Tag Archives: CV Tips

Careers Advice, Job Applications, Job Hunting, Recruitment

Understanding who reviews your CV

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When applying for jobs it can often feel like your CV disappears into the abyss – rarely receiving any replies, occasionally receiving the automatically generated response, and you are often left wondering whether your application was read. Chasing after feedback can be just as frustrating, if you can actually get through to the relevant party to discuss your application – often being fobbed off with generic responses such as “we have over XXX applications for this role so we cannot provide individual feedback” or worst still, a response telling you that your CV is fine (because they are too busy to bother spending 5 minutes to talk through details.

So understanding where your CV might end up when you apply for a job is a good starting point to enable you to make more informed decisions about structuring your CV and about where you might concentrate your applications.

  • CV sifters – this is becoming a popular and cost effective way for organisations to manage applications, taking out the recruitment element and fees. Companies specialise in taking bulk loads of CVs and sorting through to produce a shortlist of applications. Some are specialised in particular career fields but a lot are generalists and will work to a guide provided by the hiring manager. This works in respect of a popular job in that it sorts out all the relevant CVs (believe me, no matter how good the job advert, you will always get random applications from completely irrelevant job seekers), however if the sifters are not specialised and your CV reads in a technical or role specific terminology then you may find your application being put in the recycle bin.
  • Who reviews your CVRecruiters – often generalist recruiters tend to work on a pepper gun approach, taking a group of CVs which “appear” to match the job and sending them all to the employers. Similar to the sifters, this can generate a misleading hope (if they tell you they are sending your CV to the client) as you will probably be in a batch of 20/30 CVs. If the recruiter is working on dozens of jobs then it is fair to say they may not have spent a great deal of time reviewing and matching up CVs specific to the role. Not always the case but worth bearing in mind if you are wondering why you haven’t heard back or if you have been rejected post submission to the employer.
  • Specialist recruiters – these are the people you put a lot of faith in, they should know their game and in an ideal world have actually performed the roles prior to specialising in recruiting for them. As fees tend to be higher for these agencies, the employer expects to see a condensed shortlist of CVs which bear a close match to the position. This can mean a greater chance of interview should you be chosen for the shortlist but can also mean it is much more difficult to get into the shortlist in the first place.
  • HR staff – instructed by hiring managers to run a recruitment drive for a role, some HR staff are fantastic and really ask the right questions of the hiring manager and research the role, others take a less formal approach and create a list of “must haves” and use these to tick off when reviewing CVs. Remember that this tick list is most probably used by most reviewers to a point so it is important that your CV states are the things you have done which are relevant to the role.

The lesson to be learned from all the above is to ensure your CV is clear, do not assume because you have a job title of XYZ that you automatically have experience of ABC. Making assumptions and not spelling it out is the first step to failing to get past the reviewer on your job search journey.

Careers Advice, Internet Recruitment Sites, Job Applications, Job Hunting, project management recruitment, Recruitment

Internet Recruitment Sites

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Often the first port of call for most looking for a new job – internet recruitment sites can be effective but need to be tackled in the right way to ensure you are harvesting good results. It is easy to apply online for roles and using the job boards provides very easy access to hundreds of recruitment agency job adverts. However if you are merely applying for anything and everything which broadly covers your skill-set you could be off to a non-starter – look at it from the recruiters perspective, if you apply for roles which vary significantly in salary and seniority then you are wasting their time. You will get noticed but for all the wrong reasons, quickly being labelled as a “apply for all” candidate who does not A. Read the job advert or B. Does not understand their own skill-set

Take time to really understand which roles are relevant for you and make sure you don’t assume that the recruiter knows what it is like to work at xxx ltd. When I say this I mean I have seen CVs which are rather limited in information and often do not have enough of the skills covered which are required for a role, therefore the application is rejected and it is not uncommon to have a call from the candidate asking why they were rejected. When explaining the key areas for the role the candidate will say they have done this and my response was – it is not in your CV. No matter how good a recruiter is at their job if the CV is not including the key skills asked for in their client wish list then the CV will be rejected from the client and it is important for the recruiter to maintain a good relationship with their client.  Sending in CVs lacking vital information looks bad on them so they won’t do it.

Your CV also needs to be compatible for the recruiter databases – often there are some guidance notes on the recruiter sites as to what works best with their systems, make sure you follow these but a good rule of thumb is to keep the CV to a basic formatting and avoiding tables and text boxes. Otherwise you may find that your CV is not displaying correctly on the recruiters screen and could be missing large chunks of information. As the recruiter will be dealing with hundreds of CVs on a daily basis you will easily be discarded for a CV which is correctly formatted and states all the key requirements for a role.

Keyword searching by recruiters is also very popular these days due to the volumes of candidates in databases so it is important to make sure you weave relevant keywords within your CV – do not just list a mass of keywords! This is not helpful to the recruiter who requires some context of how you have used skills, software etc. Take a look at roles being advertised and check that the terminology is similar to that used in your CV, make sure you really work at placing some effective statements about when you have had exposure to certain aspects such as the project lifecycle including how, when, why.

CV Tips, CV Writing, PMO, PMO CV

What a PMO CV should say

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What should your PMO CV say – it’s all well and good telling us you support / manage / set up PMOs in your CV but do you give the recruiter or hiring manager enough information for them to get a feel for your exposure? Often I am sent CVs from PMO professionals asking for feedback and although basically it is well written, there are huge gaps leaving me wanting more detail. Recruiters and hiring managers are unlikely to pick up the phone to ask you questions when they already have an inbox full of applications, they simply move on to the next CV.

What do we want to know? Here are a few points to consider:

  • The PMO itself – what kind of PMO is it? Is it corporate level, satellite (department based, permanent for say IT), or temporary (set up for a specific programme and disbanded once the programme has delivered)
  • How big is it? Some PMOs are just one person, others run into 20’s to much larger
  • How mature is the PMO, are we talking rather new and currently creating & embedding structures, enterprise level or somewhere in between
  • How many programmes and / or projects feed into the PMO
  • What are the programmes / projects which are being supported
  • What level of support is offered – purely admin or as intended, consultants to the project management team
  • Who does the PMO report into – is it an interface between project management and the senior management team

As a PMO manager or consultant have you addressed these points?

  • What type of PMO manager are you – do you set up PMOs and move on to new assignments once you have implemented structures and handed over to someone else to manage
  • Do you have a PMO tool kit of templates which you can adapt for business needs
  • Are you all about process or pragmatic in your approach to implementing structures
  • Do you pick up existing PMOs and mange going forward as opposed to setting them up
  • What is your key specialism – do you look to address overarching business needs and work on communications
  • Are you a coach / trainer to project managers

These are few areas which require consideration when putting together a CV; too many times I have seen CVs which list a lot of bullets such as:

  • Risk & Issue Management
  • Stakeholder Mapping
  • Change Management
  • Planning

Put like this – it doesn’t tell the reviewer a great deal and does tend to read like a job description not a CV, think about adding in some context and really adding some meat to the bones. It is easy to assume that others will know all about your role at XXX plc but the reality is that we don’t, by taking time to think about how you may describe to others what you do and your environment you can really make a difference to your CV.

Career Objective, CV Tips, CV Writing, Project management career progression, Project Management Careers Advice, Project management CV, project management resume

CV Objective – to include or not

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Stating a career objective in your CV can be a great way to highlight where you wish to go next in your occupation, however it can also be stating the obvious. If you have a resume which is clear in your goals then stating an objective can over egg the pudding so to speak, however if you are looking for a change in career or want to be taken seriously for progression then including this detail can really help. For those who display their CVs online for recruiters and hiring managers to pick up, the objective can help stop wasting time being called for roles which are not on the radar for you. Especially those who may currently (and have a history of) managing projects and would like to progress to managing programmes and equally for those who have previously worked in a field which they wish to move away from.

Be careful what you state as an objective and don’t pitch yourself out of the market, a good objective will talk through why you wish to move into a particular field (such as interest or exposure to something you wish to specialise in) and also give a view of where you see yourself in the future (progressing up the career ladder).

Here’s an example of an objective which covers the above:

  • Following a successful career supporting a number of large projects now looking to progress to the role of project manager where these skills can be utilised to their full potential; following 3 years experience of managing smaller projects through the lifecycle. Long term goals include eventual progression into managing programmes of work.

Here the candidate is clearly stating that they are ready for that next step up to managing projects rather than supporting and they have experience which means it is not unrealistic. The long term goal tells the reader that the person is serious about their career and is working to a plan; they are not unreasonable and know that it takes time (and experience).

You can justify your potential for promotion / progression with your objective therefore if this is a route you are looking to take then including the objective can really work for you. Likewise if you are looking to move into a new industry or career you can also use the objective to highlight your transferability.

If you applying direct to an employer for a role, they may ask for an objective to be included on the CV. I cannot emphasise enough that all job adverts need to be read thoroughly, following instruction can be part of the recruitment process and as such you need to take this seriously and comply.

Making sure you are pitching to the right audience is key to getting viewed favourably for roles – don’t leave it to assumptions, make sure you are clear about what it is you want.