Your CV – what are we looking for?
I can put my hands up and say, since starting here at Pear Tree Recruitment just over a year ago, I haven’t given my CV a second thought – but, should we be regularly updating our CV as we gain new skills and responsibilities?? It doesn’t hurt to keep your CV topped up so to speak – and when you take on more responsibility in your current role, best to get it down on paper whilst it’s fresh in your mind.
We all know the clichés of what not to put on your CV – that picture of you and your mates on a night out that you’ve cropped or every single achievement you’ve ever had. Your Year 5 spelling test victory isn’t too impressive anymore!
I’ve even had a friend who started his CV with ‘hello, friend’… safe to say he will never live that one down!
But what are recruitment consultants and interviewers looking for in a CV? I asked the team here at Pear Tree Recruitment what they think makes a great CV and what makes a CV stand out after trawling through hundreds of applications.
Longevity in previous roles
It’s great to see your commitment with previous roles, you’re clearly a reliable member of staff and will certainly have developed in your role.
Check your spelling and grammar!
It’s the little things that will significantly improve your CV and show you have attention to detail which is always useful for an employer.
A flavour of your personality
Reading about your skills and experience is great and helps us assess whether you meet the criteria for a specific job. However, we want to know a bit about who you are? As recruitment consultants, we work to find the right role for you, so knowing a bit more about you helps us to select companies we think you’d enjoy working for.
Short, succinct bullet points
We want to know what each job was all about, and you can tell us that in direct, succinct sentences. Short bullet points make it easy for us to understand what each role entailed and we can go into more detail about your role when you register with us.
Make it clear
Make sure all your jobs follow on from each other and put your most recent role at the top! This makes your CV clear, easy to read and easy to navigate.
Don’t leave any gaps
If you’ve spent 3 years travelling around Australia between roles or you took a career break to look after your children –let us know!! Put it on there so we can follow what you’ve been doing; we just like to get a full picture of you.
So, don’t leave any gaps in dates and tell us what you were doing between roles – even if you were just actively searching for a new role!
We hope you find these tips useful. Just remember, it’s all about what you want your CV to say about you!
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