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(ARTICLE) 18 Mistakes That Ruin Your CV

Added 2021-06-27 12:36:44 +0000 UTC

Your CV is all an employer has to build a first impression of you, so just one mistake can seriously damage your chances of landing a job interview.

1. Not Tailoring Your CV

Your CV must be targeted to appeal solely to the niche of employers and vacancies that you are applying to.

Not tailoring your CV is the most damaging mistake that you can make when writing your CV.

If you only address one mistake on your CV, make it this one.

When an employer reads your CV, the fundamental fact they want to understand is whether or not you can do the job.

If your CV doesn’t include the skills and knowledge that your target employers are looking for, you won’t be shortlisted – no matter how well written and structured your CV is.

Do your research and find out exactly what your desired employers are looking for, then make sure that you are making those requirements prominent on your CV.

2. Wild unproven Claims

“Best real estate agent in London”?

“Most successful project manager in the industry”?

Claims like this can be hard to prove and do not look very credible.

Use facts and real examples of your success in your profession to prove your value to employers whilst remaining humble.

3. Big chunks of text

Huge unbroken paragraphs of text are a reader’s worst nightmare – especially when recruiters are readers are looking at hundreds of CVs every week.

BIG MESSY PARAGRAPHS = UNHAPPY READERS

Instead of making employers read through large messy chunks of text.

Break the information up into short paragraphs and bullet points.

This way they will be able skim read your CV and easily spot the information that they are looking for.

4. Not showing your impact

It’s great to demonstrate your skills and abilities in your CV but you also need to show what sort of impact they make on an employer.

Don’t simply state your responsibilities and knowledge – but go on to explain the results of your skills when you apply them.

RESPONSIBILITY + RESULT = IMPACT

For example, don’t just write;

“Producing financial reports and reviewing spending”

Elaborate to show your impact

“Producing financial reports and reviewing spending, resulting in a £10k annual saving”

It may not be possible to do this for every one of your responsibilities but try to do it where possible.

The addition of numbers/figures/facts is a great way to quantify your impact.

5. Not giving a high level summary of roles

When writing your role description, avoid diving straight into the details of your responsibilities without setting the scene first.

It will make it difficult for readers to understand how your work impacts your employer and how you could fit into a new team.

Start each role with a brief summary of what your employer/team does and how your work contributes to the organisation at high level.

6. Meaningless clichés

Your CV should focus on hard facts like skills, achievements and industry knowledge.

Cliché Phrases like:

“works well in a team or individually”

“I'm someone with a can-do attitude”

May look fancy but they don’t actually tell anybody much about you.

Concentrate on explaining exactly what you’ve done for your employer and how it has benefited the organisation to show the positive impact that can be made by hiring you.

Bulking out your CV with vague and overly complex descriptions like the ones above will just confuse and annoy employers.

7. Adding reasons for leaving

Recruiters don’t need to see the reasons you left for every job on your CV.

Your CV should be mainly focused on attracting employers by selling your talents.

You will need to explain your reason for leaving your current or previous role and joining a new employer, but you can explain this briefly in your cover letter, don’t waste space on your CV with it.

8. Elaborate fonts

One of the most important aspects of an effective CV is that it should be easy for recruiters and employers to read.

It can be tempting to use a fancy font to add a bit of elegance to your CV, it will actually make your CV tough to read and give recruiters a bit of a headache.

If you were sifting through hundreds of CVs a week, would you prefer to read one with a clear and simple to understand font or would you read one with a complicated font.

9. Salary requirements/details

The purpose of your CV is to secure job interviews by demonstrating your suitability for the role(s) you are applying for.

Money does not come into the equation at this stage.

If you want to secure the highest possible rate, for example,

if a company is able to pay £40k for a job and you’ve already told them that you only want £35K in your CV, then you will make it very difficult to negotiate closer to the £40k mark when it comes to offer stage.

**Article I wrote on How to negotiate a higher salary**

https://www.patreon.com/posts/48079947

10. Not enough detail in current role

Your current (or most recent) role, is one of the most important factors in your CV.

After giving your CV a quick scan, most recruiters will jump straight to your current role and study it in some detail.

The reason for this is that your current role gives recruiters the greatest indication of what you’re currently capable of.

If you have rushed the addition of your latest job to your CV and you’re not including all of your newly acquired skills and experience, then you are doing yourself a great disservice.

When updating your CV, dedicate some serious time and effort to writing your latest role, it will pay off in the long run.

The only time this could be acceptable is if you are a recent school leaver and your most recent role is less relevant than your education or other factors in the CV.

11. Too much detail in older roles

Use short summaries and lists for older roles.

Employers don’t need to know all of your day-to-day responsibilities from a job that you did 3 years ago – they will only glance at them at most.

12. Photographs

Unless you’re a model or actor, then a photograph will not add value to your CV.

Space on your CV is limited so use it wisely by filling it with information that will convince the reader that you are worthy of an interview.

13. Too many pages

A 10 page CV is not going to be read by a busy recruiter or employer – they just don’t have the time when dealing with tons of applications.

Keep your CV as close to two pages (MAX) as possible and make your points short and sharp, to ensure that you are communicating the important information quickly and creating a high impact CV.

14. Basic language

Your CV is supposed to be an impressive professional document and the language you use plays an important part in that.

If you use overly simplistic terminology throughout your CV, you run the risk of appearing as an average candidate with poor communication skills.

Avoid writing sentences like this;

“Helping out with different important tasks to free up time for the manager”

It looks very simple and isn’t very descriptive due to the basic wording.

Instead, use more precise language and well structured sentences to explain your points properly.

For example you could change the above to:

“Supporting various business critical functions to relieve management of administration duties”

15. Ordering roles incorrectly

Roles should be listed in reverse chronological order;

meaning, that you start with your current role at the top and work your way down to your oldest role.

The reason for this, is that recruiters want to know what your current abilities are and they will study your current or most recent role in great detail to find out.

They are not hugely interested in the roles you did 5 or 10 years ago, as you’ve probably progressed quite a lot since then.

16. Poor file naming

When you email your CV to somebody, the document name can be clearly seen in the attachments.

If you haven’t given the file a suitable name, it can look a little unprofessional.

Take a couple of seconds to change the file name to something that creates a more polished image.

17. Grammar / Spelling mistakes

Strong candidates will be expected to have strong written communication skills, so grammar mistakes can seriously harm your credibility.

Proof read your CV to check for grammatical errors.

With automatic spell checkers coming as standard nowadays, you really shouldn’t have incorrectly spelt words on your CV.

It goes without saying that spelling mistakes will damage the perception of your CV massively.

Don’t become completely reliant on spellcheck to eliminate all errors though – it won’t always pick up typos or miss-used words, so take the time to proof read your CV.

18. Lies

Do some people lie on their CV and get away with? yes… but it’s not worth the risk.

Firstly, some recruiters will look into facts that don’t add up, so you could find yourself getting caught out in the early stages and even blacklisted from certain agencies.

Secondly, if you manage to get a job based on skills and experience that you don’t have; you’re going to struggle to perform from day one in the job, and will eventually get caught out anyway.