Hobbies on your CV? Yes or no, and what sounds good?

[morningpaper]

Hobbies on your CV? Yes or no, and what sounds good?

Gardening and reading makes me sound so BORING.

Yes. Things that show you are creative, good in a team and alone etc.

None on mine, I don't think it's the done thing any more, I've never seen it on candidate cvs.

I've got a list of voluntary work under "Voluntary work"

I might not bother with hobbies then

when recruiting I always used to think that if someone was regional junior figure-skating champion or whatever that it showed a bit of character. but it was never the thing that decided whether they got an interview or not.

When i was recruiting I didn't even read them.

I always put

Activities
Member of Whatever Fencing Club
Member of Whatever Choir

Interests
Fencing, cinema, literature, classical and choral music

and don't put Hobbies or anything like Reading or Watching Films. In my defence am often applying for pretentious academic jobs where they're more interested in what you've published than what you do at the weekends.

That's interesting because whenever I recruit I find hobbies really interesting, but mainly because it just shows who is Sad And Boring and who isn't

I'm not sure it ever gives a positive impression

oops sorry x posted mrsbadger I'm sure YOU aren't boring or sad :-o

I'd say only if you can't show the sort of qualities Northerner talks about in a paid work context. in the end they want to know what you're like in work. voluntary work looks good though.

Only if it's something like charity work, running the local Am Dram society, that sort of thing - shows transferable skills.

Wouldn't bother with things like gardening and reading, after all most people like doing that sort of thing. Better to leave yourself a bit more room on the page to talk about your work experience.

Actually I think I put them in to try and prove I am a 'balanced' person and mitigate the uncompromising scienceyness of my CV - IME too many scientists do nothing but science and are hence dull.

i thought most scientists put hobbies such as "star trek meetings" and "running blake's 7 chatroom". dp was a physicist, that's what his friends put.

when I was recruiting it was the first thing I read
but only worth it if it's something out of the ordinary
put mumsnetting go on go on I dare ya

fennel - my point entirely!

and fencing is mildly unusual...

I have heard pub quizzing is a good one (although some jobs that wouldn't sound great I'm sure!). The reason for this is it makes you sound sociable and possibly have a good general knowledge.

When we recruit I would only publicly talk about preferences being based on issues that were relevant to the job, but I would secretly be thinking 'thank God, someone with a life!' (unless all they put down is reading, of course, which is a bit weak).

One point of hobbies is to give the interviewer something to talk about. Rarely do they care what you do, but often you spend more waking hours with the people you work with than the one you sleep with.
Thus they want to be able to get on with you.

We have one guy with a formal qualification in stage fighting. Not likely to be used in his job, but makes him seem interesting, at least on paper.

Also a lot of interview processes include people who have no knowledge of the specialist skills you bring to the firm. This may be a senior person, or HR. Thus by providing them with something to talk about you are making their life easier, which is always a good move.

As an aside, my firm has produced a guide to getting a job in a bank. It has interview and CV sections, if these are any help let me know.

If you want the relevant sections of our guide, I'm Dominic of PaulDominic.com

i read a lot of cvs and tend to have a bit of a giggle at the hobbies, though i have to admit i once put yoga on mine years ago after attending a very short course on the subject.

only thing that would sway me either way is

anything involving the internet (would worry person would be surfing all day long in the office)
anything that would involve requesting large amounts of time off such as high level competitive sports
references to the pub etc would sway in in my favour coz i know they'd fit in well with the rest of my team!

g

I'd say don't put them on at all unless they are something really worth being proud of as I think they are more likely to put people off than not.

Reading/gardening/eating out = I have nothing interesting to say about myself and a big empty space on my CV to fill up (I also eat breakfast and regularly go to the toilet)

Football/ computer games/ model railways = I have no friends.

World champion hanglider/ prize winning tortoise racer/ llama wool weaver = I am a liar and banking on the fact that you know nothing about my hobby so wont ask me any questions about it.

.

"Good" hobbies are those that show some achivement or skill. So "cooking" is bad, but "passed grade 3 in artesier de coulon" is good. Anything that implies that you will be missing work is of course risky, then again when I was at Coopers we had several olympic athletes who were seen to have markeitng potiential. I saw them as scary obsessives.

As for the possibility of it looking bad worth remembering that for most jobs there are lots of applicants and coming second is the same as coming 100th.
Thus sticking out is good.
Imagine your CV gives you 100 points on some imaginary scale,and that value is true for all employers.
In a world with any large number of 101's you're screwed.
Imgine some change that instead makes you 102 for some employers, but 50 for all the rest. You average pointage is worse, but you're going to win more races for the job.
The trick is thus to stand out, without being whacky.

Hobbies are good if there is nothing else to say -e.g. for a first job. For an established professional - no. As a recruiter, I am interested in whether you have the skills and experience to do the job and whether you will fit in. Your spare time is your own business.

As a pimp myself I don't fixate upon hobbies much, so I'm a bit with ClerkKent there. It's worth remembering that you may see a pimp's views aas right or wrong but typically we filter at least a bit, and if you don't get past us, there is zero chance of getting the job.

And yes when I was in the talent pool the thought of a pimp filtering me was not one I relished.

I think hobbies contribute to the "pub test", which many of our clients (mostly in banking and government) unoffically apply. They want you to be someone who is easy to work with. That's a highly personal decision, but critically important.

There are other ways of achieving this, and certainly not worth creating a hobby for.

We empasise good manners in candidates as well.