What do you think you have been doing wrong while coming up with your CV? In this article, we address the common mistakes on your CV that annoy recruiters. It is the mistakes you ought to do something about if you really want to get shortlisted for a job interview.
Ms Chabeda advises that before you present your CV to the recruiter, it is always important that you go through it thoroughly in case you made any of the following blunders while coming up with it.
1. Lying
Lying on your CV is a big mistake you can never afford to make. It completely tarnishes your image as a job candidate the moment the truth comes out.
The common CV sections in which job seekers lie most are their work experience and the referee sections. There are job seekers who have lied about sales targets met but are usually unable to prove it come the actual interview session. Others lie about companies they have worked for, which when consulted, can’t remember seeing such person working for them. And no recruiter will be happy about you lying on having worked for a certain company for a long time when you actually did not.
Also remember that when you lie about referees whom you have never met, you will actually be caught. Part of the recruitment process especially by top recruitment agencies involves a background check that involves the recruiter getting in touch with all the people provided in the referees section. Woe to you if one of them denies having met you.
2. Career gaps that are unaccounted for
Career gaps on your CV also annoy recruiters. It is usually even worse when you do not give a brief explanation on your CV to account for the time spent outside employment. Recruiters are never keen on hiring a person who makes a technical appearance into employment and then vanishes without a satisfactory account.
To fill career gaps on your CV, talk about the part time jobs you have done while you were out of regular employment. Some job seekers may not know it but talking about a course you resumed when you are not employed is also a good filler on your CV.
3. Unprofessional email address
You really annoy recruiters if you are the kind of person who still retains the fancy email address you composed several years ago when you were still in school. Your CV should be as professional as possible. Just have something like [email protected]. Simple but acceptable. Recruiters are annoyed by fancy and unprofessional email addresses such as [email protected], etc. They show lack of seriousness and maturity.
4. Inadequate information under work experience
This should in fact be the worst mistake you can ever commit on your CV. It is bound to disappoint recruiters big time. As we earlier pointed out, most recruiters would only scan through your CV to settle at your work experience as they look for candidates with required experience. Go through this article again to read more on the sections of your CV that are most important to the recruiter.
On the work experience section, the recruiter is always out to see the full names of the companies you have worked for before, the period you stayed at each specific company, and most importantly a detailed description of your duties and responsibilities at each particular past role. If there is any section of your CV that you should allocate more space therefore, it is the work experience section. Use bulleted points to give detailed description of how your days looked like in your previous jobs.
5. Contact details that are no longer useful
They leave the recruiter with no option but to just let you go. What do you expect recruiters to do when you give a phone number that does not go through or an email address which you can’t access? In as much as you may be the best candidate owing to your qualifications and experience, the recruiter can’t perform miracles to get you to attending the job interview.
It therefore calls on you to check and confirm the contacts you want the recruiter to get back to you on. Give a correct telephone number and an email address you usually frequent whenever you get any internet access. It is also important to give an updated list of referees so that you do not give contacts that your referees do not use at all.
Still got questions about where you could be going wrong with your CV? Go through this article to find out how your CV may be annoying recruiters.
