Here’s the thing: most of the CVs that recruiters read are terrible. It may sound like a hard thing to say, but it’s true. A recruiter might get 100 CVs, perhaps five of them are OK. Enough said.
If your CV isn’t getting results, it might be due to one (or more) of the following five reasons:
- You are not qualified for the job.
This being the case, the best CV in the world won’t result in an interview. I know that given this tight job market, you don’t want to hear this. You feel you can make up for the lack of technical skills required for the finance position, but lacking the basic skills for accounting won’t land you an interview.
The solution: There are jobs out there for which you’re qualified. You don’t need to meet every requirement, but you have to meet the basic and major ones. If the job calls for experience with Pastel Accounting, you must have Pastel Accounting experience. If the job requires a driver’s licence, you must have a driver’s licence. Make sure your CV shows that you are qualified for the role you are applying for.
- Your CV doesn’t speak to the needs of the employer.
In other words, it’s not tailored to that position. Please don’t tell me you tailor your cover letters—or ChatGPT does—so you don’t need to tailor your CV. Want to know a recruiting secret? Most recruiters don’t have time to read your cover letters—they’re reading thousands of CVs at a sitting.
The solution: Embrace AI and have ChatGPT, or your tool of choice, to tailor your CV to the job description. Your CV might be well-written—your foundational document—but it won’t meet every employer’s needs right out of the box. How can it? A CV is not ‘one size fits all’ and should be tailored for each role using the job description.”
- Your CV lacks relevant accomplishment statements.
Have you ever wondered which movie you should watch on Netflix? Your genre of choice is romantic comedies. Netflix knows this based on the movies you’ve watched and will suggest ones similar to them. Stating relevant accomplishments says to the recruiter, “I know what’s important to you.”
The solution: Let’s first start by recognizing that recruiters want to see your value add, so quantified results matter. Further, they have certain criteria in mind in terms of accomplishment types. Think of it this way: Meeting deliverable deadlines and collaborating across various departments are two important criteria.
Kevin is a project manager who met most deliverables through collaboration with his engineers and various stakeholders. He writes:
“Successfully met key project deliverables by fostering collaboration between engineering teams and cross-functional stakeholders.”
This is true, but it fails to impress the reader because it lacks tangible results. What does “Successful” mean?
Better: “Delivered 95% of project milestones on time by coordinating efforts across engineering teams and stakeholders, resulting in a 20% improvement in delivery efficiency year over year.
Recruiters want to see metrics. We want to see data. We want to see that you made an impact. That’s going to separate you from the other candidates that we’re looking at.
- Your CV’s Summary doesn’t show value.
Recruiters often see summaries that lean heavily on years of experience but don’t really say much. The result? A vague statement that could apply to 100 other people.
Your Summary is where you show the value you’ll deliver to the employer, and your opening statement should make the reader say, “WOW.”
The solution: Compare a weak summary with one that delivers:
Wrong: Seasoned professional with over 15 years of experience in a variety of roles across multiple industries.
Much better: SaaS Programme Manager with a background in managing R10M+ portfolios, third-party vendor integrations, and phased product launches.
See how the second version skips the years of experience and jumps right into the value?
- Your CV doesn’t pass the first test: readability.
When a CV isn’t readable—has long paragraphs and bulleted items, contains fancy formatting that confuses the reader more than guides him, and is strewn with acronyms that take a scientist to decipher—it loses the fight from the get-go.
The solution: Realize the CV is about you, that it’s written with the recruiter in mind, so have mercy on them. Less can be more in a CV. Oversharing or writing text-heavy narratives risks burying crucial content or not being read at all. Think of reading the CliffNotes guide to Hamlet to reading the actual play.
