A CV or a Resume?

CVs and Detail: As a CV is a more detailed document than a resume, all the information should be presented in reverse chronological order so that the most recent, and often most relevant, information is presented first. Most CVs begin with a professional profile summarising an individual’s key skills and personal traits. Where possible, and if space allows, a section outlining your objectives can be included and should ideally highlight the specific title of the job you wish to apply for.

Your Skills & Your Qualifications: The next section in the CV should normally cover your qualifications and education, although this section can be moved to further down the CV if the information contained here is not particularly important. The education section generally emphasises lower level qualifications whilst elaborating further on higher qualifications, e.g. graduate and post-graduate. Where appropriate, I.T. proficiency and any languages spoken should follow this section with any major achievements being included after this information..

Career Summary & Work Experience: The career summary or work experience section is quite often the most detailed part of the CV, with each role undertaken being listed along with a description of key duties, key responsibilities and notable achievements. Ideally, your most recent jobs should carry more detailed job descriptions, and it is often the case that positions held ten or more years ago will have just one or two bullet points of information or, indeed, no description at all. This makes sure that the most relevant info is given priority in the CV.

Other info for inclusion in CVs: The CV should always finish with a summary of personal details and a list of any hobbies or interests. If the CV is to be used for overseas applications, it is also important to highlight your Visa status.

Curriculum Vitae: When a ‘Curriculum Vitae’ is specifically requested for an application in the US market, rather than a resume, it is widely expected to be a much more comprehensive document, even than the typical UK format. It is not unusual for such documents to be as long as 10 or even 20 pages and they are generally requested for academic or scientific based roles.

Resumes: As mentioned, the resume is a far more tighter document than a CV and the professional profile and objective sections that were important on the CV are often not included at all. The education section tends to be the same as that of the CV but the rest of the document is very different indeed. A resume focuses more on specific skills and capabilities, rather than the full details of job roles undertaken. As a result, the career summary is generally a simple list of job titles with key skills, achievements and capabilities included in a separate section altogether.

It is important to keep the resume as concise as possible and certainly to keep it within the ideal one page format. There is no room for too much detail – interests and hobbies don’t need to be included – and every effort should be made to target specific roles or companies.

Professional Preparation: Getting professional help, this is definitely the most sensible option; there really is no substitute for taking advantage of in-depth professional experience. Please visit our site to find out how our professional writing services can help you now.

A CV is often all a prospective employer has to judge you on, so creating the right first impression is cruciall. Whatever job you’ve set your sights on, with our market-leading position in this field we are confident that our assistance will maximise your chances of getting it.

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