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How to Write a Good CV?

What is a CV?

A Curriculum Vitae (CV) is your life history, your job History, your achievements and your Skills A CV is responsible for securing you interviews and the information contained in your CV should ensure that you promote yourself optimally. Your CV needs to effectively represent you so that you can secure an interview in which you will personally represent yourself.

How to write a great CV

Think of yourself in terms of how a prospective employer may see you. Would your CV stand out among other applicants? What information is relevant?

What Information should your CV include?

Personal Details- Most CV's Start with these. However, take care to avoid unnecessary details such as religious affiliation, children's names etc.

Education and qualifications

Take care to include the names of institutions and dates attended in reverse order i.e. university before school results.

Work experience

The most widely accepted style of employment record is the chronological CV. Career history is presented in reverse order starting with the most recent. Achievements and responsibilities are listed against each role and more emphasis is placed on recent achievements/ jobs.

A functional CV may be more appropriate if, for example you have held a number of unrelated jobs. This presentation places emphasis on key skills which can be grouped together under suitable headings.

Skills

Include computer skills foreign language skills and any other recent training that is relevant to the role applied for.

Referees

These need to be relevant to the job for which you are applying. 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.

General tips

Your CV should be approximately two pages and should under no circumstances be more than 4 pages.

Information included on the CV should be concise and to the point. This is not a test of your creative writing skills.

Carefully edit and check your CV for bad formatting and grammatical errors. This is frustrating to read and makes your CV stand out in a bad way.

Decorative borders are unnecessary, as are pictures of yourself if they are not required.

Falsehoods and inaccuracies should be avoided

Current salary details need not be included

A good covering letter should always accompany your CV