WHAT MAKES A CV STAND OUT? (A PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE!) Department of Neuroimaging IoPPN

What makes a CV Stand Out? (Preferably in a good way!) Remember that if there are 100 applicants for a post, the reviewer has less that 2 minutes per CV even if they set 3-4 hours aside for shortlisting even if there are only 20 applicants, and the reviewer sets aside 4 hours, they only have about 10 minutes per CV Need to stand out!

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details Demographics Going to come back to this later...

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

Personal Statement (or similar) Keep this brief Customise it to the particular job you’re aiming for. This is your chance to “capture” the reader; tell them, in one sentence, why they should employ you: “Following my PhD, and a 2 year PostDoc in, I am now looking for an opportunity to ” Don’t include lots of generalities – Everyone wants world peace, and to help children, but it won’t necessarily get you a job! Don’t just duplicate your cover letter verbatim (or vice versa)

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

Education & Employment History Required, but probably the most boring section of a CV! Keep it brief Full details of your GCSE s are probably no longer relevant! Consider adding a 1 line overview: “Following A-levels in BLAH, I realised that my ambition to become a BLAH was best suited by pursuing a degree in BLAH” “Following my PhD, I wanted to broaden my experience of BLAH and therefore undertook a number of short PostDoc positions in BLAH, BLAH and BLAH”

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

Teaching & Supervision Experience Be imaginative – if you think you’ve not done any official teaching, for example, think what you HAVE done. Supervised MSc student projects? Given demos to visitors? Etc etc Consider adding a 1 line overview: “Teaching has always been integral to my roles so far, and I have been able to contribute to BLAH, BLAH and BLAH” Consider (deliberate) understatement: “While my PhD/PostDoc/... didn’t involve any direct face-to-face student contact, I was able to [list of 8 things you did!]”

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

Research Grants Again, be imaginative – if you think you’ve not got any grants to your name, think what you HAVE done. (List everything!) Found money for conferences/visits/... during PhD? Contributed informally to grants with others? Officially co-I-ed grants with other? Give a 1 line overview: “My PostDoc was funded by BLAH, and I was heavily involved in writing the successful follow-up grant (recently funded £1.9m, PI: Prof BLAH). I also hold 3 small grants in my own name...” Again, consider (deliberate) understatement: “While I don’t currently hold any funds in my own name, I am a named collaborator on a £2.2m bid to the MRC and a further recently awarded £100,000 grant from the Wellcome Trust” A bit naughty – doesn’t actually say whether or not this was successful!

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

Publications Again, be imaginative – if you think you’ve not lots of papers to your name, think what you HAVE done. (List everything!) Conference papers/abstracts (include, but flag as not full papers) As usual - give a 1 line overview: “My h-index is BLAH, and 3 of my publications have already received more than BLAH citations” Yet again, understatement may help: “I have over 20 publications in high impact peer reviewed journals” sounds better than “I have 21 papers”?

A Typical CV Demographics – Name, contact details... Personal Statement Education Employment History Teaching & Supervision Experience List of Research Grants List of Peer Reviewed Papers Referee contact details

Demographics Why are these sections always first and last? Good practice for reviewers is to ignore name (from which gender can often be inferred) indications of age, etc, etc Research indicates that both males and females show bias towards male candidates. (Go on one of the KCL “unconscious bias” training sessions if you haven’t already!)

Demographics Why is this section always first? Maybe make it easy for the reader to ignore/discard info that may bias them: Put all contact and similar details on a separate sheet? Put these details at the end, not the beginning, of the CV?? *DON’T* include a photo! Put referee details on this page too? Signpost reader to these details with a “place holder” on the first page???

Review: What makes a CV Stand Out? Remember that the reviewer may spend only have a few minutes at most on your CV, so you need to stand out! (In a good way!) Need to catch readers attention, and direct them to the things you want them to focus on. Must be honest, but can also direct the reader away from weaker sections, by giving them something positive instead! Need to avoid anything that will put them off: Check your spelling Make sure everything is nicely formatted...

Final Thought Don’t apply more than once! Seeing the same application twice in the same pile is a sure fire indication to the reviewer that you’re “carpet bombing” every potential oportunity, making it much less likely they’ll believe you when you say that this is the post been waiting for all your (research) life!

CONTACT NAME TITLE ADDRESS LINE TEL