Application stage – CVs, cover letters and application forms

Generally, the first stage of a recruitment process will begin with you sending in your CV, or filling in an application form. Sounds simple, right?

There are, however, lots of nuances associated with this stage in recruitment. You might have heard about how AI is screening your CVs and are controlling an organisation’s applicant tracking system (ATS). For the most part, this is not the case, and a real human person is looking over your application! But there are ways of ensuring your CV and application are nailing exactly what the recruiter (or AI helper) is looking for.

How to create a CV

First off, what is a CV? A CV (curriculum vitae) is a short document outlining your skills, experience and how these relate to the role you’re applying for. They often include your academic background and professional history, but this can vary between sectors. A CV is a glimpse into you and your experience and is usually the first thing a recruiter sees to get to know you a little bit more, so it’s important to make an impact and ensure that you stand out.

There are lots of CV-writing apps and bits of software around, but generally, if you have access to something like Microsoft Word, that’s the easiest way to create a CV. You can use a basic structure like the one below to order your thoughts on paper:

Make sure to export the document to .pdf format to ensure that the formatting remains the same as it is in your initial document.

What to put in your CV

Firstly, you’ll want to look at the job description – generally, these will include the responsibilities of the role, a person specification and logistical/salary information. Make sure that you carefully look over the person specification to include as many of the ‘essential’ and ‘desirable’ skills as you can in your CV, to demonstrate that you have all the relevant skills and capabilities that the recruiter is looking for. You can do this in the opening statement of paragraph of your CV, or throughout your work, education and extracurricular sections.

At the bottom of this lesson, you’ll find some useful links from the University of York about how to create a CV.

What not to put in your CV

Avoid putting in any images of yourself, marital status, date of birth or anything to do with your political preferences or physical characteristics into your CV as recruiters do not take these into account when they assess your application, and the space these take up can be utilised to add in more relevant information that will support your application. Even things like your referees can be excluded as they’re often asked for outside of the application, later down the line.

I’d also recommend that you make sure your CV is concise – one or two sides of A4 (no longer!) should be about right.

How to explain CV gaps

There may be times in your career history where you have short, or longer, gaps between roles. Perhaps you were made redundant and had a few months of job searching, or you took a gap year or time off to travel the world. Sometimes you need to account for and explain gaps in your CV. You don’t always need to do this, but it’s good practice to account for gaps in employment when you aren’t studying. This is particularly important if you’re applying for a role where a DBS check is required (e.g. teaching, social work, policing, roles with children or vulnerable adults).

You can use your CV to state why you had these gaps. Here’s some phrases you can use:

• Redundant: Made redundant between XXX and XXX as the company underwent a restructuring to reduce costs
• Gap year: Finished university to take a gap year

If a recruiter asks you specifically about any gaps in your CV, ensure that you answer them honestly. If they ask you about why/how you left a job, or your current role, you can look at the sites at the bottom of the lesson to see some examples of how you can word your responses.

Cover letters

As well as creating a tailored CV, you should also (if requested) create a tailored cover letter. This cover letter should be a maximum length of one side of A4 paper and should read like a formal letter – including your name and address in the top right, and the employer in the top left. The content of your cover letter should be brief, and could follow the structure below:

Paragraph 1: Introduce yourself, and explain why you want to work in the role – what is it about the job that interests you?

Paragraph 2: Talk about the organisation and why you’d like to join them – use the information I’ll provide in the ‘commercial awareness’ section to do this. Think about the field the organisation works in, and why you want to work within it. Explaining why you are interested in the organisation is something that sets candidates apart, so really stress this within your cover letter.

Paragraph 3: Explain why you are suited to this role, including skills and experiences that are relevant. Avoid copying directly from your CV here!

Final paragraph: Conclude the document by drawing everything together and ending on a positive note. Make sure to sign off with ‘yours sincerely’ or ‘yours faithfully’ and your name.

I’ve added a link from the University of York at the bottom of the lesson which outlines cover letters in more detail.

The application stage

The CV stage often accompanies an application, where you might have to answer some questions relating to your personal details, education and employment history, and possibly an ‘application question’ or two. These application questions should be taken seriously – treat them as if they were interview questions, making sure you do research and evidence your answers with experience. These can be the deciding factor in your progression through the process, as they will likely be scored similarly to interview answers, assessing the answer against a set of indicators related to competency or skill. These will often be part of a scoring matrix, which I’ll discuss below.

Scoring matrixes

Once a recruiter has your application/CV, they’ll start by looking at the ‘essential criteria’. These are usually labelled as ‘essential’ on the job specification, such as having a certain qualification, or experience of a certain type of software. Then they will go onto the ‘desirable’ criteria – things that they would like you to have, but you don’t need. They often score your CV using a scoring matrix. The matrix could look something like this example.

You’ll notice there are two keywords in the scale – STRENGTH and FREQUENCY. These relate to whether the competency or skill is demonstrated with strength, i.e. the example is solid and shows you’ve done the skill well (e.g. with evidence, or with something quantified), or is done with frequency, i.e. the skill is shown multiple times. It’s good practice to make sure your examples are strong and demonstrate the skill with frequency.

Every person’s CV is different from the next, and that’s brilliant! It gives employers a glimpse into who you are, your experiences, values and preferences. Take some time now to look over your CV and make any changes you think will be a useful starting point for when you apply for roles.

Useful links:

• Crafting Effective Applications (University of York)
• Applying Without Experience (University of York)
• How to Write a Cover Letter (University of York)
• Explaining Work History Gaps (National Careers Service)
• Presenting CV Gaps Positively (Youth Employment UK)