The Top Five Biggest Mistakes Job Candidates Make on Their CV
Having been Managing Director of a Sports Public Relations Agency for over a decade, I have seen a lot of resumes in my time. Just last month we advertised a junior vacancy and over 200 people applied; it hardly bears saying that competition was fierce – so much so that we have only just finished dispatching the rejection letters. It must be heart breaking and frustrating for any young person in this job market, so what do you do to get a break in sports PR? Here are some of my top tips which will at least get your CV read
- Make your personal profile personal: I bet you have a box at the top of your CV that says ‘Personal Profile’ – of course you do because 99% of CVs have one on it. I bet you also have at least three of the following phrases in that box ‘dynamic’, ‘hardworking’, ‘trustworthy’, ‘reliable’, ‘enthusiastic’, ‘team worker’? The concept of a personal profile box is that it gives you the chance to say something stand out about yourself, the problem is that it is almost universally filled with cookie-cutter copy of unsubstantiated bragging. Sports PR – like any other sort of public relations – requires applied nous and if your profile is so generic as to be meaningless, then you have fallen at the first hurdle
- Explain poor results: it is a sad fact but recruiters in today’s market have their pick of the top graduates from the top universities. Failing to put your degree class on a CV doesn’t fool anyone – if you leave it off we simply assume that it is a 2:2 or lower, so the chances are your CV gets put on the reject pile. There may be a very good explanation as to why you didn’t do that well – and if it was because you over committed to sport and under-committed to Theology / Ancient History / American Studies / Archaeology, it may not be a point in your favour but it could certainly redeem you enough to get back on the long list. It bears saying that honesty about failure and self pity are not the same thing – own your mistakes and be realistic about how you can learn from them; interviewers find humility in junior candidates a rare and attractive trait
- Look Interested: why would you apply to a sports public relations company if you weren’t interested in sport? Be realistic about what this actually means. Can you name the current England striker, Wales’ scrum half, leading Scottish Olympian or the horse that won last year’s Derby? If not either mug up or consider whether this career is for you
- Proof read: we should all give thanks to spellcheck as seen off most typos in CV’s, what you should be mindful of is where else might you have gone wrong. Do the dates in your work experience add up? If you are applying to several companies and have done generic letters, have you changed the personalization properly? Plenty of agencies I know put these CVs straight in the bin – you have been warned
- Reinforce your candidature with relevant interests: ‘Going out with friends’ is not a hobby and never will be. If you are applying to a sports PR agency, you don’t need to have been the next David Beckham but you will need to demonstrate a tangible passion for at least one sport.
So there you have it; work on those five things and it may not get you employed but it will certainly help keep you off the reject pile. Good luck!
ENS Ltd is a sports PR and crisis management agency based in central London, tasked with promoting and protecting brands in sport.
