What are the basic things to get right in a CV?

You must do all the following. Employers can and will bin CVs which fail at these basic steps:

• keep it short—preferably one page, two at the most—but give the employer’s needs more weight than my ideas
• ruthlessly cut—for every sentence, ask if it adds materially to your case
• choose a conservative font—Times is a safe bet
• lay out the page nicely and certainly include a decent left hand margin (people write notes in the margin)—say, 3cm
• put your name at the top and on the right (if people put printed CVs in folders, the name will be hidden if it is on the left)
• put all the important stuff on the first page
• include a good photo (head only)
• include your contact details
• get someone else to read it through for comprehensibility, relevance and style
• Top tip  spell check it, and get someone else to check the spelling and grammar too (like it or not, this is the first criterion that employers will use to bin your CV).

Why bother with this?

Employers want to see people who:

• are motivated to do the job and interested in their business. You can’t expect them to read your mind, so you have to make it clear that you are those things
• Top tip  are prepared to make an effort
• are able to see what they, as the employer, need and who are able to demonstrate they can go some way to meeting them
• can show some creativity, invention or imagination.

Conclusion

You’ve just got to distinguish yourself from the rest.  Over and over, employers tell me that this is important to them (along with a willingness to make an effort, to do more than is asked for).

You’ve got to show you understand that the employer’s needs are more important than yours.

In the words of my Russian master at school, who was fond of quoting Shakespeare,

Be bloody, bold and resolute

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> Get that CV right