what’s a CV?

Tahlia is 43 and now that her children are grown up enough to look after themselves she is enthusiastic and excited about returning to work and being able to build up a nest egg.

Putting the kids through school cost Tahlia and her husband a lot more money than they had expected.

"We have very little saved for our retirement," explains Tahlia, "so I'm eager to get back to work, make some money and start a savings plan to make up for lost time."

"I don't mind what type of work I do -- which is a great plus in my favor," says Tahlia, "but I'm having a lot of trouble finding work."

For starters, Tahlia had no idea that she would need a resume or a CV -- a
curriculum vitae -- in order to apply for a job. She thought only school leavers, starting their first job, needed to carry around a portfolio of their qualifications and references.

"The last time I worked, nobody needed a resume," says Tahlia, "and it infuriates me that I have to document my life on paper in order to apply for an ordinary old job."

Her problem is made worse by the fact that she has only done voluntary work in the past twenty years -- most of which was associated with various stages of her children's development.

Tahlia has the same problem as school-leavers -- most of whom have never worked, not even in a voluntary capacity -- and because Tahlia does have work experience in a voluntary capacity her resume is really not going to be much different from that of somebody who has been in paid employment for the past twenty years.

When Tahlia sat down to document her skills and the various community organizations she had worked for in a voluntary capacity over the past twenty years, the list was formidable.

"There was nothing that I hadn't done, or didn't have the capacity to do," laughs Tahlia. "But employers aren't interested in what anybody did twenty years ago, let alone five years ago, so my main objective is to concentrate on skills and voluntary work experience of the past two years."

Unfortunately, Tahlia hadn't done much voluntary work in the past two years, so she wracked her brains about other things she had done and realized that she had helped a lot of people with their taxation returns.

"From what I've read in the job ads," says Tahlia, "knowledge of accountancy and being able to understand complicated tax laws are skills that are in high demand, so I needed to stretch them out to the max."

"I gained earth science qualifications after I left school," confides Tahlia, "but such qualifications are far too old to be valid in today's world."

"I know that lots of how-to-get-a-job books say that even old qualifications have some value in that people who have applied themselves to gaining a qualification are seen as dedicated, organized and literate," says Tahlia, "but I don't think that's relevant advice for return to work moms."

"After I gain some work experience I hope to use my qualifications in a more professional resume in order to get a position more in keeping with my worth," confides Tahlia, "but until then I'm concentrating on finding a job -- any job -- and for this I just need a basic resume."

"The basic resume is just for basic unskilled jobs," explains Tahlia. "In it, I'm accentuating my people skills and mentioning my accountancy skills as icing. I don't expect to get a job as an accountancy clerk straight off, but I might get a foot in the door of an accountancy firm as a receptionist or administration assistant."

No matter what sort of job Tahlia gets -- in a shop, factory or office -- she appreciates that her ability to get along with people is paramount because she will inevitably be the first point of contact with customers. Most entry level, low paying jobs, are going to be in the customer service field.

"I gear my basic resume to whatever type of job I'm applying for," explains Tahlia. "For instance, if it is a customer service representative position, then I put telephone and communication skills at the top of the list and accentuate them. If it is a factory position, then I accentuate my manual dexterity and even my stamina!"

"If it's general office work, then I put typing right at the top of my skills list and fudge my typing speed," laughs Tahlia. "I can't type more than 35 wpm but most people are slow at typing when they first return to work and employers should understand that. Nobody is going to notice my slow typing and with daily practice I'll probably end up doing 100 wpm!"

Once Tahlia got her basic resume typed and started applying for jobs, she was thrilled to pieces!

"I had wasted so much time fumbling around looking for jobs without knowing what I was doing," sighs Tahlia. "It really makes a difference when you can call yourself a well-organized job seeker!"

She's a great communicator and has a good attitude and she should have little difficulty finding a basic job.

"It may not be the type of job that I want to do for the next twenty years of my working life," laughs Tahlia, "but it will be a start, paying money and that, after all, is my basic motivating factor for getting back to work."

"Money, money, money! I want tons of it for our retirement."

don't post resumes online!

Madison is single, 27, and having finally found a job -- through a friend - she she is frantically trying to delete all of her personal job hunting records from the Net.

"I was really desperate when I was unemployed," sighs Madison. "I posted hundreds of resumes online and I never bothered to keep a record of where I had posted them."

"I also joined lots of groups and left my personal details all over the place hoping that someone, somewhere would take pity on me!"

"Now that I've found a new job and my self-esteem has returned I'm feeling so ashamed of what I did -- I was, in effect, prostituting myself by throwing around my personal details on the web."

"And yet I'm not the only person in the world who is forced to do this," sighs Madison. "Lots of unemployed people do it and lots of professional recruiters tell us to do it, too. 'If you're serious about finding a job you'll do it' they told me."

"I've found a lot of my old online resumes through the search engines," says Madison, "and some of them were full of silly typing errors because I did it all so fast."

"In the unlikely event that any employer actually read my online resume it would have given a very bad impression of my skills," laughs Madison, "but no genuine employer ever reads the online resumes -- the only people who read them are the perverts and now I'm scared someone is going to stalk me!"

"Not many of the online resume posting sites have an easy delete option," says Madison, "so I've had to email the webmasters to do it for me."

"So far I've received only one response from the webmasters I emailed requesting deletion of my personal records," says Madison. "I fear that some of the sites I posted my resume to are dead -- and will just stay online for the perverts to look at until the web server company removes them."

"On one website I was able to delete my resume very easily," says Madison, "but when I searched the site for anything with other file extensions -- such as cvs.doc or resumes.doc -- I was able to get a list of non-html documents in which I was still listed."

"Granted, this sort of document doesn't get published as it isn't html," says Madison, "but it does mean that the guys running the website keep a permanent record of my details and I don't like that."

An even worse scenario for Madison is that some of her online resumes might be in some search engine cache that takes months to refresh - or is even permanently listed in some obscure search engine that never updates.

"Even though my online resume might have been removed from the site," explains Madison, "my name and personal details might still be listed with various search engines for everyone to see."

"There is also the 'Wayback Machine' search engine at archive.org that caches everything that was published on the web in recent years."

"This particular search engine really annoys me," says Madison, "because everyone has posted something to a newsgroup or website that they later regret - either for personal or security reasons - and it's not nice that we are denied the right to delete things that were never intended to be permanent records."

"There could be a permanent online record of all my personal details - my name, address and telephone number - as well as all the typos, grammatical mistakes and inappropriate information I posted on the Net when I was out of work and desperate," groans Madison.

"The Internet is not only great for research," grimaces Madison, "but it's also great for snooping on silly people like me who don't know what they're getting into when they use the Net for job hunting -- so watch out everyone!."

tailoring resumes to jobs

Stephanie, 28, believes a mistake many jobseekers make is to use the same resume for every job they apply for. She has two basic resumes -- one upmarket and one downmarket -- and alters them slightly for each position she applies for according to the particular requirements of the employer.

"I'm not only looking for the job I want but also a bill paying job to tide me over," says Stephanie. "I use the basic upmarket resume for the jobs I want, and the basic downmarket resume for the bill paying jobs. Once you've got these two basic resumes, it's really not too much of a hassle to tailor them to particular jobs."

Right now, only two of Stephanie’s roommates have a job and they are carrying her and two more unemployed girls until they get a job. Stephanie is hopeful of getting the job she wants, but if that doesn’t happen within a month then she is willing to take on an immediate bill paying job.

Her job seeking knowledge and skills are excellent and she enjoys helping the other two unemployed roommates target jobs in a more professional manner.

For the type of job Stephanie wants, her basic upmarket resume accentuates her educational qualifications, skills and experience in that order. She puts her qualifications at the top of the body of her resume and makes them bold. She makes them jump out at the person responsible for doing the culling of job applications.

For those who are not good at presentation formatting, Stephanie suggests getting a professional to type their upmarket resume.

"For the type of job you want - especially if it was advertised on the Net - there are going to be hundreds if not thousands of applicants and from all over the world, too," says Stephanie. "You need to make your resume stand out from everyone else's and while the number of degrees and diplomas you have may not necessarily get you the job, it might just give you the edge in the selection process. Take advantage of that edge."

"Unless you were required to do so," warns Stephanie, "do not spoil the impression of your upmarket resume by including your academic results. That is far too much information. If your degree or diploma was conferred recently or a long time ago, this may go against you, so I think it’s a good idea to omit the year. Use your judgment."

"The same goes for the name of the institution conferring the qualification," says Stephanie. "If it is a well-known university or college, play it up. If it isn’t, then use your judgment on whether it might be better to omit its name."

"For the basic upmarket resume," says Stephanie, "you also need to place your most upmarket skills first (eg managing, analyzing, etc) and omit your downmarket skills (eg typing, telephone skills, etc)."

"It is also a good idea," says Stephanie, "to omit any short-term downmarket jobs you have had recently, or play them up so that they do not sound as downmarket as they really were. And do not be too specific about the dates either!"

"Saving space on a resume is important," says Stephanie, "so drop what might be used against you and highlight what employers need to know."

Following is an example of what Stephanie means by strategic placing on an upmarket resume that will help you get the job you want:

Stephanie Duncan

Qualifications: BA, MA (UCLA)

Skills: Project Management

Recent Employment History: Resources Officer, Acme Products, Oct - Nov 2006

Compare the information given in the upmarket resume with that given below for Stephanie’s downmarket resume. It is the same person, but you would never guess!

For the bill paying type of job, Stephanie uses a resume that accentuates her skills. She puts her skills at the top of the body of her resume and makes them bold so that they jump out at the person reading the resumes.

"For this type of job," says Stephanie, "your resume presentation is really not going to be as important as your skills, so don’t waste money getting a professional to type it unless, of course, you have money to throw around."

"The mistake many job seekers make when applying for a bill paying job," says Stephanie, "is that they include their qualifications. You will be considered over-qualified for the job and rejected outright if you do this. I appreciate that it’s tempting to show off - after all, we all worked hard for our qualifications - but the job you need in order to pay the bills wants a hands-on worker, not an Oxford Don."

"The aim of a downmarket resume is to get an interview for a job to pay the bills. In order to do this," says Stephanie, "you need to downgrade yourself. But only on paper. Nobody wants to employ a smarty for a downmarket job, but as soon as you are in the job, anything can happen. They could love you and promote you to a managerial position if you are lucky - so it's silly to get too hung up about downgrading yourself."

"One small thing," warns Stephanie. "With downmarket resumes for bill paying jobs, prospective employers like to see exact dates of previous employment so even if you were employed for two weeks somewhere, put that in and make sure you state the exact date you started and finished."

Following is an outline of the strategy Stephanie uses on her resume for the downmarket job she needs to pay the bills:

Stephanie Duncan

Skills: Typing 35 wmp, Customer Service, Team work

Recent Employment History: Mail Room Attendant, Acme Products, Oct 19 - Nov 9 2006

"Remove the name and if you can tell it's the same person then you are mighty smart," laughs Stephanie. "And if you can't then it just goes to prove that a little fudging can get you what you want. And I don't think I am being unethical with my two resumes. I am not lying, I am fudging. there's a difference."