At Construct-A-CV, the modern CV company, we deliver some of the best construction CVs in the building industry. There is no doubt that a professionally written CV is the best way to get that job! £49.99 is a very small amount as against the enormous salary you will get at that new job that you so richly deserve. In theory you shouldn’t do your own CV as it is almost impossible to be objective about oneself! However, we help our clients whether they pay us or not! So we give free CV writing advice on how to write a CV which will help you on your way.
There are many reasons why a person does not get a job, even with the best CV possible. The job as advertised may have already gone to someone else and the advert is only running as a statutory requirement, or the advert is a fish from head-hunters or similar. There is also no accounting for taste and the person doing the interview or screening process may have prejudices. Most people have pre-conceptions, which work both ways. Matching a person with a job is quite often a matter of luck. Perhaps the most difficult thing is to actually apply for the right job.
The skill of writing that perfect CV is really concentrating on matters that you can control and giving the reader (employer) exactly what he or she wants to read. There are, of course, do's and don'ts in how to prepare a CV.
An excellent CV should show you can:
Organise data and thoughts concisely and objectively.
Present complex information in a user friendly way.
Be exact and true in every detail.
Communicate in a clear and driven way.
Show that you have the exact skills and competencies required.
The modern way to write a CV or create a top CV that will get that job is to focus upon the needs of the interviewer and to choose your words very carefully as you must use those precious first seconds to grab the reader’s attention. The brilliant CV writer must be aware of the reader’s time, and make him or her feel that reading your CV is much better than watching TV or reading the paper! No one is paid just to read CVs and the potential employer has lots of other things to do at work. The professional construction CV is not meant to list every task carried out and requires CV skills to ensure too much is not written. The perfect CV example is to briefly convey expertise and to create enough enthusiasm from the reader to get that interview.
DO NOT:-
Include invented facts or claim that you have skills that you don’t have.
Add jargon or buzzwords, as the professional CV will use everyday clear language that anyone can understand.
Post your excellent CV on the web if you don’t want your current boss to read it or until someone else has read it.
Forget to proof-read and spell-check. One of the best CV tips is to spell-check from the back to front to catch the typos. This slows your reading enough to properly focus on each word. The worst proof-reader is the author!
Overlook qualified people who may review your written CV. You are advised to get at least two other people to proof-read the finished CV who are professional CV writers or recruiters. Other people who are close to you may be able to help you as they probably know you better than you know yourself. Writing your own winning CV requires more objectiveness than one’s own view which is obviously subjective.
Send your completed and hopefully winning CV to prospective employers until you have a fully working answer-phone or email address as hoping employers will call you in the evening is madness!
Leave a nutty message on your answer-phone as you never know the personality of the prospective employer or his/her sense of humour and could be seen as unprofessional.
Use automated online CV templates (e.g. Wizards or DIY CV services) as CVs created this way look like mass-produced CVs and are no replacement for time and thought. Identical CV formats are obvious to the professional hirer and if you can’t take the trouble to do it properly than the CV is likely to hit the bin! Your CV and working life is far more important.
Use multiple CVs as employers want a clear sense of where and what you have been and where you want to go.
Make use mass-mailings, broadcast faxes or emails (spam) as employers can suss these as well as you can, if not better. Such mailings are a waste of your time and money and won’t do justice to your new brilliant CV!
CV Length
There are no rules as to the right length. There is a bias towards brief, clear CVs but someone with a lifetime of work is obviously going to have a much longer CV than the newly graduated. The length of a CV depends on the number of jobs done previously during your unique working life and beyond.
In order to realise how long your CV needs to be, it may be good to follow these rules for good CV practice:-
The ability to communicate effectively is prized by employers so use your career Curriculum Vitae as a means of expressing this talent and ‘write short’.
For each action statement made, think whether this information makes an effective marketing pitch.
Is there a way to convey the information using fewer words? It is unwise to sacrifice clarity for brevity.
Put your head on the reader’s shoulders and see if you are using your 30 second sales-pitch effectively.
If you have to go onto a second page then don’t pad that page out merely because you have available space.
Never use staples and try to avoid folding the CV if possible.
As you read each word in your pro CV, ask yourself: “Does this word add to my sales-pitch?” Can a shorter word or phrase be used instead?
Employment Gaps
It is not good to hide gaps in your work history or make-up start or end-dates, as this may well come back to haunt you later, and if discovered before the contract will almost certainly result in failure. You could be sacked if these lies are discovered at a later date!
"If you do not fail now and again, its a sign that you're playing it safe."
Woody Allen
Most people get laid off or fail. Many employment gaps are in fact times used for other skills e.g. raising a family or caring for loved ones. These skills may well be competencies needed in the new employment! Most gaps can be explained away in an interview and can only make you more human to the employer and is an opportunity to show skills gained in voluntary work or software expertise. Few employers consider employment gaps as unacceptable.
Interim Jobs
Whether you should include interim jobs is debatable and very much up to you, but, they can show added skills or talents and also explain away employment gaps. It may be that the employer could use these as an excuse to lower your potential wages! However, if an employer uses this trick it may back-fire on them if you don’t take the job or get lured away by a competitor.
Job Hopping
Job hopping is really only a problem if you have been doing it for years and it is becoming habitual, but a few years of different jobs can easily be explained in the CV or resume. The skill of the objective professional CV writer is to make these events into assets and add value to the product, which is you. Job hopping can show that you adapt to the changing markets and that you have gained extra skills and have leant lessons.
Self Employment
Include self employed work as you would any other employment but do not invent work titles (e.g. Managing Director of a one man band). Many former entrepreneurs fear that future employers will see them as non team-workers or failures. Many self employed people show excellent skills in running they’re own business and even if the venture was a failure this does not mean that you are a failure and can be put down as a lesson leant. Most employers recognise the will-power and devotion required in a small enterprise. Use the experience gained during self-employment to gear your CV for success.
Paper
Many people, these days, use coloured paper, so in fact white quality paper will stand out even more than before. The better the paper, the better the response and 100gms weight is highly recommended as a minimum. It will be money well spent in your job search.
Font Colour
Black ink is still the best, as one never knows the favourite colour or colour-prejudices of the reader. There is a problem, in this respect, for emailing as many word-processors underline spelling mistakes or change the colour of text automatically. This is exactly ‘how not to do it’ as the change draws the reader’s attention away from your intended design. You need to unblock the text on your computer.
Spacing
It is best to use the Tabs and normal indents, as well as usual line spacing. The safest way is to pre-set lots of tabs on your CV templates and use these rather than multiple spaces. Using a smaller font size also creates lots more text room, but not if it makes the CV difficult to read. Spacing does add to ease of use but not at the expense of content.
Font
A normal or standard font is much more preferable to the flashy ones as they are easier to understand and are more familiar to the most readers. Over-use of bullets or exotic fonts will concentrate attention on these rather than the words themselves. It is most important that your properly positioned words showing off your skills get all the attention. It is the content not the design that gets the job. You should use only two font sizes to exemplify the design of your perfect CV. One for the headings and the other for the paragraph text. It is best to be very frugal with boldface and the use of italics as well as underlining are not to be recommended.
Margins
It is unwise to set the margins too small (so that you can get more text in) as this creates too many words for the reader to take in per line. Instead, use fewer words and be more selective. One inch margins are the normal setting.
Contact Details
Your name and address and other contact details are arguably the most important information on the CV. These are there to identify you and to make sure that when you get selected, and that they can contact you speedily. Do not disguise your gender or ethnicity by using initials instead of a name and degrees should also be omitted. Identity and training are two separate things, so adding a qualification to your name heading on your CV is duplication and space-wasting.
If you live in a flat then always include the flat number as an employer will not be put off by the fact that you don’t have a house! PO boxes are not to be recommended as they imply insecurity. You may not wish to include your present work number as you do not want to appear to be someone who wastes employer-time on other employers.
Email is more and more common and is an absolute necessity these days. However, if you give one, then make sure you check it everyday and using a wacky one is obviously not appropriate. Also, use the same email address for sending in your CV as the one on your CV heading as it saves response-time and your CV may be dumped if copying and pasting is needed.
Statements
No article on how to write a curriculum vitae would be complete without stressing the importance of an action statement in each paragraph. This represents the skills which you can bring with you to your new job. These are the 'heart' or 'meat' of your perfect CV and if you want to write a good CV then you must present compelling proof in action statements. These statements should be brief e.g. 'Cut monthly expenses by 23%', 'Increased sales 100% in 6 weeks,' 'Met all time sensitive projects,' 'Streamlined book keeping and accounts' etc.
Each action statement should be preceded with an action word to describe your competencies.
Volunteer Experience
Volunteer experience is valuable information to a prospective employer if the skills used are relevant to the new job e.g. team building skills, patience and determination.
Education
It is worth including the dates of degrees or educational qualifications. You should be proud of your education and history. You should also mention any seminars or other courses attended especially if done whilst working as this shows dedication. If you have little formal education then focus on writing the other sections where your self-taught skills will be evident e.g. volunteer work or software skills.
References
It is not really necessary to include in your good CV a list of the referees and many people these days merely say that these are available on request.
Software Skills
If you use a PC then include all the office applications that you use e.g. Excel, Word etc. Also when writing always print the envelope as this displays your software skill or rather if you hand-write the envelope it negates those skills.
Language Skills
Include all languages spoken but designate those in which you are fluent and specify whether you have written as well as verbal skill.
Memberships
If you a member of an organisation then include the details if this is relevant to the job in question. The test is whether the information is needed to make an effective pitch and you should use your judgement to assess any risks in inclusion.
Summary
A summary is really not necessary either, as a CV is in itself a summary of your working-life, so do not waste space by repeating information.
We sincerely hope that the above advice will help you in your job search. Please remember, however, that for a mere £49.99 we will do all of this and much more! Let us give you an unfair advantage and give you the best CV ever. We offer a ridiculously generous money-back guarantee so you have nothing whatsoever to lose and so much to gain……………………Please see details of our packages
