Career Success For Accountants

Expert Insights: Creating A CV That Gets You Interviews

In the latest of our career expert insights series, Georgina Angele of Brighton and Hove Jobs shares her tips on creating a CV that gets you invited for interview. 

Tell us a little bit about Brighton and Hove Jobs

BrightonandHoveJobs.com was launched just over 2 years ago in order to provide a service to the businesses and residents of Brighton & Hove.  The job board showcases local jobs for local people, making it easy for jobseekers to find the role they want and affordable for businesses to advertise their vacancies.  We also use the job board to connect education and business through employer engagement, to offer advice to young people and experienced candidates on applying for a job, to provide a space where charities can recruit volunteers at no charge, to promote our partners brands and advertise local news stories.  Ultimately, we aim increase employment and training activity in the city.

What makes a CV stand out?

Employers will scan read a CV in a matter of seconds, looking for the keywords that fit the criteria of their vacancy and their company.  They will read your name and current employment status/details before moving quickly through the rest of your CV.  Having a concise, clear CV starting with a great personal statement that describes your key skills and attributes and communicates your own personal brand to the employer is essential.  Tailoring your CV to each application you make increases your chances of being invited for interview.

What are some of the most common reasons why CV’s get rejected?

  • Spelling and grammatical errors – always check!
  • Poor formatting
  • Being more than 2 pages
  • Experience or qualifications not meeting the criteria for the role

What must you always do when creating a CV?

  • Tailor your CV to the requirements of the role to which you are applying
  • Write a strong personal statement
  • List your employment experience chronologically, starting with the most recent
  • Include key achievements in each role
  • Read the job description to ensure that your experience and skills on your CV match the role
  • Include your contact details!

What must you never do when creating a CV?

  • Use an unprofessional email address as your contact details
  • Send it to an employer without checking for spelling and grammatical errors
  • Use jargon or extravagant fonts – Arial, Verdana or Times New Roman are fine to use
  • Copy someone else’s CV
  • Lie!

If there were 5 top tips you could give to candidates who are actively job hunting, what would they be?

  1. Research and apply for roles that match your skills and expertise
  2. Invest time in creating a good, tailored cover letter to accompany your CV
  3. If you’re not currently working, look for volunteering opportunities in your local community.  This will keep you focussed and self-motivated and add valuable experience and new skills to your CV
  4. Do not link your personal and professional social media activity, have a business account for LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter etc. that is separate from your personal friends and family
  5. Check BrightonandHoveJobs.com regularly and sign up for our e-letters!

Anything else you would like to add?

Be patient in your job search, there are many candidates competing for jobs and it may take time for you to find your next opportunity.

Always research the company to which you are applying for work to ensure that they are a company for whom you would enjoy working.

Discuss your job hunting activity with friends and family as they may have some of their own advice and talking often helps you to keep focused on what is important.

Search out professional advice too – from recruitment agencies, the Job Centre and the internet.

If you are a young person, aged between 14-19 and living in Brighton & Hove, visit BEACH – Brighton Employability And Careers Hut for information, advice and guidance.

About the Author Duncan Brodie

Since 2006 I’ve worked with in excess of 8,000 accountants and professionals in workshops, seminars and one to one helping them land their next jobs and become better leaders, presenters and business partners. Before that I spent 25 years in accountancy climbing the career ladder from Payments Clerk to FD. I’m a CIMA Fellow, Certified Professional Coach and Team Coach Facilitator.

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Leave a Comment:

11 comments
Job descriptions says 29 October 2012

Don’t ever try to copy someone resume, every person will have own capabilities, in CV mention the skills which you have, avoid the grammatical mistakes, two page resume is enough.

Reply
Steve Wilson says 18 December 2012

This is perfect! i like your article. I think its very important to have a very powerful resume too. I don’t usually write my own. I just hire professional services because i know there are a lot of experts out there. Speaking of which, this service “How to get a job Tips” helped me a lot of time with my job hunting and cv writing tasks.

Reply
Cv Writing Tips. says 7 December 2013

A CV samples helps you to prepare an effective resume for your job application. In the case of an accountant’s job, you should never ever forget to mention about your educational qualifications, accounting experience and skills

Reply
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