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.

Full time unpaid caring responsibilities for kids/disabled people/elderly or sick people tend not to be valued in our society but the people who carry them out probably think they are worthwhile and they've gained qualities/strengths from them. I think its ok to have an opinion about them mentioning these on the CV but not to discriminate against women (let's face it it's usually women) solely for mentioning what they've gained from this period of caring

The spelling and grammar thing goes without saying. The thing is that even if you do have problems spelling, would you not at least trouble to use spellcheck or ask someone who can spell to look over it?

Someone gets it .

I have some questions:

Why is dob such a No? 'In my day' it was an absolute standard. You can see how old someone is from their work history anyway. Are you saying not at all, or just not near the top?

What is your preferred order of topics to be covered?
Does it really matter as long as the sections are clearly delineated so you can easily find the one you want?

I used to work with sixth form students helping them to apply to university. The amount of times I saw something on their applications along the lines of "I like listening to music, seeing my friends and shopping" 🤦🏻‍♀️

I primarily recruit graduates and it amazes me the amount of time I spend looking at terrible CVs, 90% of them are awful or have absolutely no effort put in whatsoever. You’ve spent 4 years getting a degree, tell me what you learned during that time not that you have “excellent communication skills” or assorted CV filler phrases.

I once got a CV that was a PowerPoint titled “why you should hire me”, in which the candidate explained that they look good in green 🤷🏼‍♀️ ... the job is yours! As long as you wear green to the office every day...

@rooarsome

I used to work with sixth form students helping them to apply to university. The amount of times I saw something on their applications along the lines of "I like listening to music, seeing my friends and shopping" 🤦🏻‍♀️

I was actually told to write something along those lines when I was in Y13 in 2005. They said we had to include non-academic interests and hobbies. Most of us put this is a section called "other interests" as instructed! (I now have a shiny and professional CV without the parts about travel and music...)

Eek! I’m about to start sending out mine after a loooong SAHP gap and I’m glad I read this!

I was always taught to put date of birth at the top, somewhere below contact details etc. Has this guidance changed? Should it go somewhere else now, or are you not supposed to put it at all in an effort to avoid age discrimination (which makes little sense if you have to list dates of degrees, old jobs etc because anyone with half a brain can make a fairly accurate guess at your age from those)?

There tends to be a lot of well-meaning advice aimed at returning mums, along the lines of showing that our time as SAHPs has given us 'transferable skills'. The pressure is there not to make it look like we've been doing 'nothing' (ha!) during these years. Not all employers are as understanding as you about not judging a woman who's had a long career gap for parenting.

Could you maybe recommend a link with good advice / examples on how best to present a modern, professional CV with a 'non-conventional' chronology? TIA.

I worked in postgraduate admissions and a CV was part of the application. I only ever saw marital status on CVs from African applicants - some even put the number of children they had!

I used to work in HR and have experience of writing CVs for people. I now work in a library, and we often print out CVs for people. I'm saddened by the number I glance at and think, well that will be going in the bin. Poor spelling, tiny or inappropriate fonts, inappropriate email addresses, unnecessary information. It really should be taught as a skill in schools.

I've seen medevielle sex listed under interests... no idea what it is still

My personal favourite was Curiculum Vitae, yes spelled that way, at the top of the first page in a large, fancy font, in colour. The person didn't put their name on the CV and this was before blind CVs were ever a thing. I was always told not to waste space telling recruiters what the document was as it was obvious and to put your name at the top.

I had a look over some CVs for a friend. One chap had put his age, weight and height on it plus the age and names of his daughters.
Another pal had CVs from Eastern Europe (I know where but I’m not saying) where one person put ‘shooting guns’ and another ‘marital relations’ for hobbies and interests.

Why is dob such a No? 'In my day' it was an absolute standard. You can see how old someone is from their work history anyway. Are you saying not at all, or just not near the top?

It is a protected characteristic. You aren't allowed to take it into account when shortlisting. It isn't relevant. Personally I discourage dates for education too, although yes you can often make a guess at someone's age from the length of their employment history.

I used to sigh every time I got a CV with "Socialising with my friends" listed as an interest. (And often the only interest.)

I had a CV from a job applicant recently that went into great detail about her skills and experience in equine artificial insemination. The job was a senior digital marketing role.

So many horrific ones when I've recruited for a few junior ish posts in my team recently.

A cover email starting 'I have always wanted to work in publishing'. Lovely, but the role is in financial services.

A long explanation of why capitalism is doomed included in their hobbies (again, why the heck do you want a job in the City?).

Not a CV, but a deeply annoying little twerp called me to complain that he'd not got an interview. Was flabbergasted and offended that I told him straight that I had stronger applicants.

Maaaaany cover emails starting 'Dear Sirs'. I work in a male dominated field and most applicants are male. Applications go to a generic inbox, but I'm reasonably well known in my industry and often publicly talk about equality, so even if they don't know that I am reading the emails personally (fair enough) they should do enough research to realise that our company culture has moved on from the 1950s.

Not all employers are as understanding as you about not judging a woman who's had a long career gap for parenting.

I agree, but do you really want to work for an employer like that?

I once had one that had a section entitled 'Achievement I Am Most Proud Of', under which was 'Saving a small child from drowning'.

Yeah, great, very brave and all that, but you don't really need to shoehorn it into your CV ...

I’m In HR and we use application forms. The supporting information is often terrible though and to be honest the quality of candidates we get for jobs can be shocking. Some of the worst are graduates, who are applying for more basic admin or cleaning roles and who think they are above such menial work. So think that stating they have a masters in History if Art is sufficient and they don’t need to bother filling out the rest. I would rather have someone with lesser education, who ‘wants the job’ Having said that there are a lot of people who have no idea how to behave in the work place and think they are entitled to all sorts of stuff for little effort on their part.
We are a large national employer with a variety of full and part time jobs is many roles. Full time salaries ranging from minimum Wage to £100k plus.

Regarding D.O.B. , this information is not shown to our recruiting managers. It’s awful to think it happens, but we don’t want people being discriminated against because of their age. Our manager won’t know your name, age, sex or ethnicity until the day of interview. We want people to be interviewed on the strength of their application not on factors they have no control over.

On the plus side, if you are polite, hard working and clean and tidy in appreance, and turn up on time and don’t have loads of ‘random emergency leave every 5 minutes’ you’ll zoom up the career ladder and be very well thought of and looked after.

Executive level hiring manager here rather than HR/Job Centre. I'm told but struggle to believe that, for this reason, whatever lands on my desk has been carefully pre-filtered already.

I've seen most of the ones mentioned.

But, might I add:

STOP BLOODY LYING ON YOUR CV!!!

Look, you might be able to fool our HR people when you do. They're HR people. They specialise in HR stuff, not in your field.

But, honey, I do! And this house of cards you've erected there is going to come crumbling down when you get to interview stage at the very latest.

If you're still studying for your MBA (and not as a mature student!): please don't write that you're a "senior program lead" on your CV. If I read this, my inner auto-translate turns it into "I am full of shit!"

Yes, I used to be young, naive and I used to believe in the good in people. That's to say I actually wasted my time on interviewing a few of these back in the day.

And, mate: "There are three of us: colleague, who works part time on project A, colleague, who works part time on project B, and myself - the one who deals with the Excel file that contains the consolidated figures" does NOT make you a senior program lead. Best case scenario on that one is: I'm marginally willing to believe you that you have basic Excel skills.

And, YES!!! to the mummy CV ones. You're female and you have kids. I'm fine with that, really. I'm also fine with you having had some time off work due to it. That's normal and I wouldn't dream of holding it against you!

But also: for the sake of all that's good and holy, stop claiming that having toddlers means you have "excellent negotiating skills" and that these are in any way shape or form applicable to clients. Having done both: I can't remember the last time I tried to talk a client out of taking their nappy off repeatedly. I also don't have any recollection of my toddler telling me that they want me to knock 10% off my margin if I'm interested in this business. It's nowhere near the same thing. And it makes you look twee and, frankly, a bit idiotic!

What are you supposed to put for hobbies?

@Awwlookatmybabyspider Most people who can't spell know that they can't, so surely they can get someone to check it for them, or use a spell check?

I wouldn't bother with hobbies at all unless they're relevant to the role. If you must put them in one or two sentences will suffice.

Oh god this scares me! I've just done a cv ... facing redundancy from a job I love that I e been in for 20 years .. sounds like I've done it all wrong 😫

I take the point about spellchecking etc, but it’s so hard for people to know what style of CV recruiters are looking for, what they ought to put first, what counts as an “acceptable” hobby to mention, coming across as a knob because you haven’t used the particular font an office prefers - I feel really sorry for those looking for work tbh.

But carry on taking the piss...