Terrible CVs

[PymChurchBeach]

Disclaimer: I know times are hard and shitty right now and a lot of people are desperate for work so probably chucking out CVs left right and centre at anything and everything.

BUT. I have worked in HR for nearly a decade now and it has always been the same. The general standard of CVs is bloody awful. I'm recruiting for a mid level role at the moment and I have seen the following:

• people using little hearts and stars instead of bullet points
• massive glamour model style photographs taking up the whole first page of a CV
• people's dates of birth and marital statuses written up at the top. Just no!!!
• wacky, colourful borders and fonts. Comic sans. Enough said.

Also - this last one is possibly controversial but when women have had a break to look after DC, there really is no need to list all the skills gained as a SAHM - e.g. "excellent time management skills etc". You can just say you had time out to raise children. That's all you need to say. I'm not going to think any the worse of you for it.

I am desperate to implement application forms rather than have CVs and cover letters but my CEO is old fashioned and will not have it.

It does seem like the job centre is giving crap advice. I think there is a big difference between mass recruitment for junior roles and more senior roles. At the junior end, we bin off a fair few. I particularly enjoy the ones that like to go on a political rant. We do applications though so most people when they submit are putting in more effort to tailor their content than a standard cv/covering letter. At a more senior level, name blind recruitment is bollocks and it’s easy to find someone on LinkedIn based on job history. Even at a more junior level, It is also entirely obvious how old someone is from their employment history. I also think it is pointless to remove university because you just then end up filtering on A-levels and making a guess at academic level based on that. Name blind recruitment is important though.

Unfortunate spelling mistakes... on one under employment history was what I assume was Shift Manager but the applicant had left out the f in shift. Shit Manager isn't really a selling point.

Spell check takes minutes!!

I once had a CV where the applicant attempted to write “I thrive in a pressured environment.”

What they actually wrote was “I thieve in a pressured environment.”

My favourite example on a competency-based application form was the man who wasn't really very organised, but was trying to learn from his wife who was very organised and got frustrated with his lack of organisational skills.

And yes to Household CEO - or rather, no. I'd much rather just see 5/10 years out for parenting than that, and our company doesn't hold it against people, either. Working parents also have to do accountancy (online banking), negotiation (no more screen time today) and admin (opening the post).

Interesting thread. Can anyone please tell me where you would put your membership of a professional body? I am a guild member, when I need to alert people to that (delivering training etc) I include the letters after my name. Where would I put that information on a CV? Thanks

I've been involved in recruiting at all levels - apprentices and grads up to senior executives and seen terrible CV regardless of seniority.

One round (for apprentices) had not one but several CVs where people had very obviously copied and pasted content from somewhere else. Not only was there no tailoring to the role, the text was also in a different color and font to the rest of the document.

Other bugbears include cover letters (for fairly senior roles) that simply state "I am applying to this role". This is not what we mean by cover letter.

I am willing to overlook one or at the most two minor spelling or grammatical errors but more than thatis clearly an indication of lack of care or interest.

I'm more relaxed about innovative (wacky) layouts/designs though As long as i can still clearly see why you're qualified, and it is an attempt to stand out rather than ineptitude i don't care much

The other thing is; make sure your personal SM is locked down, and your LinkedIn corresponds with CV. As an interviewing manager, I will look in advance.

as a careers adviser and HR adviser, I really hate seeing CVs with letters after your name. It appears very pretentious.

@sassanach

as a careers adviser and HR adviser, I really hate seeing CVs with letters after your name. It appears very pretentious.

I assume you mean when it's not relevant to the role?

In my industry, the holding of the relevant qualification has a direct impact on suitability for the role so we would always expect to see the letters. We would obviously still check the education section to see if the qualification is held if the letters aren't included.

I wouldn't expect to see letters for a degree or unrelated qualification (but wouldn't hold it against someone who included them)

This has been an interesting thread - thanks to OP for starting it .

I have a query for the HR professionals / recruiters for my situation.

I am now mid 50s and looking to return to the workplace .
Wondering how on earth to get someone to give me a chance when I have been a SAHP for 20 years and abroad for 16yrs

Any tips gratefully received !

@PymChurchBeach

lemmathelemmin

I work for an organisation that is very hot on mental health and wellbeing and we actively encourage those who have experienced mental health problems to apply.

I would always advise being honest, but my reasoning for that is that an employer who wouldn't want you there because you suffered from depression is not an employer I would ever want to work for.

No no no, do not mention protected characteristics anywhere but the anonymised application form.

The time to mention that is after you get the job.

breakfastclubb

I disagree. Mental health comes the heading of reasonable adjustments.

With 600,000 people loosing their jobs recently, maybe they don't have the luxury of choice?

^This.

I know people who are very competent and now looking at their 8-10th redundancy since 2000. Their industries/workplaces have collapsed around them - pretty much very little was under their control.

I've been at SAHP for 10 years, have very little job experience before that and a degree I've never used. I'll be submitting a blank piece of paper I guess.

BeFire

A nearly empty piece of paper is much better than 2 pages of irrelevant waffle.

I would be happy with you listing your education, any work experience that you do that, any voluntary experience you've had during your SAHP years and using the person profile to say that you're been raising children for X number of years and are now looking for a new career in X.

Apologies if this has been covered but what is the best way to sign off a cover letter? Would you still use "yours faithfully" if it is addressed to Dear Sir/Madam or is this now considered too formal?
Does it make a difference if it is a letter uploaded to a website?
It's a minefield!!

I think this thread is a bit sneery. While it may seem obvious to those of you involved in recruitment that certain things should not appear on CVs, to so many it is clearly not. Do you ever give feedback to those who have included their DOB, used an inappropriate email or picture, listed irrelevant info such as family details or hobbies, included SAHM skills to fill a career gap instead of leaving a blank space? Or do you just laugh and not even contact them to say 'no thanks'?

There is a spectrum. I’d never filter out because someone put on a dob, address, hobbies etc but I would certainly filter out for an inappropriate email address. I think you have to be aware that for junior posts, recruiters can get 100s of applications. One of the problems is that different things annoy different people. I get irritated if a statement doesn’t mention my organisation. For more junior roles, I’d rather have someone with limited experience that puts the effort in to understanding the organisation than someone with lots of experience that can’t be arsed.

@Yousureaboutthat

I think this thread is a bit sneery. While it may seem obvious to those of you involved in recruitment that certain things should not appear on CVs, to so many it is clearly not. Do you ever give feedback to those who have included their DOB, used an inappropriate email or picture, listed irrelevant info such as family details or hobbies, included SAHM skills to fill a career gap instead of leaving a blank space? Or do you just laugh and not even contact them to say 'no thanks'?

A friend of mine once wrote back to a candidate who she had initially thought looked quite promising but then the CV and cover letter were so bad and unprofessional she couldn't shortlist him. She gave him some constructive feedback, trying to be as tactful as possible. She got back a furious and very nasty email. She hasn't bothered trying to give feedback on bad CVs since...

Do you ever give feedback to those who have included their DOB, used an inappropriate email or picture, listed irrelevant info such as family details or hobbies, included SAHM skills to fill a career gap instead of leaving a blank space? Or do you just laugh and not even contact them to say 'no thanks'?

I take the time to give absolutely every single person who has applied feedback, if they ask for it. I also contact every single unsuccessful candidate.

Apologies if this has been covered but what is the best way to sign off a cover letter? Would you still use "yours faithfully" if it is addressed to Dear Sir/Madam or is this now considered too formal?

Others may disagree but personally unless you are signing off with something ridiculous like see you later alligator then I don't mind. Kind regards, yours sincerely, yours faithfully are all fine with me.

I’m in my early twenties, and will be applying for graduate jobs soon. Reading through the thread I’m shocked about some of the most careless mistakes: poor spelling, over 2 pages+ CV, inappropriate emails, etc

However, I’ve had recent advice from the careers department at my university. Some of which goes against what is recommended here

It really is hard to know who to believe. I know some people say you can’t rely on school/uni careers advise as it is outdated but in my case it’s very recent.
One of my biggest issues is that as I’m applying for entry level roles I have very little work experience, and so my CV seems quite empty
I have had one job working in retail (Supermarket) as a summer temp, and one internship in Marketing. That’s it.
It’s very hard to “tailor” my CV when I have very little to work with in the first place. (Often tailoring for me just includes mentioning university modules related to job I’m applying for)

I was told by my uni careers team to add hobbies/activities section (even though I didn’t see the point unless it was linked to the job). I haven’t put anything about cooking/travelling, instead just mentioned some basic volunteering I’ve done at a community centre as well as being a member of (x) university society. (Unfortunately i was not the president/or any other significant role in the society but I feel I have to include as my CV is incredibly bare otherwise)

Basically IME what makes for a good CV is:

Name
Personal statement related to your suitability for the job (2 sentences max)
Achievements (3 bullets - numerically led for finance roles for example)
Chronological work history, three max 4 bullets for each and backing up the achievements bit
Professional Qualifications
Languages spoken (not essential)
Academic record

Sorry stupid question but what is meant by ‘achievements’, I’m slightly confused as I thought professional qualifications would be very similar?

I feel like I need to clarify about the hobbies for people liek noseresearch

I will not hold it against a candidate if they put hobbies on their CV, as long as these are concise. If they are also relevant to the job, so much the better.

Saying "In my spare time, I enjoy cooking and run a food blog. I also swim and mountain climb." is totally fine (neither here not there really unless you're applying for a position relevant to any of the above)

Writing me six paragraphs about your hobbies = not fine (unless relevant to the job!)