Guest Sdavis654 Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Hi there, I'm hoping in the next month or two to have my de facto visa so I can get back over to OZ and start my life over there with my partner. I thought while I wait, I would make a start on preparing my cv ready for applying once the visa gets sorted. However I have a few questions I hope people can help me out with.... 1) I know people say to tailor your cv to the job you are going for....but what if my last job is relevant, the one before that isn't and the one before that is (if that makes sense)? Do I just write about the ones that are relevant then put more information available upon request with the ones that aren't? 2) also what is the recommended length for the cvs there? I've heard no more than 2 but others saying up to 5. I've had a lot of jobs over the last few years as well as lots of gaps for travelling......how should this be written on the cv. any help with this would be greatly appreciated as I'm at a bit of a lose end with it all thanks Sandra Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
readstogo Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 I've always taken "tailor CV to the job applied for" to mean you make your previous jobs look similar. For example, OH works in the leisure industry. I've always told him it's basically the same job whether the centre has lycra-clad cougars, ice-skating kids, or ten-pin bowling. As a manager, he does the same tasks! But employers won't see his skills as transferable, so he 'tailors' his CV by making his tasks and skills relevant to the job applied for. His employment history doesn't change on his CV, he just adapts the blurb he writes under each position. Also, CV's in Australia tend to be longer than UK ones. They seem to like 2-3 pagers! You don't have to put in every job ever had, but you can explain gaps or early working history in the intro (ie I have a strong work ethic since I started working when I was 15 etc) Hope this makes sense. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vickyplum Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Tailoring your CV is looking at the job you want to apply for, and then rewording your CV or putting more emphasis on certain things, so that it reflects the job that the employer is looking to fill. ie, I am a Personal Assistant, and my role also contains things like SAP purchasing, document control stuff, events organising. So if I applied for a job as an event co-ordinator/manager, I would talk less about SAP and document control and go into more detail about the events I've organised (planning process, number of attendees, location, activities etc). But if I was applying for a SAP job, I would only mention the event side of my role, very briefly. This is not a Australia-specific thing - most serious job hunters in the UK will do the same. ps- sorry, didn't mean to repeat what readstogo said - didn't read through properly! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rupert Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Don't over think the "Australian-ising" bit of this, a good CV is a good CV. By all means work on getting a good CV and tailoring just means emphasis on certain things, it doesn't mean removing jobs or people will wonder what the gaps are about! I stuck to a two page CV for the first five or ten years of my working life, but now I am on 3 pages and that is perfectly fine. I rarely see a two page CV now, but some are longer than others, there is no rule. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Sdavis654 Posted February 9, 2014 Share Posted February 9, 2014 Thanks Readstogo and Vickyplum, that is a very good point, i didn't really think of it that way! My last couple of jobs have been temping things to get a bit of money in between travelling in and out of OZ so theyre not really the best jobs i wanted to be shouting to a potential recruiter about. But what you've said makes a lot of sense so i'll check through the possible job criteria's and tailor them towards it that way. Thanks you Rubert, I think my CV for the UK worked fine while I was trying to get a job back home so hopefully with a few tweaks and rewording, I can get a good one that the aussie's will hopefully like Sandra Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eera Posted February 9, 2014 Share Posted February 9, 2014 We like to see people putting thought into their covering letter and showing they know a bit about the company. Can't count the number of times I've got them with sentances like "I really want to work for your company because I like the way your company does things..." Oh yeah? What's the company called then? CVs are much of a muchness. We don't care what your A levels were and that you were choir captain at school. Personal details are too much; I don't care about your height, religion and marital status unless it affects your job. Your contacts and recent job first with how it's relevent, followed by degrees or trade certs, and a short paragraph about you being well-rounded and preferably not psychotic under interests. Think about how you will be percieved here; we had one guy writing that he liked being an amateur sleuth, we interpreted that as "I will go through your desk when you're not here" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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