How to write the perfect CV
The internet's best job hunt
advice to improve your resume
Your resume is the first
impression you make on a recruiter. This is your door way into getting a good
job. You need to make an impact. But how do you get past applicant tracking
systems and jaded HR professionals? The internet has some valuable advice for
you.
Over the years, job
seekers, hiring experts, and research surveys have shared intelligent tips and
tricks. The vastness of the internet makes it difficult to track down
everything.We rounded up the cream of the crop so you have one place for the
web's best advice on how to improve your CV:
START WITH A STRONG SUMMARY
Jane Heifetz, the founder
of Right Resumes, knows a thing or two about CVs. And she says that every
resume needs to start with a strong summary. A survey by The Ladder found that
recruiters spend only six seconds on a CV. That's 2030 words to catch their
attention. Make it good! This summary is where you tailor your CV to the job
you are applying for, making sure you are addressing that position
specifically. Highlight your area of expertise, include your years of
experience, note what type of industries or organisations you've worked at.
Avoid generic terms.
THE IDEAL LENGTH: ONE PAGE FOR EVERY 10 YEARS
Don't toot your own horn
for too long. Since the average recruiter will scan your resume for six
seconds, you need to fit in more information in a limited space. Laszlo Bock,
the HR boss at Google, has a simple thumb rule to work by: for every ten years,
use a page. Yes, it seems impossible to fit all that information in such a tiny
space. But it's important because the resume's purpose is to get you an
interview. You can then expand on any topic in the interview. A crisp, focused
resume demonstrates an ability to synthesise, prioritise, and convey the most
important information about you. Now, don't cheat on your font size and other
aspects to make it fit. Bock's one page recommendation comprises a
minimum10-point font size and a half-inch margin. The thumb rule is much more
useful and debunks the old CV myth that a resume can be only one page.
YOUR RESUME SHOULD FIT THE MOBILE SCREEN
The biggest mistake you are
making with your resume in 2016 is using CV templates shared by people over the
years. Those templates almost always adhered to the idea of someone printing
out your CV and reading it on their desk. That's not what happens in 2016.
Donna Svei, an executive resume writer, found in a simple survey of her
recruiter friends that 88 per cent of hiring professionals read CVs on their
phone. News flash: your resume needs to look great on a mobile screen! Svei's
full post on LinkedIn has some fantastic insights into formatting your CV to
make it more mobile friendly. Here are her three biggest takeaways:
1 Strive for two or
three-line blocks of text.
Never go over four.
2 Use six points of space (Format
> Paragraph > Line Spacing > Exactly > 6 pt) between bullet points
and a full space between resume sections and jobs.
3 Avoid tiny fonts. It's
impossible to read on a phone. Go with at least 11-point Calibri. Svei also emphasises on focusing on going
with simple black text on a white background.
Don't use colours. Mobile
screens differ, people use varying levels of brightness, and the end result is
that your colours won't look good at all. Just go with black on white, since it
offers the best contrast.
GOOGLE'S SECRET FORMULA
So you have limited space.
How do you fit in everything? Google's Bock shared one more piece of advice
that went viral on the internet. You will consistently hear the advice to “be
specific“ or “quantify your achievements“ in your CV. So far, Bock is the only
one to have offered a formula explaining how to do that. In an interview with
The New York Times, he shared the formula: I accomplished X, relative to Y, by
doing Z. In this, the X is the number or quantity you managed. The Y is what
the industry average or your competitors achieved. And Z is what you did
differently to get those higher numbers. So if your achievement is improving
sales, you would write it as, “Sold 15 product calls per month, compared to
company average of 9, by grouping clients based on time availability.“
Mihir
Patkar MM
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