CV Writing

A CV or Curriculum Vitae is:

Madhu Sudhan Rao. M

Your Life History Your Job History Your Achievements Your Skills

A CV or curriculum vitae is a marketing tool. With your CV you will be able to promote yourself. Imagine the CV as being a brochure that will list the benefits of a particular service. The service being your time and skills! When writing a CV looks at it from your employers point of view. Would you stand out against the competition (the other candidates) and would the manager want to talk to you for a possible job? You have to ask yourself these questions when writing your CV or curriculum vitae. Networking and interviewing are essential for your job hunt and your CV is just the first step in the job search. However, a CV will be your first contact with potential employers and will open the door. If you are invited for an interview, you would then be in a position to explain and expand on what is in your CV. A CV is an essential tool in your job search. When applying for a vacancy, you generally first have to send your CV to present yourself to the prospective employer. CV Heading In the CV heading you can write your general information:

Name Surname Local address

E-mail address Phone number

(If applying for an overseas job, please remember to include your international dialing code.) Include your mobile/cell phone number if you are going to relocate soon. CV Skills Summary The Skills Summary section of your CV includes your main skills. You should only include keywords in his section, do not go into lengthy descriptions of your skills. The skill summary is also called personal profile. CV Objective The CV Objective, sometimes also referred to as CV Personal Profile states What is the next step in my career?" This should be a short, concise statement that informs the employer what kind of position you are looking for. The type of position, the role (managerial, supervisor, contractor) should be included as well. If you are job hunting it is a good idea to have several CV's with different profiles or objectives. For example, you can have a CV for a sales supervisor and the other for a shop floor manager. Your 'sales supervisor' CV can highlight achievements in this area, and the CV would be tuned to that particular in terms of job descriptions and achievements. Education on your CV List all of your qualifications in this section. Include all of your education including certifications from non-academic institutions, especially those that are related to the job vacancy. If you have more work experience than qualifications, put your work experience before your qualifications. Job Titles and company names are emphasized with skills, duties andachievements detailed under each job title. A chronological CV is most useful if you are staying within the same industry and wish to show career progression.

Additionally, if your employer was a familiar household name, it may be wise to highlight that as often they set a precedent for the type of people they employ so the mere mention of their company name may be enough to demonstrate that you are a high caliber candidate. Most employers prefer the chronological CV format, as it is easy to see who you have worked for and what you did in each particular job. If you do not have many achievements, you can take the emphasis off this fact when using a Chronological CV. Reasons why a chronological CV may not be the best format include:

If you are changing direction and the most recent employer is not relevant to your new chosen career.

If

your

career

history

shows gaps

in

your

employment due

to

poor health, unemployment, having children, etc. or that you have changed jobs frequently. Functional CV The Functional CV is usually two pages in length and covers your entire career history. Unlike the most common chronological CV it focuses, not on your career history, but on your skills, abilities and expertise. It may not even refer to a specific industry, as the skills detailed are deemed transferable.

It is important that the skills you detail are relevant to the position you areapplying for. It is no use highlighting your great accounting experience if the position is in sales. You should highlight your achievements in a sales environment and focus on relevant aspects of that field of work. A Functional CV format is useful if:

You lack experience or have gaps in your work history; these can be de-emphasized in a functional CV while your skills and potential are highlighted.

You have changed jobs frequently and have had a variety of unrelated work experiences.

You want to promote skills and experience obtained through college or volunteer experience.

You are changing careers or re-entering the job market, perhaps after taking a career break to be a full time parent.

Your most recent work experience is not relevant to the job, but past experience is. You have been working freelance or in temporary employment. You do not want to advertise your age.

A functional CV format is less useful if:

You have little work experience and thus not much to highlight. You have a progressive career history, which reflects promotions, and growth and you want to emphasize that.

What is the layout of a Functional CV?

The Functional CV starts with a Profile that highlights specific skills, achievements and relevant personal qualities.

Grouped beneath subheadings, you should then present your range of skills and abilities beginning with the most important. Present the functions as bullet points. Rather than focusing on experience in a particular job, detail your abilities as demonstrated in that job in such a way as to show that they are transferable to the job applied for. As previous employers are not mentioned by name you can include voluntary and unpaid work.

Following this section is a list of employers and employment dates. Qualifications are covered next including professional and academic qualifications. The Functional CV may conclude with a brief outline of your personal details, hobbies and interests.

Targeting your CV The CV is the make or break of your job application. Everything in it tells a potential new employer something about you. The only information available to the employer is in your

application. We regularly advise people to target every job application with a tailor made CV, and that's why. The fundamental principles of targeting your CV are pretty simple:

Make sure every part of your CV directly relates to the current job application. Use exactly the same descriptions for skills, experience, and qualifications as on the job ad or application guidelines.

Always cover the essential job skills, qualifications, and experience in your CV. Ensure that everything in your work history is clearly relevant to the job application.

This is a lot easier to do than it might look from that description. You have the raw material available from your basic CV, and it's quite easy to adapt that material to any job. Let's go through the basic CV outline. Objectives The objectives part of your CV defines your motivations. You're telling the employer why you want the job. Write the objectives section showing a clear reason based on a career track motive like, 'I want to gain direct experience as part of my management studies.' This will explain why you want a supervisor's job. Skills Skills are often keywords in job applications, like essential criteria. Any job for which you can apply will include a range of skills you can use. You may not have all of them, but you must include all the required skills as much as possible. Use exactly the same description of these skills as used in the job ad. Work history Your work history needs particular care and good use of terminology. Explain briefly, but as clearly as possible, your job role and tasks. Again, use the same terminology as in the job

requirements, particularly the essential skills, as the framework for your description. Spell it out in those terms. Use multiple examples, and if possible show how your skills developed through your work history, making clear your level of experience. Achievements Achievements added on to the work history as part of each job description are a real positive, particularly when you show obvious relevance and value to the employer. Use examples that are clearly related to the new job application. Qualifications Many applications contain a set of required qualifications. You must provide a list of qualifications that meets those requirements. Difficulties sometimes arise when you have similar qualifications, but aren't sure if they match the requirements. Don't guess. Make sure they do, preferably by email, and get a definite yes or no. Your qualifications also need to be spelled out in detail. Broad descriptions of qualifications aren't good enough, particularly when all the other applicants will have similar qualifications. Again, spell it out, so you're obviously qualified for the job. As you can see, targeting a CV isn't difficult. Get the content right, and you get the job.