0Here’s a list of 23 things that shouldn’t have been included:
- Lying about your qualifications.
- Describing what you look like.
- Having a personal statement that contradicts itself.
- Including a photo or photos of yourself.
- Your Religion.
- Your age.
- Listing your sexual orientation – why??
- Too much personal information e.g. married, divorced, separated, children, step children.
- Political affiliation.
- Odd hobbies e.g. ‘Searching for the perfect white shirt’.
- Using negative language e.g. bad, fault, hate, problem, awful, aggressive.
- Listing all your skills, knowledge, experience and achievements over 8 pages! Yes 8 pages.
- Handwriting your CV.
- Using too many colours (and too many fonts).
- Using clipart.
- Meaningless and annoying buzzwords, jargon, clichés or vague words e.g. dynamic, go-getter, think outside the box.
- Bad grammar and abbreviations.
- Using slang.
- Having spelling mistakes (particularly when you list ‘attention to detail’ as a core skill).
- Unprofessional email addresses e.g. themaverick@.
- Links to your personal social media accounts.
- Explaining a gap in employment with an odd reason e.g. to get over a pet dying.
