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Advice & Tips for Preparing Your CV
by anonymili Having worked in HR (Human Resources), Personnel & Training related roles for well over 15 years now and on top of that having been called upon by many relatives, friends and friends of friends to help them create their CVs from scratch or update their existing CVs, I thought, why not put some CV writing advice into my own ... words? WHAT IS A CV? The acronym CV is short for Curriculum Vitae also known as Resume (although the term CV is pretty much standard in the UK). It's a selling tool for individuals wishing to secure employment. It's a record of your academic and employment history, your key achievements and skills, as well as a chance to say what you want out of your future career. WHY WRITE A CV? Well one would assume you're looking for a new job or even your first job or returning to work after a period of unemployment or after having brought up the kids. Your initial thought is to pick up the local paper and see what's going. You spot a job which looks like it's right up your street (not quite literally, but if it is on your street, then that's even better) and you give them a call. The first thing they'll ask you (99% of the time) is "Have you got a CV?" or "Can you send me your CV?" If you've not got a CV ready to send/fax/email them, you're already in trouble. By the time you've gone out and created one from scratch, the job will most probably have gone. You walk into any recruitment agency these days and they too will first ask for your CV. If, on the other hand, the role you're applying for calls for completion of an application form and submission of a cover letter to accompany it, DO NOT submit a CV instead! This will send you to the bottom of the pile or even into the bin THE ORDER OF THINGS Use white good quality paper, don't use photocopies. Use a standard font such as Times New Roman, 11 or 12 point. This is fairly easy on the eye font on use and about the right size, although many people are using Arial 11 these days too. Start off your CV with your full name - don't use nicknames. On the next line, type your full address, don't abbreviate anything, such as Rd for Road, or Middx for Middlesex, Berks for Berkshire. Make sure you include your full correct post code. On the next line, type your contact telephone numbers; if you use a land line or home telephone number, it makes sense to have an answering machine to catch any calls from potential employers or from agencies if you are out. Make sure your mobile phone has voice mail activated and make sure you have a clear and polite message asking the caller to leave their name, number and brief message. It really is not a good idea to have music on your voice mail message, I've lost count of the times I've tried to contact someone on their mobile and heard very loud rap music or the latest number one hit single and have hung up before leaving a message. Employers WILL do the same. No one wants to sit through 60 seconds of loud music just to leave a message, is it worth losing out on a job just to have what you might consider "cool" music for your callers to listen to? Leave a few lines and then type a Personal Profile for yourself. An example of a Personal Profile could be "A confident, mature and experienced customer service and telesales individual with over 5 years experience in the industry wishing to secure a role with new challenges and the possibility of career progression." Don't lie in your CV, you'll get caught out, e.g. don't say that you're confident if you are very shy and don't say you have 10 years experience in a retail environment when you've only had 2 weeks work experience in Boots from when you were studying at high school! You could follow on from your Personal Profile with a summary of your Key Skills and Achievements listing things such as: # Increased branch profitability by 25% by suggesting and implementing cost cutting measures at Company ABC # 5 years recent supervisory and management experience # Ran a successful sandwich business for 3 years # Voted Salesperson of the year in 1999 at Company XYZ # Designed new corporate logo for Company AAA in 2002 # 6 years experience as a Chef Try to avoid listing things which are irrelevant to the job (or type of job) you're applying for such as "My last boss said I make a lovely cup of tea" or "I know how to use a photocopier and fax machine" If you don't want to list your Key Skills, move on to your Employment History now. List the employer name and the period you worked for the employer. Don't type 2002 - 2003 as that could mean late December 2002 to early January 2003, which amounts to just a couple of weeks to cover the Christmas sales. Employers are not stupid, they'll see through this ploy if you are just trying to cover up a few weeks work by making it seem you were there longer. They can also check up by contacting your referees too. Below the employers' name, state your job title and then briefly list your duties. Don't write an essay, it doesn't need to be an attempt to win any national awards for literary excellence. Keep It Short and Simple (K.I.S.S.)! Potential employers or recruiters don't want to read your complete job description for each job you've ever done listed in your CV. Your CV is a taster of what you're about. It's to get you in the door to that ever increasingly allusive interview. Oh and remember to start with your most recent position first and work your way down. Employers tend to prefer work history in this order. Leave a blank line in between each job you list. When you've finished listing your present and past jobs, you can start with your Education/Training. Here you need to list your most recent academic achievements such as training courses attended, evening classes, university qualifications, etc. Lastly put in your high school qualifications (if you have any), such as GCSEs, O' Levels, CSE's, GNVQs, etc. Lastly you can list Additional Information, such as interests, date of birth, whether or not you have a driving license and/or car. Try not to list interests that indicate a negative character trait such as "I love getting drunk with my mates at the weekend" or "I enjoy having heated debates with people" You'll come across as someone with alcohol dependency issues and/or an argumentative so and so! By the way if you're applying for a job fresh out of full time education, it would make more sense to have your education listed before your work experience, especially if you're work experience is just two weeks in Thomas Cook when you were 15 or 16 years old and 5 years ago. It is not necessary to state your marital status or religion or how many children you have or height, weight, nationality, colour of your hair, parents' names, whether you're gay or straight. This information is totally unnecessary and any employer worth their salt would know it's illegal to ask most of these things or base a decision on whether or not to interview based on any of these! You might want to include your email address as a contact method at the top of your CV after your address and telephone number but you should really only do this if you intend (and are able) to check your email at least once every day. Another thing to remember about using email addresses is to try to use a sensible sounding email address, sexyhotcoochiemama@hotmail.com doesn't quite give off the right impression and nor does 12inchdickman@aol.com - nothing wrong with having a unique sounding email address but downright cheeky or offensive won't generally help your case. Don't list your salary and don't give reasons for leaving jobs on your CV. REFERENCES I wouldn't recommend listing your reference details on your actual CV. It's not unheard of for recruitment consultants to pull these details off candidate's CVs to call them up to try to get new business. People who've agreed to be listed as your references will soon get rather hacked off if recruitment consultants are ringing them up ten times a day asking if they have any vacancies. LENGTH OF CV There really is no perfect length that a CV should be. Whilst it's not a good idea to have a 5 page long CV (people will rarely read the whole thing), a 1 page CV is not always sufficient to list the key information needed to get you to interview stage. As a guide 2 to 3 pages is about the right length. Don't use too big a font to "pad out" a CV and don't use a font so small that the employer has to get out a magnifying glass to read it. Keep it well spaced out and nicely formatted. IN SUMMARY I've tried to keep to the point above with my advice whilst including things not to do in a CV. Above all, it's important to keep in mind that your CV is a "taster" and selling point for potential employers. When you get to an interview, you will have the chance to expand on your job duties and academic achievements. You don't stand much chance of getting a job if the interviewer has your CV in front of them and you rattle off word for word what is printed in front of them. Although it's important to have an impressive looking CV, this doesn't mean you need to have sleepless nights because your CV doesn't look like the best one in the world. Just try to make sure your CV gets your foot in the door - REMEMBER the employer wants to know how you will be an asset to the organisation, not how perfectly laid out and detailed your CV is (although it's definitely a no-no to have a CV with spelling and grammatical errors - if you're not sure, get someone to proof it for you). AND ON A LIGHTER NOTE... Here's a selection of CV blunders I found at jobsite.co.uk - some awful goofs - which really need to be re-phrased! 1. Received a plague for Salesperson of the Year. 2. Reason for leaving last job: maturity leave. 3. Let's meet, so you can get really excited over my experience. 4. I was working for my mum until she decided to move house. 5. Marital status: Single. Unmarried. Unengaged. Uninvolved. No commitments. 6. I am loyal to my employer at all costs. Will consider anything, please feel free to respond to my CV and call me on my work number. 7. Unwilling to re-locate or travel as my previous job involved a lot of travel sometimes at short notice and it completely exhausted me. 8. My goal is to be a psychologist but since I didn't go to college and get a qualification, I suppose I should stick to being a personnel manager. 9. Instrumental in ruining entire operation for a National Retail Chain. 10. The company made me a scapegoat, just like my three previous employers. 11. Achievements: I was proud to win the Typting Award at secretarial college. 12. Personal Statements: I will give the job my all as long as it doesn't interfere with my busy social life. My social life is very important to me. And if number 12 above made you laugh, I interviewed a chap a while ago who actually asked if we could consider making the job part-time instead of full-time as he had a very hectic social life and liked a few drinks with his mates most evenings! Beat that... Fairly needless to say, he didn't get the job. Read the complete review |
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My Experiencs and Advice
by thegreengoblin This review is not on local goverment but based on the introduction of the Local Housing Allowance that I have just heard about. The below is an important change that takes place from April 08 regarding the introduction of the Local Housing Allowance and may be of interest to anyone who claims housing benefit or landlords who ... receive housing benefit. It is in my simple terms what it involves, for more information regarding Local Housing Allowance I suggest you contact your local authority. Local Housing Allowance is a new way of calculating and paying Housing Benefit for people who rent from a private landlord. Local Housing Allowance has been around since November 2003 and has now been tested in 18 local authorities known as pathfinders which included Edinburgh,Leeds,Blackpool and Norwich. However from 07 April 2008 Local Housing Allowance has been rolled out nationally. So who does it affect? Local Housing Allowance will only apply to tenants who live in properties rented from private landlords, and who are making their first claim, moving address, or have a break in their claim of more than a week, after 7th April 2008. It will not apply to you if: You rent your home from the Council You live in a caravan, mobile home, houseboat or hostel You claim benefit for help with mooring fees Your tenancy started before 1989 The Rent Officer decides that a large amount of your rent is paid for board. You are a Housing Association Tenant How Is LHA is calculated? The Local Housing Allowance is calculated by the Rent Service for individual areas, known as Broad Rental Market Areas (BRMAs), each month. Different LHA rates will apply in different areas and our based on the median rent charged by private sector landlords for properties of various sizes. The figures calculated by the Rent Officer for the Broad Rental Market Areas will be published each month and should be available from local authorities. Once the Rent Service has determined the rates for an area, an individual customer's benefit will depend on their age and the size of the household. Size criteria will be based on allowing one bedroom for: Every adult couple Every adult who is not part of a couple Any other adult aged 16 or over Any two children of the same sex Any two children regardless of sex under 10 Any other child The number of living rooms, kitchens and bathrooms are ignored for the purpose of the size criteria. However if you are a single person under 25 will only be entitled to the shared rate LHA. If you are over 25 with or without a partner and you have no children then you will be entitled to the shared rate if you live in shared accommodation or the 2-room rate if you live in self-contained accommodation. Joint tenants will receive a rate of Local Housing Allowance based solely on the individual joint tenants family plus any non-dependants, sub-tenants or boarders that they live with. Local Housing Allowance once awarded lasts for twelve months unless you're circumstances change which changes your above size criteria. Also how much Local Housing Allowance you receive still depends on looking at your income and savings, as is the way with the current Housing Benefit Scheme. What if the Rent you pay is less than the Local Housing Allowance? One of the objectives of the scheme is to give you more choice. If you decide to Rent accommodation that is cheaper than the allowance, then you can keep the difference up to £15. What if the Rent you pay is more than the Local Housing Allowance? If you decide to rent somewhere more expensive than your Local Housing Allowance you receive then you must pay the difference from your other income. You have no right of appeal against the levels off Local Housing Allowance determined by the Rent Officer. However you will have the right to dispute any decision that the Council has made when calculating your claim. Payment of Housing Benefit? Payment of benefit under the Local Housing Allowance rules will normally be made to the claimant. It is the claimants responsibility to pay the rent to your landlord. Only in exceptional circumstances will payment be made direct to your Landlord. Benefit payments for Local Housing Allowance will be made every four weeks (in arrears) directly into a bank or building society account. Most people will find this the easiest way so you can set up a standing order to pay your landlord. If you don't have a bank account you can open a basic bank account at most bank or building societies. If someone else looks after the your money for you or has power of attorney, payment of Housing Benefit can be made to them. Read the complete review |
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Tae Kwon Do
by jenny967 Taekwon do is a Korean maritial art, Taekwon do means the art of hand and foot. I had never heard of Taekwon do until a year ago when I got a leaflet home from the school, so myself and my husband decided to let our kids join. The costs The first night they went it was free, then after that it cost £4 each per ... class, you can get a family price, my husband and two kids pay £8.00. You dont need to buy a uniform for about 6 weeks, this is to make sure you like it. The uniform costs £30, the gradings also cost £30 and the licence costs £35 which lasts for 1 year, although this sounds pretty expensive it is well worth it. Reasons for joining I decided to let my kids join partly for the exercise but mainly for a confidence boost as my daughter was really shy, She has been at it for just over a year now and loves it and she has grown in confidence. Clothing For the first few weeks you need to wear comfortable loose clothing I.E track bottoms and t-shirt, Taekwon do is done in bare feet, when you are ready to purchase a suit, it can be purchased from your instructer. Gradings There is about three gradings per year, which are held in designated grading centres, the instructer will advise you as and when you are ready for each grading. The belts white belt yellow tag yellow belt green tag green belt blue tag blue belt red tag red belt black tag black belt Taekwond is a sport which is fun, it will improve your fitness and flexibility and is for all ages, it is also helpful to teach kids discipline and respect. Patterns For each coloured belt there is a different pattern you will be taught, patterns are various movements which represent either attack or deffence techniques. Sparring When you reach a certain level, you do light sparring with other members in the club, you are provided with the safety gear for this, but if you do competions in other countries you have to buy the safety gear, again this can be purchased from your club Competions in the club In the club were my kids attend, there are competions held every month in which they can get medals, for sparring and knee tag which they find good fun. I have one child on her green tag and my other child is on his yellow tag, they both have taken part in competions in their club and have came home with gold and silver medals and have also made new friends through doing Taekwon do. Here is the website for Northern Ireland Taekwon do, if you want to have a look www.taekwondo-ni.co.uk Thanks for reading I have also done this review on Ciao Read the complete review |
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