CV template - the detail – what to include in each section

CV Header contact details

Make this clear and in a large font to show your contact details clearly. It needs to contain your full name and contact details, including telephone number, address and email address. You are not required to include your date of birth, sex or age, so leave these out, but listing that you have a full clean driving license may be useful for some roles.

Personal Profile

This short section is ideal to sell your skills as a person, indicate your career aspirations and to convey in a positive way why you are seeking a new role. A poor personal profile can do more harm than good, so don’t over-complicate things. Avoid information that has no relevance to your CV, your bubbly personality for example, and steer clear of clichés and jargon. Use your personal profile to showcase your skills, experience, attitude and behaviour in 2-3 sentences at a maximum.

Career History, including key achievements

Your career history is a showcase of your employment history and the responsibilities that you held in each post. It should show the the key achievements in each job you have held.

Pull this together

Create a heading for your most recent or current employer, with the month/year you started and finished, together with your job title and the Company name and location. If you had a number of different roles within the same Company, list the dates and then detail the specific roles and responsibilities below.

For every position held, first summarise the key facts and figures in a short paragraph below the heading – briefly including such details as your key duties, the size of your team, turnover, and your level of responsibility. This is critical information and helps an employer or recruiter assess your level of experience.

Lastly show your key achievements and responsibilities for each role. For clarity we would recommend bullet pointing this information. Remember to include any extra responsibilities that made you stand out from your colleagues.

List your Key achievements

Your key achievements form a key section of your CV. It needs to really engage your prospective employer - so use facts, figures and timescales to demonstrate that you are an accomplished performer in your current and previous positions. Don’t be scared to sell yourself, but make sure you back up each statement with solid evidence. For example:-

• As general area manager in the North West I successfully led a team of 50 to increase sales by 8% in 2006.
• As Marketing Manager I successfully managed three creative agencies to deliver 10 campaigns throughout 2008, on time and to budget
• As the Team Leader in the contact centre for XX I reduced absence levels by 20% in 3 months I achieved this through improving staff communication systems, introducing absence procedures and developing team exercises

Describe these using strong words that demonstrate what you actually did, such as:

The achievements you select should demonstrate a number of different competencies, and be tailored to the particular job you are applying for. Many successful candidates tailor their CV each time they apply for a different role to personalise it to the reading managers needs.

Finally, explain any gaps in your employment history by detailing the dates along with a short, concise sentence providing the reason why you were not in employment - travelling the world, for example, or spending time with family

Education and Qualifications

Rule of Thumb here, put your best foot forward and start with your strongest qualifications. Begin with university or college if appropriate, followed by high school qualifications at A level or equivalent, and then more junior qualifications. You need only provide details for your most important and relevant qualifications – e.g. course content and level of degree achieved at university with subjects within, reduce the detail for less significant qualifications, e,g, 6 O Levels at Grade 1-3.

Remember vocational and trade qualifications which may give you the edge over other candidates. Detail all relevant courses or company training you have received by date, course title and content if relevant.

Relevant Skills

Include skills and training here that is additional to your roles, and not immediately obvious from the previous sections. Examples of this would be:

• IT skills
• Office Skills
• Language Proficiency
• Health and Safety

References

You do not have to list these on your CV, it is sufficient to simply state references available on request. Most employers will expect you to have two work references, ideally one from your most recent role.

You do not usually have to name them up front in your CV though and they will not be contacted before you are made an offer of employment, just have them prepared in case you are successful.