Did you know that, on average, seven seconds is all it takes for an employer to go through your CV and make a final decision? Seven seconds! That’s how much (or should we say, how little) a hiring manager needs to determine whether or not you’re a qualified candidate.
Which is, honestly, not that surprising. Hiring can be a very tiresome process, so most hiring managers try to skim through as many CVs as they can—in the shortest time possible—to try and find the right candidate.
That means: it’s your job to help them find that candidate!
So, in order to do that, you’ll need to do a few things to stand out from quite possibly a huge list of CVs. To help you do that, we present to you a few hacks that you can do in the next five minutes to give you that all-too-important competitive edge:
Most CVs are filled with long, winding paragraphs that take copious lines to say something when it could have been said in one. Lots of adjectives and adverbs are stuffed into sentences with the goal of impressing the reader, which, unfortunately, almost always backfires.
We’ll be the first to tell you: It won’t impress them. Short, concise sentences are always much more powerful than meandering paragraphs. So, trim the excess. Be succinct. Don’t fall into the trap of describing what you just said. Simply make your point—focusing on verbs and nouns—and move on.
Imagine that the employer is about to pay you a visit, and they’re arriving within the hour. What would you do? You’d make sure everything’s nice and tidy, and that nothing is showing any signs of improper maintenance or the like. Right?
Well, you need to do the exact same thing to your CV? Tidy things up!
Space items evenly. Keep your paragraphs short (remember the first hack?). Make use of tools like bullet points and tables to display statistics rather than listing them in sentences. Use standard, clear fonts, and avoid fonts like Time News Roman or Georgia, as those can be pretty hard on the eyes.
It’s often tempting to fall into “features” mode when listing out your achievements. Your sole focus will be zeroed in on everything you did, but nothing to tell of what results you produced.
To illustrate this with an example, say you’re a graphic designer applying for a job. On your CV you’ve written, “Designing eye-catching visuals for sales-oriented media.” That’s feature-based. No-go.
Instead, try writing something like: “Improved conversion rates on a sales page by 20% using advanced graphic design techniques”. It is a lot more impactful, and more importantly, memorable. Fill your CV with tangible achievements, and you’ll be way ahead of your competition.
Three’s Not The Charm
It goes without saying that improving your CV can be an incredibly time-consuming process, often demanding too much of your attention—when you’d rather be applying for jobs. However, if you’re applying to jobs with a poor CV, your chances of getting hired will be pretty low.
But that doesn’t mean you have to do all the work.
Our professional CV writers will handcraft for you the most streamlined and powerfully concise CV—which will highlight your strengths and position you among the “top 1%” of all applicants. Thus, leaving all your competition behind whilst massively increasing your chances of getting handpicked by your dream employer.
Need more CV tips? We also have a reservoir of applicable tips to improve your CV on the go. Check out our blog!
