The Student Room Group

CV help

I'm 16 turning 17 in less than 2 weeks and have been looking for jobs, I have a CV written up but I know I need to improve it.
People say to include relevant work experience but what if I'm applying for a job in retail or food and the work experience I've done is sitting in meetings at the ministry of justice and with a vaccine company (I did research and presented my findings to the company alongside other students virtually)? How can I link it to customer service when in reality I want that job to improve my social skills more?
(edited 2 years ago)
You could talk about that presentation strengthening your confidence in talking to others, consequently resulting in you becoming a more sociable person who is always eager to speak with others

You may not feel that your social skills are amazing right now, but you can pick out little bits from your work experience and say how it has helped
Reply 2
Original post by Squiggles1238
You could talk about that presentation strengthening your confidence in talking to others, consequently resulting in you becoming a more sociable person who is always eager to speak with others

You may not feel that your social skills are amazing right now, but you can pick out little bits from your work experience and say how it has helped

thanks I'm thinking of describing what I did and how this help me improve or strengthen certain skills that they are looking for
Original post by t0897
thanks I'm thinking of describing what I did and how this help me improve or strengthen certain skills that they are looking for


No, that's not what they are looking for. They want to know what skills you have got, ie applied, not a story about your personal voyage of discovery.

You need to list the specific skills the employer needs for the job. Then work out what specific evidence you have that you have those skills. Then you make bullet points that begin with a relevant verb and give scope and scale to what you did eg

If they want leadership

Led a team of 4 in planning and delivering an open evening for 100 potential new students
Captained the school Ultimate Frisbee team for 2 years

Then you re-arrange all the bullet points into a CV.
Reply 4
Original post by threeportdrift
No, that's not what they are looking for. They want to know what skills you have got, ie applied, not a story about your personal voyage of discovery.

You need to list the specific skills the employer needs for the job. Then work out what specific evidence you have that you have those skills. Then you make bullet points that begin with a relevant verb and give scope and scale to what you did eg

If they want leadership

Led a team of 4 in planning and delivering an open evening for 100 potential new students
Captained the school Ultimate Frisbee team for 2 years

Then you re-arrange all the bullet points into a CV.

what if I have no examples? My school hasn't offered doing any tasks like that and I haven't focused on volunteering to focus on studies?
Original post by t0897
what if I have no examples? My school hasn't offered doing any tasks like that and I haven't focused on volunteering to focus on studies?


Then you aren't going to be competitive for a job. Everybody sleeps about 8 hours a day, works/goes to school/college 8 hours a day and has 8 hours a day to do other things. If you aren't doing anything useful in those 8 hours, you are going to be badly positioned to get a job. Usually though, people do have evidence of relevant skills for entry level jobs - they are entry level for a reason - everyone can prove they can do them. You just have to break the job down into specific skills and then think harder about how you can evidence you have those skills.

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