Having the right skills, experience and qualifications will not always result in your CV gaining an interview. There could be any number of reasons why your CV isn’t quite making the grade, and we want to help.
Here are the 3 most common reasons why your CV is failing you:-
Your CV contains sloppy mistakes
One of the most popular reasons why a CV gets rejected is because of a spelling or grammatical mistake. A CV can also be declined based upon its overall presentation, and even just the one spacing error can decrease your chances.
Any kind of error shows sloppiness and a lack of care. Both of these traits are clearly not very desirable to an employer, and they would rather hire someone who has presented a flawless CV.
“There’s simply no excuse for sloppiness, misused words, incorrect spelling, or punctuation overuse on your resume. These kinds of mistakes will get your resume tossed straight into the reject pile.”
Another sloppy mistake is ripping off part of someone else’s CV or template and expecting to get away with it. Many employers will scan CVs for signs of plagiarism – and any that fail the test will result in instant rejection. If you’re worried that you might have taken a little too much inspiration from someone else’s CV, use a plagiarism scanner to check. Grammarly.com and Plagiarismchecker.net both offer cost effective solutions.
Your CV isn’t relevant
The hiring manager reads a CV to see if that individual offers the skills and qualifications they are looking for. If your CV fails to demonstrate how you can seamlessly move into the role, you are missing out on a big opportunity.
The hiring manager should not have to ‘read between the lines’ and search for the information they desire. It’s your role as a job seeker to present relevant information and prove how you can perform to a high level if hired.
The employer is looking for a candidate that is suitable for the position, and shouldn’t have to make assumptions based on your credentials. Instead, you should tailor your CV specifically to the role and take note of the job advert and the keywords that have been used.
“If you don’t understand what your potential employers want to see in a candidate, you will be simply be using guesswork to write your CV, and setting yourself up to fail.”
You haven’t demonstrated your performance
An employer will ultimately want to find out two things when they read your CV:
- That you have the right skills and qualifications
- That you can demonstrate your performance
If your CV fails to demonstrate even just one of the above, you will be rejected instantly. But assuming you have the right skills and qualifications, you are likely letting yourself down by failing to demonstrate your past performances.
A huge mistake most job seekers make is that they state how great they are in their CV. The problem with this is that the employer cannot place their trust in a complete stranger, and instead require actual evidence in the form of examples.
Rather than telling the employer how great you are, you should show them instead. Consider an achievements section for your CV where you can list examples that are relevant to the role or the industry. Also, underneath a previous role in your work history section you could detail a few examples of performance.
“Stick to using cold hard facts like experience, skills and achievements if you want to prove your value to potential employers.”
