You’ve poured hours of time and effort into crafting the perfect CV, but you’re just not receiving the enthusiasm and responses you’d hoped for.
This can be hugely frustrating and even disheartening.
You have the best qualifications, years of work experience, and you’re eager to put your hard-earned skills to practice.
So why aren’t companies lining up to interview you?
Usually, the answer doesn’t lie within your suitability, but within your ability to convey that suitability to recruiters in your CV.
You may well be the best person for the job, but if you can’t communicate that quickly to recruiters and hiring managers, then you will continue to miss good opportunities.
But by rectifying one or more of the following mistakes, you can get yourself back on track to becoming a highly sought-after candidate.
You didn’t do your market research
Selling yourself in the job market is no different to selling a product or service – you need to understand your market and provide a solution to their problems. In job-search terms this means that you need to understand what you target employers want from a candidate in your field – and show them you have those attributes.
However, many candidates begin their CV writing process by simply adding their current role to the top of the page without any idea if the content they are adding will appeal to their potential new employers.
Before you type one word on your CV, you must find out exactly what your target employers want to see in it - this step will eradicate 99% of your CV problems. Scour the job boards, read industry news, speak to recruiters and do everything you can to find out what the in-demand talents are in your profession before you start writing your CV.
Armed with this knowledge, you will be in a much better position to write a CV that will capture the attention of recruiters.
You overcomplicated the design
A common mistake job seekers make is to over-indulge when it comes to formatting their CV. From complicated layouts, to confusing colour schemes and elaborate fonts, many people get carried away with aesthetics and fail to create an easy reading experience or highlight the key information.
Keep your format simple, organised, clean and to-the-point. Focus on making the CV easy for busy recruiters to digest.
Stick to clear bold headings, legible fonts, and well-divided sections of information that have been logically ordered. Bullet points and subheadings throughout are perfect for a stressed hiring manager who is reviewing their 102nd CV of the day.
Your CV is too long
Although it would be nice to think that every job application we send is read in full, the reality is that recruiters are normally inundated with CVs and they have a limited number of hours in the day with which to read them.
Long CVs do not get read in full and sometimes important information gets buried at the bottom – which leads to good candidates being skipped over.
Keep your CV at around one to two pages in length to meet the attention spans in modern recruitment. If you struggle to do this, cut down old role descriptions or even batch very old jobs into a summary line. Employers are only interested in your current skill-set, so in-depth descriptions are only required for the most recent 1-3 years of your work.
You haven’t focused on results
Writing about your responsibilities is necessary, but to catch the eye of a fickle recruiter, you must describe your impact.
Employers are looking for people who can make a noticeable difference to their business, so you can prove this to recruiters by including quantified results in your CV.
For example, you could include monetary figures for any revenue generation or cost saving exercises you were responsible for. Or perhaps you’ve been involved in projects that have improved efficiency and saved company resources.
Adding these types of achievements, backed up with hard facts and figures shows employers the ROI they will get from employing you.
You haven’t updated for 2020
Reflecting on the past months, the biggest “game-changer” has been Covid-19. It has drastically changed the way many workforces operate, and will likely have reduced the number of job vacancies open to you in the short term. It’s advocated the importance of flexibility and the ability to adapt swiftly to new situations.
With this in mind, make sure that your CV highlights your own resourcefulness and willingness to adapt to change.
For example, are you willing and able to work remotely? Can you prove to recruiters that you have space and equipment to run a home office, if necessary? Can you promote yourself as an individual who can meet deadlines and work efficiently without continuous management?
What qualifications do you have that prove your ability to meet modern expectations within a workforce? Have you taken any recent courses to broaden your knowledge? Have you shown resilience by moving into a new field seamlessly?
Your forward-thinking attitude and open-mindedness may just be what your CV needs to earn a second glance.
2021 will be a challenging year for job seekers, but if you are able to adapt and sell yourself effectively to your target employers, you could still make the career progression you had been hoping for.