Contact details

Put your name at the top in bold to make it stand out. You don't need to write 'Curriculum Vitae'.

As a minimum include your name, address, an appropriate email address (make sure it’s a professional looking one) and telephone number.

Marital status, gender and date of birth are all optional. In the UK, legislation means that recruiters must not use this as part of the selection criteria.

You do not need to provide a photograph or details of your nationality. However, if you want to work in a country other than your own, you may wish to leave in your nationality and explain your eligibility to work there.

Education and Qualifications

Make sure you include the name of the institution and the dates. Organise your education in reverse chronological order, with your current or most recent at the top. How much detail you go into for each section depends on how relevant it is to the role you're applying for, but usually you should include your school and college qualifications and if applicable, your degree and postgraduate study.

Refer to any relevant content or projects, and the skills gained from your studies.

You can summarise qualifications such as GCSEs, where listing them all could take up too much space.

Relevant Employment Experience

Add your employment experience in reverse chronological order, with the most recent first. All types of work experience can be included whether full time, part time, temporary or voluntary, paid or unpaid.

Include your job title, the name of the organisation and dates. Don’t undersell it.

Describe your duties, and especially your achievements, plus relevant skills. It is

important to use keywords that match the skills and experience that the job requires.

Think of ways to make your most relevant experience stand out, for example you may want to have ‘Relevant work experience’ and ‘Additional work experience’ sections. Again this should be in reverse chronological order with your current or most recent work at the top.

Skills

This is an optional section enabling you to outline the personal skills you can offer, such as communication, leadership and organisation. Make sure your headings reflect the skills for the job or course you are applying for. Do not simply list your skills, instead, describe specific examples of how you have gained them and try to show how your actions made a difference to the organisation or activity you were involved in.

Don’t repeat information that you have already covered in other sections e.g. your

education, work experience or activities and interests. If you’ve already described all your skills in these sections, you probably don’t need a separate skills section as well.

Ensure that practical skills like IT, languages and driving licence are listed somewhere in your CV.