Make your CV stand out

It is imperative that your CV makes you shine from the very first glance

No matter what level of role you are applying for, it is imperative that you spend time preparing your CV because it is a cut-throat market out there... You will be going up against other worth candidates who might have spent an equal amount of time preparing their CV.

Whilst all of your CV is important, below we have compiled 10 important points for you to concentrate on. You must not miss any of these because doing so could ruin your chances of getting through to the interview stage.

1) Keep your personal information to a minimum - Outside of your name, address, contact numbers, e-mail address, your age and if you have a full UK driving licence, an employer will not want any more information at this stage. If they do require anything else, this will be requested at the interview, or you will be asked to provide it.

2) Give a short summary - This is your mission statement; your chance to grab a prospective employers attention by using a short, sharp and snappy introduction. Say a little bit about your strengths (never mention a weakness!), mention your time keeping, trustworthiness, attention to detail, how you work well as part of a team.

3) Use bullet points - Bullet points make reading content much easier. A bullet point serves as a way of saying to someone "This is a point that is important to this document" and should be used to emphasize a short list such as your skills related to the job you are applying for.

4) You have strengths... mention them! - Remember that a CV is a way of selling your services to an employer. They will want to know that you are capable of the job at hand, so list skills that will give off the right messages.

5) Write your CV for the job being applied for - Not everyone thinks about this - after all, if you were recruiting for a Java Developer, would you really want to know about someones ability to offer skills from a previous unrelated job? By all means show your abilities by talking about past roles, but spend your time selling your ability to do the job you are applying for.

6) Don't fill the page with nothing but text - This might seem a little strange, but imagine if someone puts a full page of writing in front of you... What are the chances of you being able to look at it, cast an eye over and decide if this person is someone you want to interview? Make use of white space on the page and don't cram everything together. Allow someone viewing the page to be able to pick out important words.

7) Don't make your CV too long - CV's arrive in all shapes and sizes and the ones that will make it into the final list are those that are concise and contain the relevant information. If you CV runs to more than 2 pages, you need to think about revising it. 1 - 2 pages is perfect in all but a handful of situations.

8) Keep your font clean - The preferred font for reading page content is Times New Roman but as long as you don't go for a fancy font, you should be OK but try to stick with those that make reading easy on the eye.

9) Make good use of sub-headings - below are some of the more popular headings you will see on a CV, but don't feel you need to use all of these.

• Personal Statement
• Education & Qualifications
• Employment History
• Key Skills / Relevant Additional Information
• Professional Training / Professional Development
• Interests, Activities sand Positions of Responsibility
• Referees

10 ) Consistency - This is another point often overlooked. No-one wants to see a CV that is written using different font styles, different bullet points, tab spacing etc.

Hopefully these points will give you a few key areas to follow when writing your CV.

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