NOWADAYS, it is always that time of the year — time to dust off, create (or refashion) your résumé, curriculum vitae (CV), the list of qualification and experiences (real or imagined) that is expected to knock the socks off any potential employer. The CV is the first place that your potential employer gets a glimpse of you before they actually meet you face-to-face. Don’t let that first meeting be one where they do not want to see you at all — ever. It does not have to be that way.

In my time I have met some downright frightening résumés that have shaken the very core of my sanity. I am talking about your self-indulgent six-pagers that wax lyrical about daffodils and other totally irrelevant bits of information about the applicant and his ability. To this day, not even vivid images of Idris Elba, Denzil Washington or Asafa Powell, jogging bare-chested and sweaty, on a meltingly hot summer’s day can erase the painful assault on my consciousness, having digested any such magnum opus. Mercy, please.

The really ugly CVs are more than three pages. It does not matter or how many times NASA’s top brass have urgently sought your counsel or if you have more degrees than a thermometer, no one should have to sell themselves and their abilities over more than three pages. This is one of the very few times when short is good. The truth is that if you write more than three pages, chances are you have not tailored your résumé, eliminating superfluous and irrelevant information. We know that the Latin expression, Curriculum Vitae, loosely translated means, “the course of my life”, but it is not necessary to torture us with every idiotic details of, for example, every single medal you won from your primary school days. Save that riveting tidbit of information for the interview and get a friend (who cares about your success) to peruse your document. Remember that a good-looking CV is a précis of your skills and experience for the position for which you are applying. It contains the skills, experience and some personal information.

You CV is a standard, formal business communications document, not a demonstration of your skills in the use of all the fonts and styles Microsoft Word has rolled out over the last 20 years. Do not use borders, bullets, a variation of fonts, that in their wanton variety might startle and upset the Human Resource personnel perusing the document. Be kind. Try to use standard typefaces such as Aerial, Times Roman, Helvetica, not smaller than 12 points. Also try not to use too many bullets, underlines, shadings and colours. And cream or white paper always work. Stay away from neon and patterned paper.

We tend to fudge when describing our skills, especially if you happen to be a recent graduate and truly have not yet built up a bank of skills or else you are a slacker and a wastrel who have whiled away your best years sleeping on the job. However, if you truly have some skills, there is an art to writing about them in your résumé. Your key skills contain specific and general content and so, for example, “Sound experience in accounting and related financial skills” implies that you also know the key processes of Accounting, so you do not have to list them all in excruciating detail. Or, if you are a teacher and write that you have “sound experience in primary education and associated disciplines,” you certainly do not have to list the procedures you undertake at work. More than likely you are writing very detailed information which can be presented when you have got your foot in the door for the interview.

Good advice is to always write in a formal manner, using the third person. For example you might want to say that “you are responsible for…” or “undertook varied tasks…” instead of “I was responsible for…”.

For those of us in the autumn of our years, when you have a long job history, present your CV in a manner that makes the employer quickly see your skills relevant to the position you apply for instead of having to wade through reverse chronological data and not pick up important details on the first page. Finally, if you fall into this age category, do not blurt out your age. Do not put old education first on your résumé. Avoid listing jobs with dates older than 10 or 15 years. If you must include dusty jobs, de-emphasise the dates or omit them. Choose wisely what you include and happy hunting.

Yvonne Grinam-Nicholson, (MBA, ABC) is a Business Communications Consultant with RO Communications Jamaica, specialising in business communications and financial publications. She can be contacted at: yvonne@rocommunications.com. Visit her website at https://www.rocommunications.com and post your comments.