If you’re currently looking for a charity or non-profit role, then your CV is obviously going to be a hugely valuable tool. But what many candidates don’t realise is that your work experience comes under more scrutiny than any other part of your CV.
Your CV job descriptions need to be well structured and packed with content that showcases your key responsibilities and most valuable skills if you want to prove to employers that you’re talented enough to join their team.
Here’s how you can write job descriptions that will make your CV stand out from the competition.
1. Structure your CV job descriptions
You need to structure your roles in a way that makes them easy for busy recruiters to scan through and pick out the information they need while drawing attention to essential skills and achievements.
Make the content visually pleasing by breaking it into bullet points, headers and clearly defined sections. Start with a brief summary of each role, then bullet point your responsibilities to show your input and how it has benefitted your former employers.
2. Show how you’ve impacted an organisation
Don’t just document the duties you had in previous roles, demonstrate how you influenced the organisation and how your actions benefitted your team. By detailing your impact, you can show that you’re not just there to make up numbers.
For example, if you previously worked as a fundraiser, explain in your CV job description how you supported the organisation to reach their donation goals. What new initiatives did you put in place? Did you increase the retention rate of donors. If so, how? And how did this have a lasting impact on your organisation?
3. Provide the right level of detail
It can be a tough balancing act to provide enough detail in your CV job descriptions to prove your value, but not so much detail that it becomes tiresome to read.
Try to provide more depth when describing recent roles or ones that are more applicable to the charity sector. It’s always a good idea to split your CV into two sections – relevant experience and other experience.
Any job you’ve had that clearly demonstrates the skills and experience needed in the position you’re applying for falls under relevant experience, and you should share more detailed information about your responsibilities and impact.
If your most recent role is within a charity, then recruiters and hiring managers will want a lot of information, so adapt your CV accordingly. Show off your wide range of skills, knowledge and experience and round the section off with some impressive achievements.
4. Add figures to your achievements
It can sometimes be difficult to express the impact you made with words alone. To make these points clearer, add evidence to your achievements by backing them up with facts and figures.
For example, instead of merely stating “I reached sponsorship targets through events,” add evidence like this:
“Supported the overall goals of the organisation by raising corporate sponsorship by 15% in 3 months via networking and two national events.”
Adding numbers to your achievements gives recruiters an accurate understanding of the impact you make, and the scale of your past experience.
5. Sell yourself
Your CV is the first impression a recruiter will have of you, so it needs to be strong. It’s your chance to grab their attention and compel them to contact you. Being too modest and writing in a dull, formal tone won’t excite anybody.
Although you want to convey a level of professionalism, it’s important to make sure your CV job descriptions are written in an upbeat, positive tone with plenty of encouraging verbs and adjectives to emphasise your effectiveness as an employee.
For example, don’t just describe yourself as a “Marketing Executive with five years of experience in email marketing.” Really sell your skills by describing yourself as an “accomplished marketing executive with five years of experience supporting charity and non-profit organisations with large-scale campaigns.”
To sum up
CV job descriptions give you the perfect opportunity to showcase your abilities and prove how you’ve applied them in the workplace―so don’t waste them. Structure your roles in a way that allows them to be easily navigated and ensures the important information is easy to find.
Be sure to include all of your most in-demand skills by tailoring your CV to the job description of the role you’re applying for. And make sure to prove your value by highlighting key achievements for each role with evidence to back them up.
Now it’s time to put your new CV-writing skills to use! Take a look at some of the exciting opportunities currently available on CharityJob today.
This post was originally published in 2018. We’ve updated it to ensure relevance and to reflect the current job seeker experience.
