Skills based CVs are excellent for recent graduates, people with little formal work experience, or those moving to a new industry, because the emphasis of a skills based CV is how your personal experience aligns with the job you’re looking for.
Perhaps your most relevant experience is not your most recent job. If that’s the case, a conventional chronological CV might not allow your ability to perform the role you’re applying for come through on paper. You will likely want to highlight that specific role and set of skills, but for it to make sense to a recruiter who is reading your CV at a glance, you need to properly curate it. So, what exactly should a skills based CV do?
Understanding skills based CVs
Firstly, it’s important to understand that a skills based CV is all about strategy. Take a good look at the job description of the job you’re wanting to apply for and highlight all the sections you feel are relevant to your personal experience. You’ll want to use these sections when creating your skills based CV to create a compelling reason as to why you can meet and exceed the employer’s expectations in these areas.
Then, if you have a conventional chronological CV, do the same and highlight the areas you feel are relevant to the role. Don’t worry if you don’t already have a CV. You can simply do the same exercise looking back at any previous jobs, volunteering, qualifications, or even hobbies.
It’s important to be open-minded during this task. If the role requires public speaking but you can’t think of any examples in your life where you’ve needed to do this, think more broadly. What does public speaking involve? It requires planning, preparation, communication, confidence, and time keeping. Suddenly it becomes a lot easier to think about how your experience fits in with the need of the employer. For example, your experience gained in a call centre can showcase your communication and time keeping skills. Perhaps you run a personal blog? That’s a great addition to a skills based CV to highlight that you’re confident in public and open to hearing from new people.
Ultimately, a skills based CV is about gathering evidence to support your claim that you have the necessary skills to do the job.
When is a skills based CV desirable?
Now that you know what a skills based CV is, you might be wondering under what circumstances you should use them. Here are a few scenarios where you might consider using a skills based CV as opposed to a more conventional chronological CV:
- You’re looking for your first job and don’t have any paid experience
- You’re a graduate who is yet to work in your industry of choice
- You’re a graduate with some experience, but you’ve decided you want to work in a different industry than your degree
- You’ve worked a lot of roles through temping so you’ve gathered a wide range of skills
- You’re applying for a job that’s very practical, such as electrician
From the perspective of an employer, a skills based CV might be desirable or even requested if the role is highly technical. They allow hiring managers to quickly identify who has the right skill set regardless of length of experience.
Skills based CVs are also a great way to promote diversity in the hiring practice. They take the focus away from what school a candidate did or did not attend. Instead, it’s all about ability, making it easier for people from a range of backgrounds to prove they have the required skills even if they didn’t follow a typical or expected path.
How to format your skills based CV
Use the moment you need to format your skills based CV to showcase another skill: your ability to write clearly and concisely. Try to keep it as short as possible. Your CV should ideally be one page long, but if you have a lot of experience then two pages would work too. Remember, anything left out of your CV can be included in a cover letter or mini presentation for an interview.
A skills based CV should follow a structure similar to:
- Personal details – your name, contact details and the area you live in (if your location is relevant to the role)
- Your skills – ensure these are related to each job you apply for
- Any experience you do have – part-time jobs, volunteering experience, work placements, internships or any other extra-curricular activities
- References – if specified that you need to include them as part of your application. If not, you could include a sentence stating ‘References are available upon request’
At the end of the day, it’s important to remember that your CV is ultimately a personal branding document and marketing tool. It’s a good idea to include headings for each section and bullet points that detail your key skills.
When listing your skills, try and add a short description that details a time you’ve needed to apply each skill. This will help communicate to the hiring manager if you have the key requirements for the role. If the job you want needs Python knowledge, you don’t want to leave it up to the hiring manager to find out you can do it!
In need of some inspiration? Here are some bullet points an IT graduate might use:
- Project management: I successfully managed three first-year cyber security students in a hacking challenge as part of our university’s annual Hackathon
- Communication: I gave three talks at local colleges to inspire more young people into pursuing IT at university
- Front end skills: I designed and built a website for a local charity to help them raise the funds they need
How to design your skills based CV
When it comes to the overall look of your CV, asking people who work in your goal industry or researching example CVs online is an excellent way to get started. You could also get feedback from a career advisor at your university.
The question of how to design your CV will depend a little on your industry, so don’t hesitate to ask people for help with it. An occasional infographic can work wonders if you feel the image adds to your CV and doesn’t distract the reader or make the document look cluttered. You can also watch our free webinar, ‘How to write a standout CV’, on YouTube for more advice on how your CV should look.
There are many CV templates you can find online to help you with writing your new CV (including our free template). Word and Google Docs are probably the most well-known, but if you fancy testing out new tools, why not try out your design skills in Canva or Adobe Illustrator?
That being said, the most important aspect is to display the information in an easy-to-read manner. Be aware of not making the font smaller just so you can fit more information on the page. This can make the text hard to read. Also consider using a reader-friendly font, most sans serif fonts will work here.
Remember to send your CV and any other documentation in a format that is readily available to most people, such as Word documents or PDFs. If you need to use alternative formats (such as those only supported by macOS), check with the recruiter that these are suitable before submitting your CV.
Now that you’ve got the knowledge of what a skills based CV is, it’s time to put your skills to the test and get one made!
We regularly update our career advice section with job hunting advice. If you’re in the process of applying for a new role, check out our articles on how to get a job with no experience and our top 10 job application tips to put yourself in the best position for securing an interview.
This article was written by Lucy Hulton.
Last updated on 23 May 2024
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