CV help please

nimbo

Hi,

I am wanting to hand in a CV for a job that I want....

However I am really bad at doing CV's and have never had any luck with one...

Could you guys please give me some advice?

I have removed town names, and it is in Ariel 12 pt...

nimbo

[FONT=&quot]Professional Profile[/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]An enthusiastic self motivated individual who is conscientious and hardworking. With experience of cash handling in environments working with customers face to face. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Excellent with the public with great customer service skills. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Experience of working in customer focussed environments.[/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Polite, patient and understanding personality.
[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Is the above Ok for an opener?
[/FONT]

ohreally

nimbo wrote: »

no worries posted elsewhere...

Where....?

nimbo

haha sorry cross posted.

I took down the whole CV as i thought it may be too much of a mouthful to look at...

Hence the small segment posted now...

nimbo

Hi i'm looking for some key phrases to complete the profile section....


aaaaaarrrrrrrggggggghhhhhh

this is soooo hard to do.

I just want to write

'please give me the job I need it and I'll work my butt of for you...'

nomadical

nimbo wrote: »

[FONT=&quot]Professional Profile[/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]An enthusiastic self motivated individual who is conscientious and hardworking. With experience of cash handling in environments working with customers face to face. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Excellent with the public with great customer service skills. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Experience of working in customer focussed environments.[/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Polite, patient and understanding personality.
[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Is the above Ok for an opener?
[/FONT]

Hi Nimbo,

My opinions:

For your opening sentence, the should be a comma and not a full stop after 'hardworking'. This probably seems like a minor thing but most employers will be up on grammatical mistakes.

I don't think this should be your opening though. If it were me, I'd call it a 'Personal Profile' rather than 'professional' and put the cash handling/customer service in a separate 'skills' section. Then your 'Personal Profile' should be about your personality. So you can have the first sentence, then maybe a little bit about how friendly/outgoing/bubbly etc you are. I would have this as a short paragraph or too and no bullet points in this section.

Then I reckon it should go:

-Skills (bullet points)
-Work Experience (you could call it 'Professional Experience' if you prefer. Also bullet points)
-Education (put the subject, grades, institution and dates)

Of course there are so many ways to do a cv, and people will all tell you different things. This is the format I have used and its done me well so far!

A lot of the big job sites (try Monster and Total Jobs) have all kinds of different CV templates. If you think that would make it easier find one you like the look of and download it, then you can just add your info in.

Good luck with the application! CVs are such a pain!

maryroberts

I'm curious - why take off town names - is that the norm for CVs now? Surely it's useful to know where someone has worked? I'm just reviewing my own CV so I'm interested to hear views on this.

jbreckmckye

nimbo wrote: »

[FONT=&quot]Professional Profile[/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]An enthusiastic self motivated individual who is conscientious and hardworking. With experience of cash handling in environments working with customers face to face. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Excellent with the public with great customer service skills. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Experience of working in customer focussed environments.[/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Polite, patient and understanding personality.
[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Is the above Ok for an opener?
[/FONT]

I have a little experience from recruitment; I can weigh in on a few points. I'm going to be a bit harsh, though, because I know how demanding these gatekeepers can be.

nimbo wrote: »

Professional Profile

Probably don't need the heading if this follows the title / address / contact data.

nimbo wrote: »

An enthusiastic self motivated individual who is conscientious and hardworking.

Says who? You need to substantiate these claims with cases and examples. Anyone can say they're hardworking, and everyone will. Sentences like these used to make me switch off immediately.

Oh, you didn't do it here, but in case anyone else is reading: whenever I saw a CV that said anything woolly about being an 'excellent communicator' or 'great team player', that was a big minus right from the off. So don't do it. If you have to tell me you're an "excellent communicator", then you're evidently not.

nimbo wrote: »

With experience of cash handling in environments working with customers face to face.

How much experience? A week on a till at a charity shop? Six years' doing lunchtime rushes on a high street retail chain? Unless you tell me, I have to assume the former, even if you've actually got the latter.

nimbo wrote: »

Excellent with the public with great customer service skills.
Polite, patient and understanding personality.

Again, I need substantiation. Anyone could say this, so it's not enough.

nimbo wrote: »

However I am really bad at doing CV's and have never had any luck with one...

CVs are simply documents that make a case for employing you. That's it. As you write and design your document, keep asking yourself, 'how does this *actually* build my argument?'. Assume the person reading this is going to be paying their own money to employ you (in small businesses, they actually will). What can you say to give them cast-iron certainty that you're not just spewing buzzwords? This is your one chance - don't waste time on filler!

EchoLocation

nimbo wrote: »

[FONT=&quot]Professional Profile[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]An enthusiastic self motivated individual who is conscientious and hardworking. With experience of cash handling in environments working with customers face to face. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Excellent with the public with great customer service skills. [/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Experience of working in customer focussed environments.[/FONT]
· [FONT=&quot]Polite, patient and understanding personality.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Is the above Ok for an opener?
[/FONT]

The following may sound a bit pedantic, but then any potential employer may well be pedantic...


It all reads like it's in the 3rd person. It should be statement from you as in 'I am...', 'I have...' etc. Make the whole thing a bit more personal.

'self motivated' needs to be hyphenated.

You shouldn't begin the second sentence with 'With...' in this context. Either use a comma to join it to the first sentence or reword it in the 1st person as advised above.

'With experience of cash handling in environments working with customers face to face' is maybe a bit of a mouth full, I'd change it to something like 'With experience of cash handling working in face to face customer environments'

The first two bullet points are too similar sounding, try to make each one a distinct point with key words.

I read 'focussed' to be the past tense of 'focus', so I'd use 'focused' instead.

nimbo

maryroberts wrote: »

I'm curious - why take off town names - is that the norm for CVs now? Surely it's useful to know where someone has worked? I'm just reviewing my own CV so I'm interested to hear views on this.

i'd taken town names off for the forum only - not the actual CV.... I had posted the whole document and had for example hidden my address also...

nimbo

jbreckmckye wrote: »

I have a little experience from recruitment; I can weigh in on a few points. I'm going to be a bit harsh, though, because I know how demanding these gatekeepers can be.

Probably don't need the heading if this follows the title / address / contact data.

Says who? You need to substantiate these claims with cases and examples. Anyone can say they're hardworking, and everyone will. Sentences like these used to make me switch off immediately.

Oh, you didn't do it here, but in case anyone else is reading: whenever I saw a CV that said anything woolly about being an 'excellent communicator' or 'great team player', that was a big minus right from the off. So don't do it. If you have to tell me you're an "excellent communicator", then you're evidently not.

How much experience? A week on a till at a charity shop? Six years' doing lunchtime rushes on a high street retail chain? Unless you tell me, I have to assume the former, even if you've actually got the latter.

Again, I need substantiation. Anyone could say this, so it's not enough.

CVs are simply documents that make a case for employing you. That's it. As you write and design your document, keep asking yourself, 'how does this *actually* build my argument?'. Assume the person reading this is going to be paying their own money to employ you (in small businesses, they actually will). What can you say to give them cast-iron certainty that you're not just spewing buzzwords? This is your one chance - don't waste time on filler!

don't they get time frames from the actual document rather than the key points?

as well as the evidence to prove I'm hard working?

I don't got CV's!!!!!!!!

bring back person specs for jobs.