The most frequent question asked to a recruiter – ‘Is my CV okay?’. It’s hard to know what’s right or wrong when compiling your CV. Video CV’s allow us to expand on what’s written and most importantly get your personality across. Let’s go through each section one by one:

Introduction video – They say first impression count so make sure you practise your smiley face! Start with your name and location and what work you are looking for. Be sure to include your preferences for remote working or specific hours. You don’t need to go into too much detail with your experience here but summarising your career in a sentence such as ‘I have 3 and a half year sales experience in various tech settings’ is a nice way for the employer to be hooked initially. You might have specifics in terms of the type of company you want to work in, for example a B corp company who puts sustainability above profit, or a large corporation where you can climb the ladder.

Experience – This section is the easiest. You are the only person that can speak about your experience and that knows the ins and outs so, although it will probably be the longest to complete, it will fly by. Start with your most recent employment and talk about your main responsibilities (both day to day and sporadic), systems used, team structure, additional responsibilities you took on and your reason for leaving each position. Stay professional and concise with your reason for leaving… At the first interview stage you can expand on these if asked. Here’s a few examples:

• Career progression
• Broaden knowledge in another sector
• Career change
• Professional development
• Organisation restructure
• Outgrown current role

Skills – Competency bars are a great way of showing an employer what they could build on in your skill set if they employed you. Resist the urge to put everything at 100%! The categories are quite general so in your video clip deep dive into the specifics of your skills. For example, if you put marketing down as a skill, explain that you mainly do content creation and social media in your recording. Talk about popular software packages such as Adobe Suites or even CRM’s such as Salesforce as these specifics are often on job descriptions.

Interests – The most fun category. There really is no right or wrong with this, the quirkier the better! Automatically we think of sports, travel, music which are great, but think outside the box too. Do you enjoy reading or watching a specific genre? (I see you, true crime fanatics…). Explaining a recent golf tournament or your next booked holiday are easy and interesting things to talk about and will come naturally to you. Everyone loves a holiday!

Education – Not the most fun category…but nevertheless needed. This could be your shortest clip as it kind of says what it does on the tin. Explaining when you graduated or modules you enjoyed at university or school are again another important insight into you as a person. If you did any interesting extracurricular activities then be sure to mention those too.

Top tip – don’t stress! You will stand out by being you and the right company will see that. Short and snappy videos are what we are all used to nowadays so don’t worry about trying to fill time and ramble to get the video longer. This is just the start of the process so any questions the employer has can be asked through the DM service or when they invite you for an interview. You’ve already given yourself the best chance of finding your perfect career by doing an interactive CV rather than the old fashioned written ones.