Compass House Consultancy Ltd - Personal Development - Develop your CV

Career Development

Preparing your CV

Lets be Clear - The Objective

A CV has only one objective:-

TO GET YOU THROUGH SOMEONE'S DOOR

To do this it must capture and hold the interest of the reader, who may be busy, or bored, or have a pile of similar documents on his desk. A successful CV will have some of the qualities of an advertisement while conforming to accepted norms of the recruitment business. It should -

attract attention
develop interest
arouse curiosity
clearly define the product (you !!)
highlight key selling points
be attractive in layout and easy to read
be truthful and accurate in detail

It should NOT -

leave the reader in doubt about the main thrust of your career or your entitlements in this field.
omit facts which are generally regarded as basic essentials for a CV - eg. Name, Address, Qualifications or age. (Note: Age should not be included in CVs sent to USA or certain other countries.)
leave unexplained gaps in an otherwise continuous career outline.
puzzle the reader with technical terms or obscure abbreviations without explanation.
force or encourage the reader to perform mental arithmetic eg. to convert a date of birth to age, or to see if a percentage turnover increase is compatible with absolute figures given elsewhere.
make the reader search for the information he needs - most commonly latest job, qualifications and age.

A CV should preferably be confined to two pages. This is discussed in more detail later. However, some people, such as computer experts, may need to describe their experience or usage of particular technology or equipment which may best be covered by a short Appendix. In this Appendix technical terms may be used as you may assume it will be studied by someone appropriately qualified. So long as your target appointments lie broadly within the general parameters for which your entitlements are strong, there should be no need for more than one CV. Indeed it is difficult to handle a search using more than one at the same time. An application for a job which is known to require experience not emphasised on the CV, (and therefore almost certainly marginal), can be strengthened by reference to this experience in a covering letter.