So what exactly should you keep on your CV ? Here are the Top 6 Things to Keep On Your CV in 2024. The traditional things include your contact info, work history, and education. But what about showcasing your skills or sharing your career goals? And if you’re making a career change, how do you communicate that?
One of the challenges with CVs is that there is no one-size-fits-all approach, however, there are a few things recruiters love to see that can help you stand out. Here are six things to definitely keep (or add!) to your resume.
1. Keep: A Strong Objective Or Summary
It is important to have a CV objective or a summary and regardless of which one is a better fit for your career goals, we recommend keeping one on your CV. These can be especially helpful when you’re looking to explain any career gaps, career transitions, or extended time off. Plus, since you’re going to tailor this statement to be relevant to the specific job and company you’re applying to, you integrate some of the keywords they used in the actual job posting.
With more and more people changing jobs recently, recruiters are using these statements to fill in any questions they have about why the person is applying for this role.
2. Keep: Volunteer Work, Internships + Related Experience
Especially if you’re entry-level, returning to work, or trying to explain a career gap, you might have work experience that’s less traditional like in the form of volunteer work, internships, freelance work, etc. You will definitely want to include that experience on your CV and even t create bullet points that illustrate your achievements and skills.
Entry-level CVs don’t always have the benefit of formal work experience but recruiters are expecting to see your internships. If you’ve been out of school for several years, skip featuring internships and instead include related experience that is more recent.
3. Keep: A Skills Section
We LOVE a skills section! The old rule of thumb was to work your skills into your bullet points in your work experience section, however, when a recruiter is scanning your resume in just a few seconds, it’s actually better to highlight these on their own.
You can even organize your skills section into groups like soft skills, hard skills, technical skills, or even a section that’s relevant to the job you’re applying to. For example, if you’re applying to be a project manager you might create a section called “project manager skills” or “project management software” and list specific items.
Be sure to check the job posting to see what skills the company is looking for. Those are the keywords or key skills you will definitely want to include on your resume.
4. Keep: Bullet Points Whenever Possible
Remember how we said recruiters will spend just a few seconds scanning your CV / resume?!
That’s why bullet points are so important. They visually direct the recruiter to your work experience quickly. This is also why it’s important for you to write strong bullet points that catch our attention with action verbs and power words.
Why Bullet Points?
- Bullet points make it easier to read.
- Bullet points make it easier to scan.
- Bullet points make it easier to pick out important information.
Think of it this way—would you rather read a one-page document that uses bullet points to explain the important details or long paragraphs of text? Scanning bullet points is always going to be faster so use them with each work experience you list on your resume.
5. Keep: Certifications + Related Coursework
Your CV education section isn’t just limited to your formal degrees! Include any relevant certifications you’ve earned and related coursework you’ve completed. This can include online learning, executive education, workshops you’ve attended, or certifications from a specific software company. For example, a Digital Marketing certificate.
Your goal here is to showcase your professional development efforts. If you’re trying to fill a skills gap, the additional courses will show that you’re actively working on skills development.
6. Keep: Links to Cover Letter, Portfolio, And LinkedIn Profile
Including links to the other job search documents that tell your story help give us a better look at your full experience. And with almost all resumes being digital these days, the links are easy to access. The goal here is that you don’t want all of these links to be carbon copies of your resume.
Your resume is a tailored snapshot of what you’ve done that is relevant to the specific job and company you’re applying to. Your LinkedIn profile, cover letter, and online portfolio can be a bit more general but still tell a consistent story. It shouldn’t feel like the online portfolio belongs to a different person.
Bonus Tip on the Top 6 Things to Keep On Your CV in 2024: Match your cover letter and CV format. On way to stand out from the job search crowd is to match the format of your CV and cover letter. Consistency with your design and formatting not only looks clean and organized, but it shows your attention to detail.
See also: Job Seekers, master these 5 questions to ace your next interview
