5 Things Recruiters Want To See On Your CV

Ever wondered why that cozy, well-formatted, one-page résumé of yours hasn’t been landing any test invitations or interviews? It’s probably because recruiters of top MNCs have become bored of seeing the very same monochrome documents in every pile of résumés they process. Moreover, the year is 2015 and trends have changed for everything, from Toyota Models to one-page CVs (yeah, seriously!). So here are five suggestions to make your résumé stand-out from the pile.

1. LinkedIn Handle: Over the years LinkedIn has become a very integral platform for recruitment firms. Almost every Human Resources person or recruiting agent wants to know the “LinkedIn side” of you, so you’d better save them the stress of having to open a new tab on Mozilla by linking your résumé to your LinkedIn page. Moreover, since typical résumé length is 1-page, you could use your LinkedIn page to your advantage by putting all other information not listed on your resume. However, recruiters are only prompted to go there if you lure them with your linked handle (okay, enough with the links).

2. Highlights in pictures: As I said before, monochrome is boring. Recruiters can easily miss that awesome internship you did at Unilever or that wonderful scholarship award from Total E&P when you present these details in black and white.It is always advisable to provide graphical highlights of your major achievements. For instance, If I were a recruiter, I’d be more easily drawn to the short summary under the Microsoft Logo on your résumé, than one long statement about the firm, lost in-between the lines in black and white. (Especially when I only have an average of 30 seconds per resume).

3. GPA: These days, it is very common to find people listing their educational achievements without indicating their graduating class or GPA. Well, that might still land you opportunities with some boutique firms around your neighborhood. However, if you’re looking to play in the big leagues, you’d better start saying something about your grades early on in your résumé. This is the major factor most recruiters use in the first part of the screening process for most entry level positions (and even experienced hires), so by not indicating your graduating class, it’s an automatic throw in the “NO” pile. In fact, these days most recruiters want to see your very GPA and not just the class alone (because a 3.7/5 and a 4.48/5 are two different players in the same sport). Of course the only exception to this rule would be those that have obtained a degree class which is way below the requirement. For such people, presenting the degree anonymously can only do good to your application (especially if you have strong internships and notable extracurriculars which could convince the recruiter to offer you an interview).

4. IT Skills: For fellows in Arts and Humanities, recruiters are increasingly demanding just about the same IT skills from you as they require from your engineering and science-oriented counterparts. So spend the next summer break or your NYSC year learning advanced use of Excel (Excel is the most popular of the Microsoft Office suite programs used in most firms) , at least one programming language and proficient use of Windows 8, 8.1.

5. Unique Extracurriculars (ECs): In the 21st Century, almost every job-seeker loves to read, travel and swim as part of their past-times. Unfortunately, recruiters have become too used to these series of hobbies and are unimpressed by them. However, the candidate that says he loves rock-climbing and states that he climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro last fall would still get some attention. He’d certainly be invited for interviews so long as he has met other criteria moderately (Which recruiter wouldn’t want to find out what the experience was like?). So it’d be better to highlight only extracurriculars that are unique to you. Of course as part of your ECs, it is also commendable to provide details of leadership experience during your undergraduate studies as this is just about the only way recruiters get know if you have leadership potential.