What are the Best Curriculum Vitae Tips?

While there are many different curriculum vitae tips that should be considered by someone creating a curriculum vitae (CV), the best ones are those that fulfill the particular needs of an individual. This is important for anyone creating a CV, since the tips and format that work best for one person may not be the most advisable for someone else. In general, however, someone should consider curriculum vitae tips regarding the organization of information he or she wants to emphasize and how best to relay the information he or she presents in the CV.

A CV is a document that functions in a manner similar to a résumé, though often with more detailed information and information about the personal interests and accomplishments of the individual. The best curriculum vitae tips are those that work well for an individual, so anyone creating a CV should consider what is best for his or her purposes. This often begins with tips on organizing information.

It is typically best to begin a CV with the areas of experience or skills that are strongest for a particular person. Someone who has extensive professional experience, with little educational background, should therefore present his or her work experience first. One of the best curriculum vitae tips for someone lacking much relevant work experience, but with practical skills and knowledge, is to create a functional curriculum vitae. This is similar to a standard CV, but emphasizes skills and abilities over experience.

There are also curriculum vitae tips for the way in which information should be presented on a CV. Two common methods for creating effective, brief communication, such as on a résumé or CV, are known as “gapping” and “parallelism.” Gapping is the use of incomplete sentences to convey information in a way that is quick and concise, while still easily understood.

Full sentence descriptions of job duties can be written as, “I have used a register, with experience in cash handling. I have also used word processing software, and I understand how to use editing features in such software.” Someone can instead write “Register use with focus on cash handling. Word processor use, including editing features.” While this may be grammatically incorrect, because these are fragment sentences, the meaning is still clear and presented in a way that can be read quickly by someone scanning a page.

When someone is using gapping, it is often best to also use parallelism. This means that though some words are left out of descriptions, this should be consistent between uses. For example, if someone leaves out pronouns from details provided in one section, such as in the above example, subsequent sections should also lack pronouns. This creates an overall CV that can be quickly and easily read, without interrupting page scanning due to inconsistent grammar.