Are you looking for a new job? Perhaps you have stumbled across your dream job? If this is the case, you will need a crackling good CV that makes you stand apart from the crowd. This article will give you a few simple tips on how to write a CV in 2021.
What is a CV?
You use a CV to quickly and concisely communicate the experience and competence you have developed through work, education, courses, and other relevant experience – such as, for example, extracurricular activities and the like. This document gives your employer a good overview of your background, as well as a better understanding of why you’re the most qualified candidate for the position.
The CV should not exceed 2 pages, ideally. Therefore you should write concisely and only include what’s most important. Remember – your CV is a fluid document that should be adapted to the position you’re applying for.
What is the goal of a CV?
The CV is your first handshake with the employer. In just a few seconds, you are asked to communicate your key qualifications – and most important: why you are the perfect candidate for the position.
In fact, research shows that employers spend 7 seconds on average to judge a candidate based on their CV alone and that they often sift through hundreds of CVs in the course of a recruitment process. This makes it crucial that your CV grabs attention from the very first sentence.
THEREFORE, the CV must be structured conscientiously so that your experience and competence are presented as clearly and precisely as possible. A red line must permeate the entire document to connect your work-related and educational experience understandably and intuitively. In other words: It must be clear to the employer why you have made certain choices and what opportunities the business gets as a result of hiring you.
Instead of going into all of the complicated specifics of writing a CV, we will give you the only tip you need to ensure good quality.
The CV Template
The first commandment of writing a strong CV is to use a clear and professional template. The overall goal of the template is this:
- To give a quick overview of your key competencies.
- To show that you have relevant experience from work, education, or both.
Note: In some cases, you can be a good candidate despite lacking specific competence or experience. What’s most important here is to quickly explain why you still believe you are a qualified candidate.
When you’re writing your new CV, it’s important to use a template that makes the document as clear and readable as possible. The internet is overflowing with endless free templates, and it can be difficult to find one which is both professionally made and suits you as a job seeker.
But…
Why should I care to use a template? Isn’t it enough to list my experiences in a simple Word document?
The reason we encourage everyone to use a template for their CV is pretty simple. When your employer sits down in front of their pile of documents, they only spend a few seconds on each CV. In other words, this means that your key qualifications have to be presented as quickly and compellingly as possible, so you don’t just get thrown into the “no-pile” before your employer has even gotten the chance to consider you as a candidate. A template also makes it easier for you to structure the content on your own, and you can highlight the most important parts: the qualifications that will get you the job.
Examples of how to write a good job application here: cvguru.no (only in Norwegian).