Make Your CV Stand Out From The Crowd

Wit industry and business booming in Ireland companies are flooded with job applications and CVs every day. The competition can be tough out there. Your CV is just a piece of paper telling the company what you are all about, but sometimes it is really the only thing that is stopping you from getting your foot in the door and getting to the next stage – the interview.

According to Recruit Ireland, content is king. Their advice is that ‘bells and whistles’ CVs might not always work and that often clean and simple CVs are the best.

Research by job-matching service The Ladders found that recruiters spend an average of six seconds reviewing your CV, stating ‘it’s important to make every second count’.

However, many people feel that innovative CVs will grab more attention. Ireland has seen some of these creative characters thinking outside the box. One of them is UCD graduate Jordan McDonnell, who posted his alternative style slideshow CV online. It quickly went viral, getting more than 90,000 views. He received job offers from around the world, but accepted a job as an account manager with Twitter in Dublin.

‘I’d worked in the finance sector, but I wanted a change of career into something more creative. I sent out traditional CVs, but as I had no experience or creative background, I wasn’t successful in getting interviews. I looked into some alternative style CVs and when I put mine together, it really was a last resort for me,’ he said.

‘It was a total shock when it went viral. I actually got the position I have today by my manager trawling through CVs and going on Twitter to tell people to stop sending in four-page-long CVs with spelling mistakes. Someone tweeted him my CV saying, ‘I don’t suppose this guy has any hope so!’, because my CV was 33 pages long. Anyway, he liked it and invited me in to meet him and he offered me a job.’ Jordan recommends being creative when applying for a job, saying: ‘Do something a little different, do something creative and something that is you – that should work.’

Féilim Mac An Iomaire is another Irish jobseeker who decided he wanted to get noticed. He took out a billboard ad, dubbing himself the ‘Jobless Paddy’. As a result, he landed a role at the Paddy Power betting company. In Ireland, #jobfairy is another resource people are using to advertise and seek jobs.

Whether you decide to be creative or simple, there is key advice not to be ignored when submitting a CV. Tara McMenamon, executive consultant in accountancy and finance with Sigmar Recruitment, said: ‘What matters is what the hirer thinks of your CV. His or her opinion will be made by comparing your CVs with the others he or she has received. So think about what the other “competitors” are likely tohave on their CVs.’

According to McMenamon, some of the golden rules are: use bullet points and use spelling and grammar check, make every effort to get your hands on a job spec for a vacancy and explain all gaps on your CV.

Irrelevant detail is a cardinal sin, says McMenamon. ‘Everything must be relevant to the job for which you are applying and you must remove anything that is not relevant as far as the reader is concerned,’ she said.‘The reader has absolutely no interest in what you have to offer to the world. He’s interested in the resource that he wants to buy for his company at this moment.’

Most importantly, she added ‘the job must be one that really interests you and you must have a realistic chance of winning it. Otherwise, you will be generating a CV for something that you cannot obtain.’