Combined with this, you may be open to lots of different types of jobs which itself can be confusing as they may have quite different skill sets attached to them. The first thing to do is to step back.
What roles are you targeting?
If you have a clear vision for your future and know exactly what types of jobs you are targeting, this makes focusing and structuring your early career CV reasonably easy. If you are open to lots of different types of roles then the first thing to do is it note the most common job titles for these roles. You can then start to group job titles that require similar types of skills. Read the job descriptions and person specifications to get an idea about the skills and experience needed. You should also prioritise the job types so that you focus your efforts to those you desire most.
Tailor your early career CV
Now you have a clearer focus on the jobs you are targeting you have a better idea of the number of initial CVs you might need and how these should be focused. Too many job seekers use one generic version of their CV to apply for every job. This often leads to little success and great frustration. But how can you expect one CV to be aligned to jobs with vastly different requirements? You can’t. You need different versions of your CV tailored to the different roles you are applying for.
Structuring your CV
With less than 30 seconds spent on average reading a CV, and most attention spent on the first page, structuring your CV to get all the most important information upfront is vitally important. You should always start with a ‘professional profile’. A short positioning paragraph outlining the personal qualities you bring. The rest of the structure is then down to your own personal situation. If educations and qualifications are a key strength then place these next. If you have relevant work experience you want this placed first. There is no right or wrong, only what works best for you. Aim to get all the most important information on the first page.
Highlight achievements
A CV is all about giving confidence to the recruiter to call you for interview. This is not about making pie in the sky statements that cannot be substantiated, it is about providing specific examples of achievements to show you have what it takes. Support your examples with facts and figures. Focus on the outcomes – after all, it is the results that count. You can use examples from work, education or other activities so long as the examples clearly demonstrate the skills required in a meaningful or quantifiable way.
This article is written by Neville Rose, Director of CV Writers.
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