1. Basics: CV or Resume? Who is hiring?
CV or Resume
"CV" (Curriculum Vitae) is a Latin word that means "course of life"
"Resume" is a French word that means "summary".
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Usually, in the North American context, a CV is used for academic purposes, it will likely include any publications, awards, honors, and similar, and it can go up to 10 pages in length.
In the same context, a Resume is a concise document that is used for job applications. Its purpose is to provide succinct information on your background – skills, professional experience, education, and others – to your potential employer.
In the rest of the world, most of the time, a CV is used for job application purposes, and it is not that common to see the usage of a Resume.
Having said all this, in reality, these two words are often used interchangeably in the job application context, so you don't have to sweat it.
Simply, we are talking about a document here that will help you to land that interview! We will call it a CV from now on.
Headhunter, Recruiter, Hiring Manager
Headhunter
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Usually works individually or for a recruitment agency. They’ll connect you with a potential employer, and earn a commission if you are hired.
Recruiter
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Usually works for your potential employer. They’ll handle your recruitment process from start to end.
Hiring Manager
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Often confused with the other two roles, actually, this is the person who will decide to hire you, or whether you will even get a chance for an interview. They are not recruiters or headhunters (as with everything, there will be exceptions). They are rather business line managers/executives. They might highly likely be your boss if you are hired. Most importantly, this is the person you need to impress with your CV.
2. Length: How many Pages?
Firstly, there is no hard rule that a CV must be 1 page long – save any efforts trying to cut it down too much.
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You can use below for a reference according to how much professional experience you have:
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0-5 years: 1 page
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5-10 years: 1-2 page(s)
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10+ years: 1-3 page(s)
Try not to go beyond 3 pages as it will greatly diminish the chances of your CV being read by the recruiter or headhunter, even before reaching the hiring manager.
3. Type: Reverse Chronological vs Skills-based (Functional)
Reverse-Chronological
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Most common. Lists your Professional Experience from the most recent to the least. Stick to this style unless you have a reason not to.
Skills-Based (Functional)
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Lists your Skills from most important (to the position you are applying to) to the least. It is worth considering; if you changed many jobs, but developed a few particular skills, OR, you don’t have much work experience and you want to emphasize your skills instead, OR, you have work experience but not particularly related to the position you are applying for, and you want to emphasize your transferable skills.
Infographic CV
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Least common. It is worth considering if you are applying to a creativity-related position, such as Graphics Designer. Else, be mindful that it might raise eyebrows.
4. What to Put In
Name and Contact Information
Obvious? Not necessarily. Many candidates simply forget to put their contact information:
Name, mobile number, email address, a link to your LinkedIn profile
You don’t need to provide your detailed home address though – unless specifically asked by the employer for some reason (for sending you some hard copy forms to fill maybe? But it is not that common really).
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Consider only including your neighborhood/town/district/ etc. name, and that should be enough. It is beneficial for data privacy purposes as well.
Summary
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A preferably not very long list of your skills, which consists of:
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Hard skills: Skills that you are trained on, are measurable and are teachable. Example: Project Management
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Soft skills: Skills related to your personality and habits, and affects how you work as an individual contributor, or as a part of a team. Example: Problem-solving
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Transferable skills: Skills that usually are soft skills, and sometimes hard skills, which you developed in another job, but will help you at the role you are applying for
Make sure each skill you put in the summary is somehow explained or justified in the next sections so that you won’t be seen as just throwing in random skills.
Professional Experience
Name of the company you worked for, or of own company, job title, duration
Include 2 or 3 bullet points to summarize what you did using positive action words, a.k.a power words, such as “achieved”, and ideally throw in some numbers as well. Example: “Achieved 30% increase in domestic sales within 6 months”
Education
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Name of the school, degree, years attended
Put in any scholarship you had, or any significant award, or accomplishment
Certificates
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Create a list of certificates, and for each, include:
Name of the certificate, providing institute, awarded date, expiry date (if applicable)
5. What to Leave Out
Ethnicity
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Not relevant in any context – this is the year 2021
Marital Status
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Shouldn’t be anybody’s concern. This is about your personal life
Religion
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Shouldn’t be anybody’s concern. This is about your personal life. (unless you are applying for a religion-related role)
Date of Birth / Age
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To avoid unconscious bias of “too old” or “too young”
Gender
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Not relevant in any context – this is the year 2021
Sexual Orientation
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Not relevant in any context – this is the year 2021
Photo
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We noticed that many candidates still put a photo in their CVs. It is better to leave out to avoid unconscious bias
Salary
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Never expose your hand on this one; be it past salary, or expected. Leave it for the interview
6. What to Consider
Hobbies / Interests
You can include if the hobby or interest is relevant to or aligned with your experience and/or the job you are applying for.
For example, if you are applying for a Team Leader position, having “Captain of the local sports team for the last 5 years” in your hobbies or interests will be greatly beneficial for your cause.
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Conversely, “Climbing” won’t help much if included as a hobby, for a Software Developer position.
Languages
Similar to hobbies/interests, it would be a good idea to include any languages you are skilled in if it is relevant. If you have official certificates/exam results showing your degree of control on the language, make sure you indicate those, e.g., TOEFL score.
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Try to add only the languages you are at least conversationally proficient in. There is not much value in adding “French: Beginner Level” to be frank: it’ll seem like a hobby rather.
Explanation About Any Gaps
It is totally fine to have gaps in your CV, as long as you are upfront and honest about them.
If you are applying for a role that requires collaborating with multinational teams for example, and let’s say you took some time off and have traveled extensively at one point in your life, it would be greatly beneficial to put this in your CV.
However, let’s say you were unemployed for a year (which is fine), it wouldn’t be a great idea to include this as “Year to Year – Unemployed”. Rather, either leave it out, and explain if it is asked in the interview, or put it in your CV but highlight any courses you have taken, any relevant books you read, and similar activities you did to utilize that period.
7. Cover Letter: What's the big deal?
Let’s follow a contradictory approach to common belief here: you might not need to write a cover letter unless it is mandatory for you to submit the job application. With the number of applications they are receiving, chances are low that the hiring manager, recruiter, or headhunter will have the time to read your cover letter. Rather, spending the effort on improving your CV could be a better option to choose.
If you do write a Cover Letter, make it specific to the role you are applying to – do not submit a generic – copy&paste letter.
8. CV Document Format: Word, PDF, or?
If you are uploading to a career website, usually MS Word file format (.doc or .docx) is a good idea. It will be easier for any application system to process the document/extract your information from it.
If you are going to email your CV to a recruiter, headhunter, or hiring manager, stick to PDF, as it is elegant, and it will prevent any unintended changes in the document.
9. ATS: What is it about?
An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) is simply a software solution that can process a large volume of documents in a short amount of time and is used by many companies to help them in their recruitment processes.
Why? Because usually there are hundreds or thousands of candidates applying to an open position, especially at Fortune 500 companies, and there is no way or need for humans to go through all those CVs to select a few candidates for an interview.
Rather, HR staff can easily sort, filter, or rank candidates according to multiple criteria, and pick the ones they deem fit for the role.
10. Free CV/Resume Template
Feel free to download and use the reverse-chronological CV template in MS Word format below:
to land that Interview!