CV Blunders and other Reasons Candidates Annoy Us

According to research from Fish4Jobs badly presented and written CVs are more of a turn-off to almost three quarters (73%) of employers than a candidate showing up late, wearing inappropriate clothes or swearing in an interview.

The most irritating mistakes include misspelling key details such as the employer’s (and even the candidate’s) name or job title (reported by 67% of recruiters), grammatical errors (89%) and including irrelevant information (65%). An additional 63% reported seeing inappropriate personal email addresses.

What I love about these surveys is the funnies they highlight.  According to Fish4 here are some of the most common errors that CVs are likely to contain:

• Candidates claiming to have “worked in a busty office”
• People looking for “a job as a manger”
• Jobseekers after a position in “pubic relations”
• Candidates often claim to be “a good leeder”
• Many have been trained in “fist aid” rather than first aid.
• Candidates “attended collage”
• Or went to “a very good skool”

It's been a week for recruiters pointing out the error of candidates ways.  On the BLT Blog dodgy email addresses are discussed.  Andy at Sirona Says talks about how annoying it is when candidates have applied for a job when they don't match the advert in ANY respect and Steve at SupplyChainRecruit.com tells candidates how to write a decent CV. I ought to mention that the Fish4 press release gives tips on putting together a decent job application.  The Westmorland Gazette lists them in full on their website.

It's a shame that Resume Hell spends too much time on his day job.  I'd love it if he posted more of the "dumb stuff I read on resumes" (don't be fooled by the title - he's a UK Recruitment Consultant). 

Right, back to mange people in my busty office.

Comments

[Resume Hell]

Always far too busty with my day job.
So many shoddy CVs...not enough time !

My fave simple typo recently was "Career break in 1999 to renovate my horse"
http://resumehell.blogspot.com/2007/04/call-peta.html