Latest Tip - CVs that deliver

How sharp is your CV? It's one thing making your CV stand out but it's another ensuring that it reads easily and the right information jumps out from the page. As a recruiter scan reading a CV, the most important things should be easily found such as degree course, degree grade and A-levels. Only include relevant work experience and detail the highlights in bullet points. Leave nothing to question - detail dates that are chronologically watertight. Your interests/hobbies section can really be the only part of your CV that's written in full sentences and paragraphs. Don't ever attempt to pad out content to make it look like you've done more as all that does is make it harder for the recruiter to extract the facts. When you're looking over hundreds of CVs everyday the last thing you have time to do is to read bulk text so if you stretch out information in this way it may get overlooked.

Are you looking for a career or a job?

When searching or applying for graduate jobs what mindset are you in? Are you just looking for a job or are you looking for a career? This is a question all recruiters will be trying to suss out as early as possible in the recruitment process. They’ll be trying to find someone who is looking long term, a person who is really serious and committed to the idea of working in their industry. With this in mind you must be doing everything you can to convince them of this and equally, not applying to jobs that you don’t feel passionate about.

Stay focused during these busy times

We understand that this time can be a difficult to work on job hunting due to exam revision or final projects due all at once - don't let this get the better of you. Focus on remaining calm and not letting this overwhelm you to a point that you lose sight of your job application plans. Things might seem tough to manage at the moment but in the world of work you will face these demanding times on a weekly basis so take it with passion, skill and grace so with everyday you'll become stronger, more confident in your ability and ultimately more employable. If you need a break from revision, why not print out the latest jobs from our feeds to give your eyes a rest from the screen. You can get links to every feed from the orange RSS Feed triangle logo on the folders of our homepage.

Keep your details up to date

If there is one thing that can be really frustrating in graduate recruitment it has to be finding someone who looks perfect for the job and not being able to get in touch with them. We dread to think how many missed opportunities have drifted past over the years so lets not let it happen to you. Foremost, make sure you update us with another email address if you are using a uni one that's about to expire. Secondly ensure we have the most up to date telephone number for you - remember if we can't speak to you we can't put you forward and do our job!

Secure Your References

Now the end of the academic year is approaching it would be a good idea to secure your references so you know that if called upon, they will be happy to recommend you. Bettering that, get a hard copy signed by them - it will really speed up the job offer process if you can present this at interview and also show that you're organised. Your reference normally comes from a tutor/lecturer or an employer whilst at university. It might sound obvious but make sure you pick people that you’ve worked hard for and you know you get on with!