Some time ago I was chatting to a client about the CV that they had sent me and they wanted to know what I thought. At that moment, they were renovating their house so with that in mind, I personalised the conversation and asked:
- Do you want to polish it up, give it a new look and clear the clutter?
- Or do you want to knock down the walls and give your CV a total refurbishment to create a new and more focused, professional personality?
As with a house refurbishment or renovation, price plays a factor with writing CVs but more importantly, what do you need for the CV/space? A renovation is a ‘transformation’, whereas a refurbishment is making more of what you have and improving the CV ‘feng shui’ to make it more targeted and effective.
To make the decision, it was imperative to clarify the client’s why. Did it even need transforming? I’m not one of those CV writers who always says I can redo the CV if it doesn’t actually need any work. So I asked them:
1 Why do you need a ‘new’ CV?
2 What do you think is missing?
3 How many more achievements can you include? (Delete any time you say ‘Responsible for’ and never talk about it again! Recruiters want to know what results you achieved, not what you were responsible for)
4 What role are you are applying for?
5 Have you made your CV as targeted and relevant as possible?
6 Have you tailored your CV to the targeted role? Because you are tailoring your CV, aren’t you?!
So, there you go. If you need help refurbishing or renovating your house, flat or boat, though I am a huge fan of property-based TV programmes, I am quite literally the last person to ask for help with DIY.
However, if you need help with refurbishing or renovating your CV, then I am very much your man. Get in touch!
Email jason@jncv.co.uk
LinkedIn Jason Newton
Photo R ARCHITECTURE on Unsplash
jncv.co.uk 
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