Has anyone used a CV writing service? Help!

[Floridagirl]

I've recently been made redundant, and although I have applied for about 20 jobs that I am more than qualified for, I haven't even got as far as interview stage. I have a feeling that my CV is probably holding me back so I'm thinking of using one of the services that rewrites your CV for you.

However - there's so many of them! And they all pretty much charge the same. So, have you used one, if so, which one and would you recommend them?

All help appreciated!

Anyone?

Hiya, didn't want to read and run. I got mafe redundant 10 years ago and found a lot of free resources at the time. I don't know if that kind of thing is still available? I found them through my local library and job centre, they don't really advertise themselves so you'll have to ask. Good luck

Hi
I am not working at the moment and have taken the time to revamp my CV. I found that actually getting the template right was half the battle as it helps you order your career info more effectively - I used a downloadable template service called My Perfect CV - it costs about 6 quid a month but with a week or so free trial so obviously if you move fast it's effectively free

I have a feeling that my CV is probably holding me back

Well, obviously, as it's the only thing they have seen.

I wouldn't pay for a review, I got a 'sample' review once and it was awful.

Ask a few friends to look at it, research CV guides on the internet and make sure you have things in the right order etc.

Focus on what you have personally delivered or achieved and be careful not to simply rewrite your job description. Use strong words like 'delivered', 'managed', 'devised', 'ensured'......rather than more passive expressions like 'was part of a team where...'.

There is no perfect way, there are probably as many ways to write a CV as there are people!

If you want to PM me I don't mind taking a look and telling you if there is anything that particularly jumps out as needing to change. I am no expert but have seen quite a few through my job and re-wrote my friends one recently - it was 6 pages long

I had a free review that didn't make me want to pay for a rewrite. I've found that adding a one-sentence 'professional profile' thing at the top of my CV with lots of buzz words and career highlights has made my CV slightly less invisible. That's as far as some (all?) recruiters/CV sifters seem to look. Good luck - it's a tough jobs market, and recruitment practices and priorities are difficult to fathom.

Please DONT
My dd used to work in recruitment and her stance was they aren’t any good

Get a decent up to date cv and any good decent recruitment company would tweak it

Get a decent up to date cv and any good decent recruitment company would tweak it

No they don't.

Plus, as a recruiter within an organisation myself I specifically ask agencies not to tweak CVs, I want to know how the person wrote it themselves, so they may get client instructions not to.

But, very few do that anyway. And the few times I have seen that done it has made it worse, often cutting out whole relevant chunks.

I'm struggling here too, all the advice is to put what you actually delivered ie increased sales, cut the budget. My jobs just haven't been like that so I feel stuck.