March 4, 2025
We read A LOT of CVs. Unfortunately, far too many fall short. Beyond the basic errors letting job seekers down (spelling and grammar) many simply don’t sell the author! That’s right, it’s a sales document. Rather than a list of abbreviated role descriptions your CV has one purpose – to stand out against others of similar experience.
Experience alone doesn’t make you a great candidate, what you achieved in each role does. In fact, once you’ve achieved mastery in a role there is no correlation between years of experience and capability. If you’re in a role where you feel achievements are harder to quantify, that’s ok. There are plenty of other ways you can demonstrate your value and we’ll explain how.
Realistically you have only a few seconds to make an impression on the reader. So your CV needs to be easy to digest and your value should stand out. It’s a super hard document to write, and the last time I updated mine I must have edited it 6 times or more. I also put it in front of others that knew me for their opinion. As Kiwis, we’re typically shy to promote ourselves but this 2-4 page document is the time to put our modesty aside.
Here’s our advice to make sure your CV is working for you. We haven’t covered every aspect, just the parts that are most critical and/or most often deficient.
Why start here? Because hands down it’s the most critical section. Undercook this part and the rest hardly matters. Like it or not, most readers gravitate here first, before moving to your prior roles and other sections, but only if they like what they read.
Have a career that isn’t linear, includes multiple promotions, you’re later in your career, or your employer has changed names? Think about including a brief employment summary before the role breakdown. Do this in a table with the organisation name (and industry if you have room), employment dates, and role titles as a list.
Start with the most recent role and work back, shortening the information for your oldest or less relevant roles.
Title
If your title is obscure or unique to the company include the market equivalent in brackets. Why? The reader’s main aim is finding certain key words or job titles aligned with the role you’ve applied for, so make it easy for them.
Dates
Include both the year and month please. Why? Although how long you’ve been in a role doesn’t indicate mastery, the difference between 1 month and 1 year of experience is significant. If you don’t include this, the reader may assume the worst and move on.
Company
Don’t force the reader to Google your company! Include a 1–2-line summary of the organisation as it relates to your role. In payroll? What was the employee headcount? In sales? What product, service or market did you operate in? In accounting? What’s the ownership structure and scale you’re reporting on? This is important yet often missed context to then apply your role summary to.
Role Summary
A short summary of your role, purpose and core responsibilities. Please avoid internal or industry jargon and remember the reader might not have the same technical knowledge as you so write in layman’s terms. I have read some role summaries multiple times and still not understood what someone did. If in doubt apply the “Mum Test”. Give it to your mum, aunty or other family members and ask them if they understand what you do for a job.
Achievements
The hero of this section is often missed altogether or muddled with the responsibilities. What makes you a standout? What did you achieve? What are you proud of? If you feel the nature of your role makes measuring success harder, you can still provide evidence or examples of your reliability, work ethic, initiative, work quality, problem solving or relationship management.
These could be:
- awards or other internal recognition,
- extra training,
- projects you helped with,
- feedback (include a quote from a stakeholder you impressed),
- colleagues you trained or mentored,
- improvements you suggested,
- membership of a social or cultural group…
Whatever you include, write them as bullet points for ease of reading.
Employment Gaps
If you are, or have been, out of work for more than a month or two, it’s ok to include these periods too. Don’t let the reader wonder where you disappeared to between employment dates. If you had a part-time job, volunteered, travelled or supported a dependent during that time then list that. If your most recent role was a step down to establish yourself in a new market or pay the bills in the absence of a more suitable role, make that clear. Otherwise, the reader assumes your last role is reflective of your actual seniority or experience.
Undertaken Temporary or Contract Assignments
Make sure you label them as such and highlight if any assignments extended or became permanent. 4 permanent roles in two years has me very worried, but 4 clearly labelled contract assignments can say you’re in hot demand, especially if employers asked you back.
If you’re a senior or executive leader much of this guide is still relevant, however I do suggest you represent your Work Experience slightly differently, in particular the role summary.
Typically, a senior leader’s remit and influence is broad, and titles can be misleading. Therefore, you should still summarise your role, including what you were accountable for (team size, geographic reach, delegated authority, revenue or profit targets etc.), but also include a further statement that captures the core challenge or opportunity you were there to deliver on. In other words, what was the state of the team, function or business you inherited and what were you hired to achieve? This allows your following achievements to speak to this remit, so it all ties together. You want the reader to think “that’s similar to the challenges/opportunities we have”.
Be careful also that your experience isn't too centred on technical or functional experience. Senior leaders need to show that their influence and achievements extended beyond their immediate team.
There are plenty of online CV templates that work just fine. Pick one that resonates with you but avoid layouts with large tables or formats that create too much under-utilised space. Images or intricate designs can also be distracting to the eye so save the creative stuff for a separate portfolio (assuming you’re in the creative sector). Yes, a typical CV is a little plain as a result but it’s about allowing the words to jump off the page and catch attention, and you can show your personality in the way you write.
Avoid large blocks of text, small font and redundant or filler words. In fact, I suggest your final edit should include the removal of words or phrases that are repetitive or don’t add to the point you’re making. The finished product should look uncluttered, with white spaces, easy to read quickly and gets to the point (without selling yourself short). AI is excellent at doing this editing provided you prompt it clearly.
Clumsy English, long winded sentences, grammatical errors are obvious issues that we still see. Hence the need for someone else to proofread, as we’re often blind to our own mistakes.
Also avoid jargon, acronyms, corporate platitudes or buzz words. The latter is particularly common – and it’s hard to set yourself apart if you describe yourself using the same words everyone else does. Instead write it as yourself without trying to get too clever with language. You can even inject a touch of humor to show your personality. I still remember a mother returning to the workforce who had described her family and domestic responsibilities as you would a CEO. It was witty and memorable yet still informative and professional.
For me this is the only section where a paragraph rather than bullet points can work but still keep it short and punchy. No more than 3-4 line paragraphs and a total length of ¼ page. This is the first section of your CV after your personal details, so it’ll get seen early, but maybe not read fully until your work experience is deemed appropriate.
It’s your chance to explain (in your words remember) what you’re about, what you can do (think value you offer) and what you’re passionate about doing next. I call it the 3 Ps: (you could write these in sentences or bullet points)
Purpose: One to two sentences on who you are and what you stand for professionally.
Professional summary: A sentence that sums up your experience and capability in a way that speaks to the value you bring to a future employer
Passion: What spins your wheels, gets you out of bed and thriving professionally and how your next role will align to that. You can be as direct as “My next role will allow me to…..”
This approach shows you have good self-awareness and a view of what’s important to you next – people buy into other people who can articulate this.
Stepping down in responsibility?
This is the place to front foot that your life stage or personal circumstances, is such that you acknowledge your overqualified for the role but that you have a legitimate reason to be interested. Therefore, your interest isn’t driven by necessity, and you won’t desert them for a better offer down the track. Most people leave this for the cover letter, if it is included at all, but cover letters aren’t always read, so ensure anything critical is included in your CV (see more on this below)
This also goes for why you may be seeking part-time, temporary or other types of work – answering any questions the reader may have, so they don’t put you in the too-hard basket.
Don’t underestimate this part. It might not be the first section read but it’s a great area to show your humanity and what you value as the person behind the professional. Once I know you have the right experience this part gives me a sense of who you might be as a colleague.
If your experience and motivations are such that you could be suitable for two different roles then there is definitely benefit in a second CV version that emphasises different aspects of your experience and motivations. However, keep in mind that platforms like Seek can store your CV, if you’re pre-registered, so that you can apply on the fly off your phone without attaching a CV for each application. So, you might have to apply manually in this case or ensure all versions are loaded to these platforms.
Reading a CV that uses some of the same language used in the job ad is also a powerful way to get attention. Highlight a few of the key requirements from the advertisements and sub some of your terminology, only where it’s interchangeable of course. Those confident with AI tools will realise you can do this in 30 seconds with the right prompting.
If the advertisement requests one then there’s your answer. If not, then I’m not convinced they add a lot, especially given the way applications are processed. Most Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) used to electronically manage candidate records and applications can separate the two documents and default to showing the reader your CV. To read your cover letter, they’d need to click on a different tab. If your letter is the email you wrote accompanying an attached CV then this is still stored the same way. So, a cover letter should never contain information someone couldn’t find in your CV. Therefore, in the event you do include a letter, focus on your motivations for applying to that particular role, and a summary of the experience fit based on the advertisement.
Photos
You may believe you are a good looking individual, and yes, it makes the CV feel more human. But keep in mind it also gives an easy target for unconscious bias, which we all have. The reader could decide your photo looks too corporate, too casual, too serious, too old, too young….or you remind them of someone else they didn’t get on with! Unless your image is your job (TV presenting and modelling maybe) what you look like is not actually relevant, so my personal view is leave it off. If you want to include a photo, make sure it aligns to the personal brand you're trying to cultivate.
Remember, If the reader likes your CV enough to click through to your Linkedin profile they'll see your photo there anyway. This image also needs to be chosen carefully.
Ageism
Yes, this still exists. Easy ways to minimise ageism are to remove the dates of any education or early roles. Your CV would then only include the full details of the last few roles yet provide a short summary at the end of the experience section with a snapshot of the prior roles, industries and/or technical responsibilities, again without dates.
Disclosures (Eg: disabilities or neurodivergent diagnosis)
Personally, I’d avoid any disclosures in a CV too. Provided it doesn’t impact your ability to perform the role then it’s just another reason to reject you unfairly. In the case of cognition, I’d prefer job seekers to focus on the strengths they bring to a role in this document. There may be accommodations you need for these strengths to shine (quiet space, headphones, flexibility, accessibility needs, etc) but there is time to mention this later in the process.
Looking for more personalised support with your CV or job search? Connect with our friends at MyCareerBrand here.
