What not to put on your CV
Recent research into job applicants found the apparent contradiction that whilst 82% of IT candidates thought they were good at interviews, 66% of recruiters said they had seen candidates with poor recruitment skills. Of course, there is nothing mathematically unusual there, except the oddity that people who try to add unrelated percentages together are often surprised when they don't add up to a hundred.
More useful information to come out of the survey is that the five commonest errors in CVs are:
1) Spelling and grammar mistakes
2) No clear demonstration of technical skills
3) Too long
4) Rambling
5) Listing of irrelevant skills
When writing their CV, job seekers should remember that old adage that you never get a second chance to make a first impression, and check their typing carefully. Better still, get someone else to proof read it for you and you might just avoid becoming a legendary CV howler. Some of my favourite CV errors are:
* I am a prooficient typist
* My job involved processing clams
* I received a plague for Salesperson of the Year
* My interests include cooking dogs and interesting people
* Socially I like to dine out with different backgrounds
* Left last four jobs because managers were completely unreasonable
and perhaps my favourite, on a form which asked for Marital Status, the applicant had written "Gemini".
29th March 2011