The core of every application is the resume. It is no longer a secret that recruiters sometimes skim a cover letter. What they always study, however, is the resume. So it's worth investing time in designing your CV. Today you will find out which mistakes happen to you most often and how to pimp your resume.
Your resume not only ends up on the desks of local HR managers but often also in our pop-up CV checks. These CV checks regularly stop at events such as career fairs or universities and technical colleges to subject your CVs to a detailed examination. We look through several hundred resumes with you over a year.
I was continuing the theme of the perfect resume. Recently, I've been surfing the internet looking for ready-made resume templates. Some were pretentious, and some were outdated. And then, I came across a completely new and fresh look at the design of the resume. They were great modern templates like this artist resume template. I was pleasantly surprised to find this resume template.
Quick fixes for your resume
We review hundreds of checked CVs and tell you today which mistakes are most familiar to applicants and how you can whip up your CV.
Full contact details
The email address is there, the phone number is missing - or vice versa. In many resumes, full contact details are missing. This includes the postal address, email, and telephone number.
- It is advisable to give the complete area code (including the country code) - mainly if you apply to large corporations.
- You also leave the first impression with your email address. Choose a professional address that contains your first and last name if possible, and avoid talks with nicknames or fancy names.
- If your resume extends over more than one page, you can also insert your contact details on the second page at the bottom of the top.
The thing with the photo
CVs without photos have not yet established themselves in practice - at least not in Austria. So if you have to include a picture, then it should be a good one.
- Keep your photo as up-to-date as possible, do not send applications with images that are getting on in years.
- Cell phone snapshots are taboo, but they still appear again and again in CVs.
- In a white T-shirt, in front of a white house wall, every HR manager will see that this picture was a quick fix in bright sunshine.
- Be authentic and have several picture variants ready. A portrait in a business suit with an updo does not fit every job or employer.
Ensure a clear structure
The challenge with a resume is to pack jobs, further training, and a piece of personality on a maximum of two pages. And the whole thing clearly and neatly.
- Always state professional stations, schools, universities, and universities of applied sciences in reverse chronological order.
- Stick to one font and use no more than two different font sizes
- Structures the CV with the help of paragraphs
- Don't keep headings too general. You can subdivide sub-items such as "other" into hobbies, projects, or voluntary activities.
- The problem of too much text cannot be solved with a tiny font.
- Either enter complete dates with day, month, and year or use the month/year information. Years alone are not enough.
Your training and further education
Sometimes the only thing missing is little things that you as an applicant don't even think about. However, the HR manager also quickly notices minor errors.
- Always write out the names of institutions such as universities or technical colleges.
- You no longer have to include information about the primary school you attended in your resume.
- Check all data on completed training courses again: Does the given completion date match that on the certificate, etc.
- Only list those languages in your CV that you speak. If there is nothing left of the school French - it is better to remove it from the resume. In addition: Be honest about your knowledge of a language yourself.
Previous employers
Particularly interesting for every interested company: Where have you worked so far and what have you done in these jobs? However, the naming of previous professional positions is not always correct.
- Be sure to state the names of the employers fully and correctly. For each position, write whether it was a complete, part-time, or internship position.
- Some job titles are more meaningful, others less. How much additional information you have to give for each position is individually very different. In any case, be brief and do not explain anything that is not already evident from the job title.
Hobbies and Interests
The majority of employers appreciate finding out private information about the applicant from their resume. Mentioning hobbies and personal interests is an excellent opportunity to make yourself attractive as a personality.
However, interests that are kept too general say little about you. Travel, literature, cycling - it can be a lot. Use this point on your resume to tell a story: You not only enjoy cycling, but you also cycle regularly across an entire country. You don't just read, and you appreciate British crime fiction. You are not a package holidaymaker but prefer to travel spontaneously through the world with a backpack.