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There’s no question that job seeking is very competitive in today’s economy.

Many people are looking and applying for the same job opportunities as you. As such, you need to stand out in your applications, to enable you to land an interview.

While you want your CV to be eye-catching, employers still expect to see an appealing CV format. No matter what, you need to play by some standard CV writing rules.

According to our professional CV writers, these are sections that should not be left out of your CV:

1. Contact Information

Contact information should be included at the top of your CV. Beneath your full name, include details such as your cell phone, email address, portfolio link (if you’re in the creative industry).

2. CV personal statement

A CV personal statement (also called a CV personal profile or a CV profile) is a short, 4-8 sentence paragraph at the top of your CV.

Its purpose is to give a summary of your career, your top skills or achievements and also show what you can do for your future employer.

This section answers questions such as: why should the employer continue reading and what sets you apart from everyone else.

Not sure of how to go about it? Contact a professional CV writer here.

3. Work experience

This is the most crucial section of your whole job application. According to Rebecca Nyawira, a CV writing professional at Corporate Staffing Services, employers consider relevant work experience the most important thing on a CV.

In the CV work experience section, list jobs in reverse-chronological order. For each job include:

  • Position name
  • Company
  • Dates worked
  • Up to 6 bullet points outlining your achievements and responsibilities
  • Numbers and metrics to back up your achievements

4. Education

What you need to put on a CV in this section depends on your experience.

If you are a senior-level job seeker, your education section, might not really make a difference.

For entry-level CVs with little work history, place your education section above your work experience.

5. Skills

Now for the final mandatory section of a CV: skills. Good skills to include on a CV vary across most positions, industries, and individual sets of qualities. There’s no one-size-fits-all formula.

A skills summary should be broken down to individual skills using bullet points or a nicely formatted list so that your potential employer can scan it easily.

Things not to ever include in your CV are: date of birth, photo, salary requirements, irrelevant social media links, more than 15 years of work experience, tables, images and, obviously, lies.

Remember, if you are not sure of where to start when it comes to writing your own CV, consider getting in touch with our professional CV writers here, and get a FREE CV review!