How to write an effective CV

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A CV or curriculum vitae is a concise summary of your skills, qualifications, achievements, and interests inside and outside of your academic studies. It is your key marketing document in your pursuit of employment, and along with the covering letter is often the only opportunity you have to impress the employer.

However, an employer may only spend around 30 seconds (or less) reviewing a CV in order to shortlist. Your CV needs to make an instant positive impression and convey the most relevant points about you in a clear, accessible way. The challenge is to focus on the essential requirements from the job description and adapt your CV to address these requirements.

Before you go any further you need to make sure that you have done your research and that you are a fit for the role and the organisation. Read the section on researching the organisation.

To truly create an outstanding CV you need to tailor your application to their specifications which requires analysing the job description and matching these requirements.

Key Advice
Get the formatting right
Basic Sections of a CV
Different styles of CV
Tailor your CV
Review your CV

Top Tips

• As a general rule, keep your CV to two A4-sized pages as recruiters won't have time to read more. If a job doesn’t require lots of qualifications or experience, a one-page CV may be fine
• While the choice of format is yours, the main thing is to show how you meet the job requirements. Focus on relevant information and don’t over crowd the space
• Aim to get the most relevant information early in the CV. The recruiter will not search for it
• Sell yourself - provide examples of the skills and qualities required, whether that is through your studies, work experience or interests. Don't just list everything you’ve done. Instead, provide a bit of detail
• Consider using bullet points rather than paragraphs when describing your experiences and skills. Instead of using "I" every time, start each bullet point with a verb, e.g. "Organised...", "Liaised with...." - Take a look at our action word list for inspiration
• Emphasise your achievements
• Use simple language; avoid jargon which may not be understood
• Ensure you include dates and locations (town/city) for education and work if there are gaps explain them in your cover letter
• If there are gaps explain them in your cover letter
• Write in the past tense if it is something you have completed rather than something current
• Use common fonts and black text on a white background to make it easy to read
• Check your spelling, grammar and punctuation - any mistakes will put your CV into the rejection pile
• Remember to PDF your CV

Get the formatting right

Font size and style

Choose one font and use throughout your CV, Ariel and Times New Roman or Tahoma are widely used. Keep the font size between 10 - 12 to enable readability.

Margins

Keep the margins at least 2.5 cm on all sides of the document.

Headings

Use a consistent style throughout the CV (using bold, slightly bigger font or all capitals).

Bullet points

use of a standard bullet point is preferred as unusual symbols can look untidy and confuse some electronic platforms.

While there is no right or wrong way to write and present a CV there are some common rules that apply:

Your CV should be well presented, clean and professional
Essential information such as your contact details, career history and relevant qualifications should be included.
Your CV is targeted to the specific job that you are applying for and brings out the relevant skills that you have to offer
It is structured in such a way that it is easy for the employer to see why you are suitable candidate.

Be concise

Use bullet points to package information succinctly
Avoid too much context, detail or unfocused maternal that will dilute the impact of your most important messages.

How long should a CV be?

The length of your CV will depend on the vacancy and the country you are applying for, so check if the employer has specified that is should be a certain number of pages. In the UK keep it to two pages, the exception is for academic CV's which can be longer to cover publications and research papers.

UK Norms

No photo
Date of birth, nationality, gender should not be included
All other “personal information” including marital status is not required

Basic sections of a CV

Contact details

Include full name, address, mobile number, email address and LinkedIn URL

Tip: there is no need to head your CV ‘Curriculum Vitae’.

Personal or career profile

If you choose to include this you must be focused and no more than 3 or 4 lines. The purpose is to highlight your objective or motivation for a particular career.

Education and qualifications

Starting with the most recent first, list and date all previous education and qualifications. Include any professional qualifications.

Tip: the amount of space given to any section reflects the importance you attach to that information. So if your postgraduate degree is more relevant, you may decide to provide more details including your dissertation title, relevant modules and projects you completed.

Experience (or Employment)

This should include any internships, voluntary roles or previous jobs. There are various ways of presenting your experience. You may wish to choose subheadings such as ‘relevant experience’, ‘volunteering’ and ‘additional employment’ putting the most relevant first. Include dates, company names and job titles. Give more information on jobs/duties that are relevant to the job you are applying for and less on those that are not so relevant. Try not to list everything you did, but select the things that will interest the employer and demonstrate your suitability for the post. Include any key achievements.

Skills

If you have presented most of your skills within each of the other sections, you may choose to call this ‘Additional Skills’ e.g. IT skills, language skills and a driving license. However, if you are following the skills based CV, more detailed evidence should be provided on relevant skills for the job. For example, the ability to work as part of a team, manage people, customer service skills or problem-solving.

If you are including a skills section it is important that you back these up with evidence, usually one or two examples, or the employer will not be convinced.

Interests

You are able to use this section as another opportunity to demonstrate your competencies for the role.

Referees

Two references are usually required, ideally one academic and one work-related. It is acceptable to state ‘references available on request’ unless specifically asked for. Remember if giving referees to ask your referees’ permission first.

Different styles of CV

There are a good many different styles that you can adopt when creating your CV which present information differently. The primary difference in the styles is the layout of the content. The style you should use depends on what information you want to highlight to the employer.

The most common types of CV are:

Types of UK CV
Reverse Chronological	Skills based	Academic
Traditional CV format. Outlines your experiences in reverse chronological order Contains sections for relevant work experience and education. Easy to compile and useful if you have relevant experience for the position you're applying for	Focuses on skills and provides evidence of these, usually in a bullet point format Education and work experience are kept brief Relevant if you have little experience in the position or area you are applying for Be sure to match your skills to the employer's requirements	Used to apply for academic research and lecturing related roles Key extra features include: publications, your research activities and any funding awarded No more than 4 pages is recommended For more information visit: vitae.ac.uk

Other options also include

**Other options of CV include:**
Part-time jobs	Infographic	International
Often only one side of A4 outlining your education, work experience and skills Provide any details of relevant experience including skills developed and responsibilities	A relatively new type that uses graphics to display your qualifications, skills and experience in a visual way Used primarily to apply for creative design oriented jobs.	Different countries have different requirements – be sure to check these out before you apply In the UK we typically use a two-page document. This can differ in other countries – make sure you research the application method

Tailor your CV

Different CVs for different roles – tailoring isn’t just for clothes

One of the messages that you will hear us repeating is that your CV must be tailored to the job for which you are applying. But what does tailoring your CV actually mean?

In a nutshell, there isn’t such a thing as one CV that suits all job roles. Every time that you apply for a job, you will have to think about what you can tweak so that it suits the job description. Of course if you are applying for very similar roles, the tweaking will be minimum. Here a few steps to ensure that your CV is tailored.

Analyse the employer's requirements

Don't rush in, read the entire job description, this is your insight into what the employer is looking for and your CV needs to match this or it will end up on the rejected pile. For example, if the job requires skills in teamwork and communication, you need to ensure the employer can clearly see that you have these skills somewhere in your education or experience. Maybe you worked in a team on a for a voluntary role or as part of your course. The important thing is that the employer can see that your CV is tailored to them and not a generic CV that is being sent to every employer.

Identify skills and provide evidence

After analysing the job description think about your own skills and how they match the jobs criteria, gather examples and use these examples in your application. A way to ensure that you tailor your CV and show that you are the ideal candidate is to the role is to match your skills, education and experience to the job specification.

Putting it together

Put yourself in the employer's shoes and speak their language. If they are looking for someone with managerial experience, focus on the aspects of your jobs that have allowed you to supervise or manage people, motivate a team, plan strategically, etc. If what you are applying for is a job in accounting, it will make sense to put emphasis on your experience with financial statements, looking after budgets etc.

Scanning software

Make sure your application gets read

Recent media reports indicate that many large companies use software to scan applications and CVs looking for keywords. If the keywords aren’t found the application is rejected before it gets seen by a human being.

Software will often be company and role-specific, so it's more important than ever to tailor your application to the job you are applying for. You should repeat back to the employer specific words and phrases they use in the job description.

Use the links below to get more information about scanning software and how to 'beat' it:

Lifehacker - tips on working with and getting past scanning software.
Quintessential Careers - a dvice on effective use of keywords in CVs.
Resume-Help - information on use of scanning, use of keywords and general tips on writing applications.

Review your CV

Take time to cast a critical eye over your CV. What does it look like? Is there too much text?

Be honest with yourself, take 30 seconds to scan your CV, if you were the employer would it be immediately clear that you have the skills that meet the criteria? Take some time to look over our CV checklist below - don't forget to get your CV checked!

You can also ask a friend or family member to review your CV using our helpful worksheet. Also use our CV checklist as a final check before sending your CV away.

Try our CVs Learning Pathway

CVs and Applications

Designed to support you in writing high quality CVs and applications which will appeal to graduate employers.

Try our Cover Letters Learning Pathway

Cover letters

A cover letter introduces and markets you effectively by complementing your CV or application form. Even when applying online, you'll still need to add a cover letter setting the scene to your application - all CVs and applications should be accompanied by one unless specifically instructed not to include one - it sets the context as to why you are applying for this particular role, at this particular company. In this Pathway you'll find out what is a cover letter? (and how to write a good one)

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