Get yourself noticed and stand out from the crowd with
Improve your CV application to interview ratio with a clear, concise, well formatted, tailored and digestible CV
Keep the viewers attention preventing them skipping through the document
Formatting
101
- Uniform formatting throughout the document
- Word or Google Docs have the most recognisable styles
- Use a clean and crisp font such as Calibri or Arial
- Black text on a white background
- Avoid Italic and underlining
- Complex downloadable CV templates are questionable, albeit novel
- Two pages is the gold standard, but three or even four is fine when structured well
- Use bold headings to divide each section
Structure
101
- Name and contact details – at the top
- Personal profile or statement – to summarise brief into paragraph that summarises your abilities and aims
- Core Skills – offering a snapshot of your key skills
- Work Experience – reverse chronological order and be broken down into core skills
- Education & Qualifications – at the top if exceptional, at the bottom if not
- Hobbies & interests – optional but do include if you think will add particular value
Ground Rules
101
- Every word counts, think brevity over hyperbole as your audience will get bored and skip on quicker than you think
- Stating facts without figures or tasks without results will not stand out from the crowd
- Tailoring a CV and covering letter to a specific role is about as important as writing a CV in the first place
Detailed Instruction On
Each Section
Name and contact details
- First thing at the top, you don’t want them to be missed, you can add a professional title next to your name, make sure the email is professional looking, phone number and general location
- Don’t – include your full address, date of birth, marital status or a photo of yourself, all unnecessary and take up valuable space and more importantly the readers attention
Personal Statement
- First content which summarises your skills, experience and knowledge
- Grab the readers attention, excite them and encourage them to read the rest of your CV
- Give the audience an overview of your industry specific skills, types of companies your worked for, qualifications you’ve gained
- Most importantly the benefits that you deliver for an employer
- Keep it short and sharp, between 5-10 lines, pack it with in demand skills and experience, avoid cliché terms like “hard working team player”, be authentic
Core Skills
- Bullet pointed list of core skills, your most valuable attributes over 2-3 columns
- 2-3 words each so they jump off the page as a snapshot of your offerings, they can be digested in seconds
- It clarifies your relevance immediately, making sure readers stick on your CV and don’t skip past it, otherwise they may read an unusual job title or a company they haven’t heard of
- Tailor to target roles




Career Experience
- Demonstrate your core skills specifically in the workplace, proving the difference you make
- Exhaustive detail in recent roles, far less detail in older roles
- Where possible quantify the impact the action has on the employer such as on saving costs, generating revenue, saving time, improving processes, hitting targets or helping customers/team mates/stakeholders
- Structure is date, company, role title and an outline of the company
- IMPORTANT – breakdown key responsibilities into subheadings which match your previously listed core skills. This allow you to put down far more content, yet it still be digestible and the audience can skip to more relevant key core skills for their opportunity
Education & Qualifications (above Career experience if exceptional, below otherwise)
- List qualifications, institutions, dates and grades obtained
- Make a call based on your seniority if you feel secondary education is now relevant
Technical Knowledge & Systems
- List your key technical Accounting, Regulatory, Legal and System knowledge
Hobbies & Interests
- Include if you feel will have a positive effect
- If relevant to industry / discipline and highlights a genuine passion
- Impressive achievements like sporting or charity work work well

