Professional Experience

Your career experience might be very straightforward, but it’s up to you to deliver your background in a way that makes a long-lasting impression on the employer.

The best way to map out your career experience is to present your background in reverse chronological order (most recent job first). When listing each position of employment or work experience, clearly state the following:

• Your job title

• The employer’s name and address

• The dates you worked for the company (from - to)

• A brief summary of what your job entailed and successes achieved during your time with the company

The heading of each previous employment history should look something like this:

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The job title, employer’s name and address, and dates worked with the company are straightforward; but the brief summary of each position should be broken down into bullet point form to be clear and concise. You should list your key responsibilities in the role and any skills used which benefited the job, as well as any transferable skills that might also be of value. You should also touch on any successes you enjoyed while working for the company.

In order to achieve that ‘stand out’ affect, it would be a good idea to try to include some powerful verbs where possible. Powerful professional verbs have been proven to influence decision-making. Here is a list of 10 powerful verbs:

1. Managed

2. Authorised

3. Planned

4. Spearheaded

5. Motivated

6. Negotiated

7. Resolved

8. Reduced

9. Increased

10. Developed

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Including your brief summary, your work experience should now look something like this:

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Keep in mind that if you have a long history of work experience, it’s good to only include relevant history or history that could be interpreted as easily transferable.

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Educational Experience and Qualifications

Keep your educational experience in line with the layout of your professional experience - reverse chronological order. Design the heading in a similar way, too. The educational experience heading should look something like this:

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It is important to remember that you should place your educational experience in the relevant place on your CV, based on how long ago you qualified in your field and when you completed your education.

If you’re a recent graduate, with no work experience relevant to what you’re applying for or in which you are newly qualified, then it might be a better idea to list your educational experience before any employment history, as your education might be the most prominent piece of your CV. If you’ve just completed a degree, you could list relevant modules, assignments or projects underneath your educational heading.

If you’re an experienced professional, place your educational experience section below your professional experience.

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Employee and/or Character References

A person listed to provide an Employee Reference or a Character Reference is known as a Referee. Unlike in the past, references are no longer standardised. They are not mandatory, but if you want to include something in relation to a reference, you could include something that looks like this:

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As you can see, you should include the Employer’s full name, their position in the company, the name of the company, and any contact numbers available. Keep in mind that some of your previous Managers or Supervisors may no longer work for the company, in which case you will need to find alternative contact details for them.

A character reference is very similar, with just one change; instead of stating the reference’s position in the company, you should state the relationship you had with this person. This could be a Spiritual Leader, for example, or maybe a local Politician or other reputable Community leader.

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Below is a table listing the pros and cons (good and bad qualities) of including a job reference (where the alternative is to state: ‘References available on request’.

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