A sample chronological CV
Here’s a sample of a ‘traditional’ formatted CV that has been modernised.
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John Wong
0400 000 000 | [email protected] | Melbourne VIC 3000 | LinkedIn | Permanent Resident
Overview
I am a degree-qualified engineer and project manager with experience running projects of up to $100m in large-scale construction and transportation. I am highly competent in the proposal and tender preparation as well as assessing tender submissions from subcontractor organisations. My experience includes working on public and private partnership projects.
Skills
- Engineering and construction
- ABC estimating software
- Public-private partnerships
- Estimating
- Bridge construction
- Tender preparation/bid management
- Contracts management
Education and training
- Graduate Diploma in Project Management | RMIT | 20xx
- Bachelor of Engineering | University of Melbourne | 20xx
Other courses
- Project Management: Prince2 Foundation | Prince2 Practitioner | Agile Scrum Master
- Management: Running Diverse Teams Managing Conflict in the Workplace
Employment
DEPARTMENT OF INFRASTRUCTURE
Project Manager | since Jun 2012
I led the scoping and tendering for major infrastructure projects. Recent projects include the xx Bypass Freeway ($240m) and the removal of level crossings on the xx train line ($180m).
I prepared the groundwork that enables major public and private partnerships to deliver commitments for xx:
- Delivered several major RFT proposals for large-scale infrastructure projects. No major legal or practical issues have arisen.
- Rated outstanding on past four performance reviews.
- Appointed Acting Director for the Construction Division on three occasions ranging from one to six months.
- Selected to attend an international conference on public and private partnerships.
- Invited to chair an infrastructure roundtable of all major engineering organisations in Melbourne.
- Promoted from Project Officer to Project Manager.
- Prepared highly complex requests for tender. Some of these are 500 pages long.
- Appointed to a lead role in coordinating the involvement of other internal departments including legal, finance and environmental evaluations.
- Monitored the progress of contracted works, ensuring that timeframes and costs are being met.
- Oversaw two junior project staff and an administration resource.
Project Officer | May 2012 — Jun 2012 | Contract
I joined the department initially on a six-month contract to assist with the preparation of several lengthy contracts for construction projects that were due around the same time.
- Prepared geographical information and user statistics for inclusion in tenders.
- Liaised with consultants on the timely provision of information.
- Researched the latest trends in engineering and public and private partnerships.
- Promoted from a six-month initial term to 18 months.
- Represented the department at numerous working groups to monitor project progress.
- Awarded the divisional medal for teamwork.
SAVVY CONSULTING
Junior Estimator then Estimator | Jan 2009 — Apr 2012
Savvy is a worldwide consulting group specialising in engineering and building. Its clients include X, Y and Z.
- I prepared engineering costing estimates for several tenders.
- Liaised between suppliers and other parts of the business internally.
- Maintained the organisation database for pricing.
- Prepared sections of tenders.
- Contributed to the achieving of three tenders worth over $10m each.
Other positions include:
- CAD Operator, ABC Organisation
- Filing Assistant (while studying), XYZ Organisation
Other Information
- I have a French background but am an Australian Permanent Resident.
- I speak English and fluent French.
- My interests include sailing, dining out, AFL, trivia nights and exploring country towns.
Preparing a compelling CV
What is the difference between a CV and a resume?
The terms “CV” and “resume” are often used interchangeably in Australia although they do mean slightly different things.
Typically, a resume is one (1) to two (2) pages long whereas a CV (as I will refer to it) is longer with two (2) to four (4) pages, depending on how much experience you have.
A CV (short for the Latin phrase curriculum vitae, which means “course of life”) is a detailed document highlighting your professional and academic history.
The challenge is including enough information in the CV to sell your skills while remaining brief.
Have a compelling CV
The main purpose of your CV is to secure an interview. It is the primary means on which a hiring manager will assess your suitability and capability for the advertised role. This initial assessment can be as short as six (6) to ten (10) seconds!
It is therefore vital for you to make a great impression very quickly.
Writing a CV
Writing a CV can be challenging, particularly when you lack strong writing and English is not your first language.
If you are struggling to get started, just get some thoughts down on paper. Refer to online descriptions of job advertisements to jog your memory. You can edit it later.
Your CV should be a stand-alone document. It should contain all the information you want a hiring manager to know, subject to relevancy and length. It is unrealistic to expect a recruiter or hiring manager to cross-reference your CV with your cover letter.
Types of CVs
There are three typical styles of CV:
(1) Chronological CVs – These are the commonly used and emphasise your employment starting with the most recent role, working backwards. Your achievements are listed under each role.
(2) Functional CVs – These emphasise your skills with achievements listed underneath in dot points. Employment details are brief, often with a short paragraph of explanation for each role. Functional CVs are sometimes favoured to disguise breaks in employment as they may list time spent in roles rather than actual dates.
(3) Hybrid CVs combine both – These tend to use the chronological approach with a greater emphasis on skills and achievements.
Skills are the new currency in the workplace
My preference is the use of the functional CV.
It de-emphasises my overseas employment and my age. But it emphasises key skills that I have and be transferable into a specific job in Australia.
Perhaps, if you are unsure, you may need to try out different CV types to determine which one gives you more visibility and responses.
The selection depends on your employer, industry, and job title. Traditional industries and employers tend to favour the chronological CV.
General conventions
As such, there is no one right style a CV. Ultimately your CV presentation is a personal choice relative to your employer, industry and job title.
Formatting varies according to practice in different sectors, but there are some more universal features:
(1) Sell you well for the job, employer and industry.
(2) Stand out for the right reasons. Remember the 10-second rule.
(3) Be contemporary and well-presented.
(4) Be tailored specifically for each job you are applying for.
(5) Use good English.
What your CV should do and have
Your CV should:
(1) Only contain information relevant for the job you are applying for.
(2) Only contain facts you can substantiate and proof.
(3) Be brief to a max of four (4) pages.
(4) Be written clearly.
(5) Appear professional and contemporary.
(5) Be structured so that it is easy to read and contains enough white spaces.
(6) Focus on your achievements i.e. what you did. Remember to show, not tell.
(7) Use a modern font, 10- to 11-point size depending on the font (recommend Arial Narrow).
Your CV should not:
(1) Have a cover page.
(2) Be titled or labelled as a “CV” or “resume”. Use your name instead.
(3) Include irrelevant information e.g., date of birth or marital status.
(4) Have a photograph (unless your appearance is vital for the job e.g., modelling or for a market where that is the requirement, e.g., Singapore).
(5) Contain any outright lies.
(6) Have grammatical or spelling errors. You must use Australian English instead of US English.
(7) Contain corporate or government-speak or other acronyms or language. Try to write in lay-person terms without assuming the hiring manager knows them. Don’t assume.
(8) Require an employer to have to research or investigate anything.
(9) Go back beyond 10 to 15 years unless perhaps there is the experience you wish to highlight that is directly relevant to the job you are applying for.
(10) Try to be all things to all people. Your CV must be tailored to different job opportunities and requirements.
(11) Contain tables or other formatting that does not work with CV scanning software.
Structure
The general sections usually included in a CV are:
(1) Your name – Used as the header of your CV.
(2) Personal and contact information below your name.
(3) Summary or Overview of your career or your professional Profile.
(4) Education and Training.
(5) Employment or Professional Experience (no need to add the word “History”).
(6) Other Information.
(7) Referees, if appropriate.
Name (in the heading)
Make your name as the heading for your CV. There is no need to add qualifications after your name (e.g., “CPA”).
Do not call the document a “CV” or “Resume”.
Personal or Contact Details
List all relevant details across the page under the heading. There is no need for a separate section.
You might include mobile, email (a professional-sounding personal email unless it is an internal application), suburb, state, postcode, Linkedln link and immigration status.
There is no need for a full address at this stage.
Add “Australian Citizen” or “Australian Permanent Resident” if the hiring manager might reasonably think you need sponsorship to work – i.e. you studied or lived abroad.
Summary / Overview / Profile
This is not a summary but your sales pitch for the role at hand.
Most people write a short paragraph (3 to 4 lines) or 3 to 4 dot points which may be written in the first person (“I am”). It should never be written in the third person (“Susan is”).
Spend time crafting your pitch. Think about why you are a match for the specific advertised job. What unique experience, skills, and qualifications do you have that will appeal to the hiring manager? Ask yourself what your key value or offer you will be brought into this role. It may be that you have worked in the sector, used the software that the employer is using or know the industry-specific methodology.
It is about what it is that you do best!
Skills
Focus on your “hard” technical skills (e.g., project management) rather than your “soft” skills (e.g., teamwork).
The rule of thumb is that your hard skills will get you an interview, but your soft skills will get you the job.
Long lists of unsubstantiated personal skills will often be overlooked.
A chronological CV may list relevant skills briefly as keywords. You can use columns, but not tables, to save length.
A functional CV will list skills and have a few dot points of actual achievements as examples under each one to substantiate that skill.
Education and Training
If you have the prerequisite qualifications for the role, place this section before Experience. If you do not have relevant qualifications and want the reader to focus firstly on your experience, then move Education and Training beneath Experience.
The convention is to list your qualifications in reverse chronological order but consider placing at the top your highest level of qualification and/or the most relevant course as readers will focus on the first line and assume that is the highest level you have attained.
List the degree, its abbreviation in brackets, the institution and the year attained. If you are age-conscious, you may consider omitting the dates.
There is no real need to include your secondary schooling unless you are in the early stages of your career.
You can combine your formal study and short courses under one heading. In general. you don’t need to include where and when you did short courses – the names only will be enough. You can then group them collectively under a “named” dot point (e.g., management, communication, safety, etc.) and across the page. This makes the information more concise and easier to change the order of the courses for different applications.
If it is vital for your role that a certification or course is current, you can note “(current)” after the course.
You do not have to add details such as subjects or the name of your thesis if not relevant to the role.
Experience
Demonstrate that you have relevant skills and expertise that is required for the advertised job.
Start with the employer’s name in capitals as the first line. If you have had multiple positions with the same organisation, this structure will indicate the progression more readily. Otherwise a quick skim might look like lots of separate jobs.
You can list the total date next to the organisation name and the individual time spent in each role next to that line.
You would generally include the month and year, noting `Contract’ if applicable.
Consider including a line or two about the organisation unless you have only worked for brand-name organisations.
Traditionally. each job would have been broken into responsibilities and achievements.
This should be avoided.
Modern CVs focus on achievements. Achievements, on the other hand, always start with a strong verb in the past tense e.g., “Delivered”, “Instigated”, “Created”, “Project-managed” and tell the hiring manager the impact you have made or value you have created.
Responsibilities list the functions of the job and are usually in the present tense. Responsibilities should not be a rehash of a job description but a simple explanation of what you did.
List a short paragraph to explain the role broadly especially if it is not common. Then to launch straight into achievements.
You don’t need to list every single function you undertook. Try also to consolidate similar achievements by making a broader achievement status such as “Saved X through process improvements including” and listing examples underneath.
Other Information
Include other relevant information like your interests (if relevant), registrations (e.g., as a Teacher), Working with Children Checks, driver’s licence (only if specified in the ad or relevant to the role), volunteering or languages, etc.
This can be written as separate sentences after a dot point.
Referees
Either include referees or leave the whole section off altogether. Saying “Referees – to be provided on request” or “at interview” is a little meaningless!
Reference checks have gained importance. Many ads now prescribe including two referees with your application.
If you don’t want your referees contacted, you might consider either including only your referees’ positions or just their names and no phone numbers. Keep in mind that there is always the risk of an unsolicited approach to any potential referee (listed or otherwise).
Optional Elements
(1) Licences can be relevant or mandatory in certain professions e.g., in construction.
(2) Professional associations, memberships, or registrations. List only current and relevant ones. You can just list them without the dates.
(3) Software packages can be particularly important in roles like accounting.
(4) Technical skills are very important for IT roles. Consider grouping technology together such as security. telephony, databases, etc. This is a key consideration for organisations that are likely to use CV scanning software.
(5) Accreditations or certifications especially if they are pivotal for your role.
(6) Publication, conferences, etc. are relevant for university, scientific and research positions. Before including large lists of publications, be sure that their inclusion adds value. Be consistent with your formatting convention.
(7) Volunteering can be useful in demonstrating experience relevant to a new role or industry.
(8) You may add social media handles elsewhere if relevant to the job and you are happy for a potential employer to review it!
What is not needed
Your age. date of birth, marital status, and children (if any). gender, smoking or health status. driver’s licence (unless a prerequisite) or photo.
CV formatting
CV formatting has changed dramatically in the past few years, both to meet CV scanning software requirements and a general expectation of documents being more visually appealing.
Having a dated CV might give the reader the impression that you are not open to ideas and have poor computer skills.
Make sure the formatting is:
(1) A4 size paper, portrait orientation.
(2) Arial Narrow, with minimum font size 10 for CV and size 12 for a cover letter.
(3) Australian English spelling.
(4) Defined as styles in Word. This ensures text is consistent and shows you know how to use Word.
(5) Not in tables. These make the margins inconsistent and do not appeal to CV scanning software.
(6) Consistent.
(7) Not too squashed on the page.
(8) Presented as the type of file sought by the reader (PDF or Word).
Reducing the CV length
Most CVs would be a maximum of three (3) to four (4) pages, although academic CVs might be longer.
If you are struggling to reduce the length of your CV, some simple tips include:
(1) Replacing several words with one e.g., “at the same time” to “simultaneously”.
(2) Removing unnecessary details particularly in jobs from a long time ago.
(3) Reducing the length of sentences.
(4) Changing fonts or formatting. Arial Narrow is a skinny font to use if you are desperate. Sans serif fonts can often be used at a smaller size and still be legible.
(5) Combining similar roles if the responsibilities were similar. For example, you can add your title “Sales Assistant” and the dates immediately under the “Senior Sales Assistant” and its dates and have the one description of what you did in both roles. Where you have returned to the same role. add both date periods separated by a semicolon.
(5) You don’t need to start the top of each page with a new job.
Contentious issues
There are many contentious issues related to CV that you must be aware:
(1) Objectives are no longer used. They can limit you. The focus now is more on what value you can offer the employer.
(2) Interests can help you stand out, demonstrate a cultural fit, be a conversation starter or otherwise help build rapport if they can help you with the job. It can also show some personality or a sense of humour. If you want to include them, add them to the Other Information section.
(3) Writing in the first person is more acceptable now than say ten years ago.
(4) In permissible industries, it is common for people to use colour sparingly (e.g., in headings). While people are more comfortable viewing documents on the screen, use colours that will print well in black and white.
(5) CV scanning software may make an incomplete study more noticeable. If only a small portion was completed. you can list individual subjects as short courses. Never list more than one incomplete degree. Do use your judgement.
(6) Thesis and academic awards are valued in academic or research roles where they can be listed as minor points under the course.
(7) Account for any gaps in employment. It also draws attention to it. This is another judgement call.
(8) Maternity leave – Leave the position as is while you were on maternity leave. You still occupy the position even while on leave. So, there is no need to account for this. If necessary, you can add information to the fine print i.e. “Please note that I was on maternity leave from X to Y.”
(9) A separate list of achievements on the front page to draw attention to them. If there is something particularly significant, you can draw attention to that in the Overview.
(10) Readers will assume each role is full-time. Note a role is a part-time role if you are applying for another part-time position.
(11) You do not have to explain why you left every job ever. Add an explanation in your overview of the role (the paragraph explaining your role in broad terms) if necessary.
Common mistakes
Here are some common mistakes on CVs that need to be double-checked:
(1) The past tense of “leading is “led” not “lead” as in pencil.
(2) Check for the word “Manger” which is often skipped by a spelling check when it should read “Manager”.
(3) It’s “ten years’ experience” (note the apostrophe) or “ten years of experience”.
(4) Typically, numbers up to and including ten are written in words so it is “a team of three”. Beyond ten. write the number i.e. “a team of 18”.
(5) The usual “its” versus “it’s”, “to” versus “too”, etc. If you are not sure, check with a good writer!
(6) The plural of KPI (as in key performance indicator) is “KPIs” not “KPI’s”.