To ask for the worst CV's you've ever seen?!

[Isitgiroday]

About to pimp my CV prior to a career change after almost a decade in the same industry - looking for tips and hints of what to avoid!

Yeah ot means life, but nowhere it says whole life. This was actually probably the only quite consistent advice I had over the years. Interestingly

@LadyFlumpalot

I keep two niche hobbies on my CV in an "other information" section that's about three lines long. I was tempted to take them off but my last two interviews have both started with "oh, I wanted to ask you about doing xyz" so I guess they must be standing out.

Please can I ask - I had a situation where I left a job due to the commute, my closer to home job turned into a crock of badly mismanaged shit and I jumped ship after a year and went back to the one I'd left. I've always struggled with how to put that on my CV. Putting it as:

2000 - 2003 ABC
2003 - 2004 XYZ
2004 - 2014 ABC

always seems clunky. I've toyed with the idea of just missing out the XYZ job and saying that I worked at ABC from 2000 - 2014. The XYZ job has no relevance to what I do now. Can anyone advise?

@Ladyflumpalot, I'm in the same position and I go with the clunky look. I was prepared to be quizzed extensively about why the middle one didn't work out, but actually no one seemed bothered. And it meant my references matched the dates I'd given, rather than being off by a couple of years.

Yeah ot means life, but nowhere it says whole life.

Even the bloke who put his nurseries down as 'academic background' still blatantly omitted his life history before the age of 2. Still, 'learned to walk and not poo myself quite as much' aren't the most in-demand qualities

Random apostrophes @Isitgiroday are quite annoying

[quote BrightYellowDaffodil]@riceuten

It doesn't cost anything to send an email, though I guess they want to avoid telling people so they don't hassle them for a reason they weren't chosen

I know exactly why I wasn’t chosen - because I wanted to have some semblance of a work/life balance, and the people interviewing me seemed to have no concept of this (“Oh, well we all love our jobs so much that we stay until we’ll into the evening” - my explaining that I had a sport at which I compete which meant I had a commitment outside work was met with blank looks of incomprehension...) and TBH it just saved me the job of saying I’d rather eat my own feet than work there

(And I landed a much better job a week later!)[/quote]
Yes, I had a similar experience (but was offered the job, so I must have hid my disappointment well!) with a large housing association who, when asked about flexitime, looked at me as if I had mentioned sealclubbing as a hobby.

"No", they said, "we don't have flexitime, we expect staff to work the hours the job needs...but we would expect you to come in no later than 9am and go home no earlier than 5pm". "Evening meetings?" "Yes, about one a week, sometimes more". I was too aghast to say anything more, all the while thinking "Not for 20 grand a year in London as an Admin Co-Ordinator, I won't".

I have also been advised to reword perfectly good sections because they thought the grammar was wrong - whereas their rewording was completely incorrect.

This angers me far more than it possibly should. The clear implication is that, because I currently have a job, I am automatically more intelligent and academically much better than you in every way, just because of the situation that you're currently not in work - for whatever reason

Similar but not quite the same, although I probably did get just as angry - I was working as a sub-editor on a privately-owned scientific journal. I would send the copy (edited correctly) to the printer, who would then send a proof back for checking. I was constantly having to re-edit it to "remove spurious comma" and changing American spellings back to UK spellings.

In the end I had to ring them and ask if they were simply running it through a spell and grammar checker, which they were (a US, non-scientific one) and could they please STOP because it was wasting everyone's time! The software once put a full stop in the middle of a sentence it considered to be too long, thus destroying ANY sense therein.

They did stop using the software on my stuff after that, thank goodness!

Ones that apostrophise plurals, for example CV's.

I'd widen your search to include local government as well, to be honest.

@riceuten Thanks but I'm not looking for an NHS role now This was many years ago. I was trying to be helpful.

Job advert stated that previous customer service experience was an advantage. Applicant wrote, “I have previously exposed myself to customers on the front desk.”
Oh dear

Sorry this might have been said but dont put you are dynamic or similar words etc. Also if older only put about last 10 to 15 years if jobs - depending how many you have then group the rest together in one paragraph just setting out what sort of work you have done and say details can be provided. Also I would put the education at the end of your employment ie. Have that first after name etc especially if the job you are going for want more experience than education. Good luck.

I work in corporate PR

Yes PR is in the title but it's very businesslike and quite serious.

We had an application from an actor who was in Corrie in the 90s and subsequently had a (short lived) music career.

His pitch seemed to be 'I used to be famous so I can get your clients some attention'.

I felt very sorry for him.

Some of these are priceless.

Apologies again to the apostrophe police - it was typed in haste. I actually studied English at uni but you wouldn't know!

It turns out I have to fill out an online application which contradicts much of the (serous!) advice given here. It's for a social care related post within the local council so very different from the corporate world (thank f**k). The first thing they'll read is a 4000 character personal statement. Better get scribbling!

*I mean serious, of course, not serous before all the pedants wade in!

Don’t include how if your name is Googled you’d see that in a similar role they had been caught stealing thousands and thousands of pounds worth of good but ‘won’t do that again’

I paper sifted a CV once that listed this in the next of kin section
Name: mum. Relationship: good
Didn’t forward it on.

@Gwenhwyfar

"She emailed back directly and attached her cv to the email. No other comments or explanations.

So bizarrely out of touch."

Or maybe she was just applying to keep the Job Centre happy.

Absolutely, but those people tended to follow instructions to the letter IME because otherwise they might get in trouble at the job centre, and also she was actually quite qualified. Apart from the little thing that her behaviour disproved her CV/cover letter claims of attention to detail and great computer skills. Sending the cv through the email was fine, that happened a lot and you set them right, it was sending the application through the comment to webmaster that was the odd thing.

I am an OT for which you need a degree. Somebody once applied for a job in my department as an OT without an OT degree based on the fact that she had been a carer for her child ie a parent.
Her child didn't even have any disabilities. She obviously felt that she was up to the job.

Once came across a cv for a professional role in academia where the author listed himself as having been a "professional gambler" for nearly 2 years.

It was inappropriate to the role and came across as a cover up for unemployment. Being honest would have come across much better. Or something like "self-iniated research into x field with a view to publication".

Include any languages you know.

It seems really simple but I've helped teenagers write CVs who were fluent in community languages, but they didn't put them on their CVs because, "I don't have a GCSE in it"

I had to persuade a few that, "fluent in spoken Urdu" was better than GCSE French grade G.

These were students wanting to work in health and social care where speaking Urdu might be the thing that gets you a job over a similar candidate.

Include any languages you know. Well.

Some people include any language they know without knowing them well enough to have practical use. Holiday level (6 sentences) of Spanish/Russian/Italian is for nothing and not a begginer level in reality.

"Name: mum. Relationship: good"

That's hilarious.
On the other hand, I always refuse to give a person to contact in an emergency (which I presume what next of kin was getting at) and I would hate having to give details of family members when I'm not even working somewhere.

@user86386427

If submitting electronically ensure you end track changes and delete comments, had a CV sent last month (from someone with a PhD applying for a technical role) who had had someone review their CV and left all the comments on! The funny thing is I agreed with the comments but she didnt make all the suggested changes, she should have.

Many, many years ago I looked at my own (large) employer's Vacancies pages and downloaded a job description (Word document). I was flabbergasted when I opened it to see that all the Track Changes notes were still there. Par for the course from our HR department back then, unfortunately. I also saw jobs advertised with 'tbc' still included here and there in the blurb. It made a bad impression on me and I was internal - what a prospective applicant thought, I can't begin to imagine.

One CV that stuck out for all the wrong reasons: I was screening applications for a Forensic Psychology Master's course. One applicant talked at length in his personal statement about his passion for justice and how he would welcome the chance to be involved in making sure that wrongdoers were appropriately punished for their actions. He went on about this at such length that I was left with the impression that he would have liked to be one of those vigilantes who got publicity at one point for travelling around the New York subway in some sort of pseudo-military uniform looking for antisocial behaviour. He didn't get an interview (not just because of his vigilante-like remarks).

"Yes, I had a similar experience (but was offered the job, so I must have hid my disappointment well!) with a large housing association who, when asked about flexitime, looked at me as if I had mentioned sealclubbing as a hobby."

I know someone who interviewed to work for a place dealing with gender equality and was told something like "we don't want one of those mothers who have to rush home". She wasn't a mother, but didn't want to work there anyway after hearing that.

@SchrodingersImmigrant

Include any languages you know. Well.

Some people include any language they know without knowing them well enough to have practical use. Holiday level (6 sentences) of Spanish/Russian/Italian is for nothing and not a begginer level in reality.

Yes, obviously 6 sentences is not very useful, but I've read people saying not to put any languages in which you have a basic level, but I'd disagree with that. While you can't work through that language, you have a base upon which to build, it shows that you made an effort to start learning and you might be able to understand emails in it, etc. So I include my basic language, but note my level.

@tillyandmilly

Nhs recruiting is a fairly simple points based system. However I think people are thrown by the supporting statement bit or try and use the application form a bit like a cv, missing the personal statement and not realising the weighting it has

In the job advert there will be a link for a job specification. That job spec will give you a check box of describe and essential criteria. All the recruiter does is rate you as met, not met or partially met each of the points then those with the highest points go through.

If something is on that list then make sure its in your personal statement. Eg. If it says car driver, write that you are a car driver. The downside of the points based system is that the three points you get for fully meeting the car driver criteria are equal to the three points you get for any other category eg.having relevant extra training (eg a masters!) Or even experience in the role.

Sometimes on the job spec it will have soft skills like punctual and obviously if you've maintained a job for 6 years I can assume you are probably punctual but if you haven't referenced it you don't get the points.

Obviously a good shortlister won't stick rigidly to the points system and progress people to interview who look promising so if someone has accrued lots of points in the experience part, and not got some of the easier points (and you suspect they have they have those skills but haven't written them).

However If you have 15 candidates that scored say 30 and then you may have to cut off at 30 regardless of those below. Equally it would be hard to take a 28 person to interview if you hadn't progressed someone who was a 29.