5 Ways to Drastically Improve Your CV in 10 Minutes

"5 Ways to Drastically Improve Your CV in 10 Minutes By: Vincent Czaplyski

Follow these quick and easy tips to build yourself a better
resume in under 10 minutes flat.

* Use strong, action oriented language that describes
specific skills or accomplishments.

Go through your resume from top to bottom and eliminate weak
language. Don't write "Was in charge of large graphic design
department that increased company revenues" when you can say
"Managed 12 graphic artists in major creative projects that
increased revenues by over 3 million last year."

Whenever possible, eliminate all forms of the verb "to be"
(is, are, was, am and so on), as demonstrated in the
previous example. Instead, replace them with strong action
words that paint a compelling picture.

* Add bullets.

Bullets are a great way to transform lists that would
otherwise make tedious reading in paragraph form, or that
would benefit by a cleaner layout. They make the job of
reading your resume more pleasant for the reader. A perfect
candidate for bullets is a list of accomplishments related
to a single job. For example, "Postmaster, 1998 -2003"
followed by 3 or 4 major accomplishments in bullet form.

* Write a specific, concise job description.

If the job you really want is "Director of Human Resources
at a Fortune 1000 company," say so. Don't write "Middle
management position at a large or mid-size company" or
something equally vague. That covers a lot of territory. You
need to help the company with the exact job you're looking
for find you. Put yourself in the hiring manager's shoes.
Would you call a candidate for an interview in the hopes
that she is a good match, or would you call the person whose
job description specifically indicates she wants the job?

* Don't include every single position you've ever held.

Your resume is a document designed to land you an interview,
followed by a job offer. There will be times when omitting a
position - especially if it has no relevance to the position
you are seeking, may be in your best interest. This is easy
to do where omitting short term positions or special
projects conducted as part of an ongoing job assignment will
not create an obvious "hole" in your background that you
will need to explain.

(There are ways to avoid making an employer suspicious of
resume rough spots, like gaps in experience or experience
that lacks relevance to the position you are seeking. A
professional resume writer can offer you specific advice on
ways to do so, considering your unique background.)

* Spell check.

When you're finished improving your resume, run a final
spell check. Your word processor's spell checker probably
won't contain all the acronyms and specialized industry
jargon that your resume likely contains. In that case, take
the time to manually check each flagged item to make sure
your resume is spelling error-free.

Follow these five easy tips for a better resume, fast!

Copyright 2005 by Vincent Czaplyski, all rights reserved.

You may republish this article in its entirety, as long as
you include the complete signature file above without
modification.

About the Author

Copywriter and consultant Vincent Czaplyski is founder of
www.impressive-resumes.com, your online source for
professionally written "industrial strength" resumes and
cover letters guaranteed to land you an interview.

How to Recruit the Best Legal Candidates

How to Recruit the Best Legal Candidates

Are you a legal firm looking to recruit a new solicitor or legal secretary? Are you wondering how to find the best ILEX graduate or paralegal in your area? Do you need quality legal candidates to fulfil your companys legal work or law jobs?

The tips listed below should help you get the best legal job searchers.

Four Steps to Recruiting the top level players in the Legal Field

1. Post your Legal Job on a legal niche job board.

I know it sounds so simple but many firms and recruitment agencies are not yet clued into the niche job boards market. So you want legal candidates then don’t post on a generalist board. You will get a raft of poor quality responses that will take time to sort and the likely hood is you won’t find the new member of staff you are looking for. Your advert will also get lost amongst all the other jobs on the board. No if good quality candidates then use a board like:

Simplylawjobs.com

Its easy to use for both recruiters and job seekers. The roles are broken down into Lawyer and Support staff and can be further sorted into area of law and region. If you are seeking a solicitor in Shefield or a Legal Secretary in Liverpool then you can post these details in your legal job advert.

2. Use an Legal Recruitment Agency

If you do not want to advertise directly then you should use a recruitment agency that specialises in the Legal jobs market. These agencies have a stack of quality candidates, local firm knowledge, contacts and experience in the field.

3. Use In House Referrals

You may discover that an existing staff member may be the best fit for the role. Are the member of departing staff if they know of anyone within the company that could replace them. In a field such a law many of your staff will know other people within the industry who could become your next lawyer or paralegal. Encourage a culture that fosters this kind of referral. If possible even include a cash bonus for finding staff.

4. Make use of specialist CV databases

As well as being an advertising portal most job boards also carry a large CV database. Again for the legal profession niche is best. Simply Law Jobs has an online database that is searchable for a fee. Take time to search the database and you may be able to headhunt your perfect employee without have to shell out on a fee for a headhunter.

A combination of the tips above should result in filling your role. It really could be that simple.

NOTE: We have spent time over the last few weeks devising a succinct document that you can download which has some money saving tips to reduce your cost per recruit. Most of them we are sure you will know, but every little helps! You can visit our website and download our '20 tips to reduce recruitment spend' - This document is available from the bottom right part of our website, on every single page & is titled "Is paying too much for the right staff leaving you bitter?" (Alternatively, you can enter: http://www.simplylawjobs.com/pdf/SLJ%2020%20top%20tips.pdf into your web address bar and download from there).