5 Important CV tips to create an impact

11:01 AM

Your CV is a vital tool in the job seeking process. It’s your first chance to impress a prospective
employer, providing details that underline your suitability for the role. On average, recruiters
take just eight seconds to decide whether or not to keep a CV, so you need to be on the ball.
Our top five tips will give your CV maximum impact:
1. Keep it concise
Recruiters are often faced with mountains of CVs and don’t have the time or patience to trawl
through a rambling document. Remember that your CV is only the first step, a way of getting
your foot in the door, so keep it punchy. Make it no more than two sides of A4 paper and save
the real detail for your interview.
2. Tailor your CV
Take time to adapt your CV for each individual role you apply for. Research the company and
use the job ad to gauge what it is looking for in an employee. Link your skills and experience to
the requirements of the role. Similarly, if you are logging your CV with a job site database, look
at the sort of jobs on the site and the employers who are advertising, and rework your CV
accordingly.
3. Don’t leave gaps
Gaps invite the recruiter to guess what you were up to, so instead of allowing them to make their
own assumptions give them the details. Even in time out of employment you can develop soft
skills such as communication, teamwork or project management. You should update your CV
regularly, regardless of whether you are actively jobseeking, to avoid having to recall distant
points in your career.
4. Ensure it’s free of errors
One of the easiest ways for recruiters to weed out weaker CVs is to scan them for errors. If you
fail to check your CV for basic spelling and grammatical mistakes, you are setting yourself up
for a fall at the first hurdle. Most errors can be rooted out using your PC’s spell-checker, but you
should also ask someone else to read your CV and ask that person for an opinion.
5. Tell the truth
It’s one thing to highlight the positives on your CV, but telling blatant lies is a bad idea. You are
highly likely to be caught out and your application rejected. Many companies check the facts —
such as qualifications — that candidates supply. And a good interviewer will soon spot any
inconsistency in your story, even if it concerns your leisure activities. It would be hugely
embarrassing to be caught out by an interviewer who’s an expert in your half-baked hobby.

TYPES OF INTERVIEWS
10:49 AM
Interviewers come in many styles, shapes, and sizes. They may be trained professionals or rank beginners. They may be
pleasant and encouraging or rude and opinionated.
Likewise, there are several kinds of interviews, depending on the personality and preferences of the
interviewer and the instructions from the employer. Generally, in on-campus and consortia interviews
students will be involved initially with a screening interview, one from which the interviewer makes a
recommendation about whether to consider a candidate further. The screening interview is usually (but
not always) conducted by a friendly, encouraging individual who has been trained to follow a fairly
structured line of questioning.
Telephone
Telephone interviews are merely screening interviews meant to eliminate poorly qualified candidates so
that only a few are left for personal interviews. The jobseeker’s mission in this interviewed is to be
invited for a personal face-to-face interview.
Panel
A panel is the reverse of the group interview. There are several people from the employer. You might be
interviewed by 2-10 people at the same time. Be sure to make eye contact with each person. When a
question is asked you want to direct 50% of your eye contact to the person that asked the question and
the other 50% to the other members of the panel. Try to get everyone’s contact information so that you
can write each of them a thank you letter.
One-On-One
This is the traditional format for interviews. Make good eye contact and try to match their “style”. If
they are very conservative and don’t smile it would not be a good idea to try humor in the interview. In
a one-on-one interview the jobseeker’s goal is to establish rapport with the interviewer and to show
that his/her qualifications will benefit the company.
On-Campus
The main challenge is that you usually only have 30 minutes with the recruiter. So be sure to use all the
time to your advantage. If there are company representatives in the waiting area, take advantage of the
extra “face time” by speaking with them. Remember, they are always evaluating you.
On-Site
When you get an interview that is at the employer’s place of business you need to stay on your toes.
You want to be nice to everyone from the receptionist to people you pass by in the parking lot. You
never know what their position is at the company. Plan your route to the location and make sure you
allow for traffic. You do not want to be late to an interview! Arrive about 15 minutes early but you want
to be near the employer about 1 hr before your interview so you can make sure you have everything
together. Take the last 45 minutes to get some water or a bite to eat if you are hungry.
Stress Interview
Stress interviews are used to see how the jobseekers handle himself. You may be sarcastic or
argumentative, or may keep him waiting. You may also lapse into silence at some point during the
questioning, this is used as an attempt to unnerve the jobseeker.
Screening Interview
Typically this is the first step a company takes after the resumes have been scrutinized. The purpose of
this meeting is to assess the skills and personality traits of the potential candidates. The objective
ultimately is to “screen out” those applicants the interviewer feels should not be hired due to lack of
skills or bad first impressions. The interviewer must also “screen in” those candidates she/he feels would
make a valuable contribution to the company. Your job during this preliminary meeting is to convince
this person you are worthy to take the next step.
Lunch Interview
The same rules apply in lunch interviews as in those held at the office. The setting may be more casual,
but it is a business lunch and the jobseeker has to be watched carefully. The jobseeker must use the
lunch interview to develop common ground with your interviewer.
Committee Interview
Committee interviews are a common practice. Jobseeker will have to face several members of the
company who have a say in whether he/she is hired. In some committee interviews, you can ask the
jobseeker to demonstrate his/her problem-solving skills. The committee will outline a situation and ask
him/her to formulate a plan that deals with the problem. The interviewers are looking for how the
jobseeker apply his/her knowledge and skills to a real-life situation.
Group Interview
A group interview is usually designed to uncover the leadership potential of prospective managers and
employees who will be dealing with the public. The front-runner candidates are gathered together in an
informal, discussion-type interview. A subject is introduced and the interviewer will start off the
discussion. The goal of the group interview is to see how the jobseeker interact with others and how use
him/her knowledge and reasoning powers to win others over.
Informational Interview
Typically this is an interview set up at the jobseeker’s request with a Human Resources Manager or a
departmental supervisor in the career field he/she is interested in. The purpose of this interview is to
help the jobseeker find out more about a particular career, position or company. He/she is seeking
information from these people in hopes that they might refer him/her to someone else in their company
or to somebody they may know outside their company who could use your skills.
The Informational Interview is a part of the “cold-calling” process whereby jobseekers are generating
their own job leads.
The General/Structured Interview
Frequently the Screening Interview is combined with the General Interview due to time constraints
many companies have during the hiring process. Often the jobseeker will meet with the supervisor over
the position for which he/she is applying. During this interview he/she will be discussing the specifics of
the position, the company and industr

INTERVIEW SKILLS TIPS

10:46 AM

Interviews are about presenting yourself in a positive and confident manner and we have interview skills
and tips to help you. Many candidates are often worried that by “overselling” themselves they may
appear arrogant and, as a result, they opt for mainstream answers which can sometimes appear fairly
vague.
In our courses there are a number of interview techniques that you can apply to ensure that you do
yourself justice and improve your interview skills to a level that will make you one of the strongest
candidates. For some free interview skills and tips continue reading and we’ll tell you 10 crucially
important interview skills and tips:

Interview Skills Tip 1. Spend time to know yourself

It may sound corny, but many candidates fail simply because they have not spent any time thinking
carefully about what they can offer. Take time to think about your experience, why it would make you
an ideal candidate for that post and how you can demonstrate it through concrete examples. Practicing
too early can be detrimental to your confidence as you will keep repeating the same mistakes and will
get frustrated. Only practice and go through mock interviews once you have gathered your thoughts.

Interview Skills Tip 2. Research the job and your future employers
Your interviewers will want to know whether you are fit to join their company. At an interview, you will
find it difficult to demonstrate that you are the best candidate if you don’t know what they are looking
for and how the company may fit within your overall career plan. In addition, demonstrating knowledge
of the company will ensure that you come across as a motivated individual. Use all the sources available
to you, including any information sent to you by the company with the application, the company’s and
other websites, their Annual Report & Accounts (which can usually be downloaded from their website –
if not, ask them), etc.

Interview Skills Tip 3. Keep your answers between 1.5 and 2 minutes
Lengthy answers do not make the points clearly enough, whilst short answers tend to make too few
points. No one will be prepared to listen to you for more than 3 minutes anyway. So as a general rule,
ensure that your answers fit within the 1.5 – 2 minutes timeframe, with a bit more maybe for answers to
some of the more open interview questions (such as “tell me about yourself”).

Interview Skills Tip 4. Structure your answers in 3 or 4 points maximum

In order to make a strong impact with your interview answers, you must ensure that the message is
coming out loud and clear. By adopting a 3- or 4-point structure, you will help your interviewers identify
the important themes in your answer and they won’t have to work so hard to get the picture. If you
have more than 3 or 4 things to say then you should organize the information differently. The human
brain cannot take more than 3 or 4 things at a time. Don’t drown your interviewers with information.

Interview Skills Tip 5. Clearly headline each point in your answers

Too many people waffle around a topic without stating clearly what they are trying to say. Once you
have derived a clear structure, ensure that each section is headlined by the message that you are trying
to convey. For example, if you are being asked a question such as “What are your main strengths?”, you
could structure and headline your answer as follows:

 One of my key strengths is my ability to keep a team motivated, even at difficult times.
 I am also a very approachable and supportive person.
  Another one of my strengths is my resilience and hardworking attitude, and particularly my
ability to complete projects.

Interview Skills Tip 6. Expand on each point with your personal experience
Simply stating a series of headlines will make your answer sound “cheesy” i.e. no more than a
succession of sound bites which have no real impact by themselves. Interviewers do not only want to
know your own opinion of yourself, they want you to back up the claims that you make with examples
from your experience. If you adopt a 3-point structure over 1.5 to 2 minutes, this gives you on average
30 or 40 seconds per point. You must therefore ensure that you keep your examples succint and to-the-
point.

Interview Skills Tip 7. Avoid announcing a structure upfront unless you are absolutely
confident
Although it can make you sound very confident and “in control”, it can also be dangerous to announce
the structure of your answer upfront. For example: “There are many things that characterise my
experience: one is my in-depth experience of project management, one is my ability to manage a team
and the last one is my interpersonal skills”.

 It will force you to have a ready-made structure as soon as the interviewer has finished asking
his question. This could be awkward if you haven’t prepared the answer previously
 You will lose flexibility. As you develop your answer, you may find that you want to introduce
something that you had not originally thought about or, on the contrary, that you want to scrap
something that does not sound so good after all. If you have announced the structure of your
answer upfront, you will not be able to change it half-way through.

Interview Skills Tip 8. Use active verbs and power words to describe yourself
Most candidates, in their fear of overselling themselves, use words which do not reflect their true level
of confidence, skills, competence. If you want to make a strong impact you cannot use expressions such
as “I was involved in” too often as they reflect a situation in which you played a role rather than the role
itself. You should use words and verbs such as: “played a key role in”, “managed”, “elaborated/built on”,
“was instrumental in”, “achieved”, “proposed”, “derived”, “proficient/competent in”, “confident in”, etc

Interview Skills Tip 9. When answering questions asking for examples, use the STAR
framework
The STAR framework is a well-known (though often neglected) interview technique to answer questions
asking for an example, and it is certainly a method which all HR professionals will have trained in and
learnt to recognise. It is important that you practice it thoroughly so that you can use it naturally at your
interview. See our separate page on the STAR interview technique for full details.

Interview Skills Tip 10. Behaviour and body language

Your body language will give a lot of information to your prospective employers about you. They
probably will not be looking at it specifically (unless it is so bad that they can’t miss it!) but they will be
subsconsciously affected by it throughout the interview. For a comprehensive look at how your body
language affects the interviewer’s perception of candidates, see our special page on interview
behaviour and body language