Little CV Tip.....

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Hello all,

As i've posted earlier, i've just got back from passing the 70-272 exam to get my MCDST. While i was at the testing centre i was chatting away to the exam room 'guard' (for want of a better word) and i noticed a little poster that got me curious.

I thought that at this stage of my cert journey it could be a good idea to get an extra logo onto my CV - i'm not sure how many of you know this but you can get a Microsoft Office 'Specialist' Qualification which will give you quite a nifty little logo for the top of your CV.

Best thing is, you can get the full 'Office Specialist' title just by taking one exam in an Office chosen application (outlook/excel etc.) - Oh, and apparently the exam is only £25.

Personally, i think that its a bargain when you compare it to the impact value on your CV.

Logo for the CV and details here....

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/officespecialist/default.mspx

 

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Nothing personal, but if someone sent me a CV with logo's on it it think knob.

 

Mmmm...

Thats a strange reply i must say, almost everyone i speak to puts their logos on the top of their CV, including all of the IT Pro's at the Training and Testing Centre, it's also recommended practice from Microsoft. It makes perfect sense to me but perhaps i'm just naive...

How would you make your CV stand out Simon ?

 

I guess that to me it just makes something professional look, well, a bit tacky.

It is not just the CV that will get you noticed, but also the cover letter aswell.

If the employer is only asking for your CV at this stage then I'd try and make it stand out by simply sticking to cold hard facts, I have X cert, Been working for Y X Years, etc. Experience in ...... You get the idea. Leave the Personal stuff for the covering letter or the interview, this is where you can show some personality, say how much you enjoy stuff, etc.

Does it stand out? I don't know, but I do know that I usually get an interview when I send it out.

 

Logos on CV's aside
attaining a cert for a logo is not the right reason to persue IT certification
and devalues the certs of thousands of other people

 

Another weird thing is that if you read the FAQs for MOS (on the page that you linked to) it actually tells you that even if you are an MOS you are not allowed to use the logo anyway.

Bit odd that.

I like logos, but I've had loads of CVs from IT professionals, many very highly qualified, and I've never seen one with a logo on.

I think that it may be a newbie thing, we get all excited at first, then we get old and cynical about the whole thing.

Don't we Harry...

 

I think that perhaps i didn't explain thoroughly enough in my first post.

I really don't think many people will spend xx amount of hours studying for a cert, just to get a logo onto their CV - I was trying to imply that at this stage (MCDST) it's an ideal opportunity to get an extra cert as Office is covered quite alot by the 70-271 and 70-272 exams, and it's a relatively inexpensive cert to obtain.

I can understand your thoughts on the logo's but please try to remember that there are PLENTY of people like myself trying to get their 'foot in the door' - with entry level jobs i would have thought that this logo as a visual impression would have been an ideal thing to have.

At this stage, i think that everything i can get will help me to find that job.. its a shame for us newbies to meet such opposition.

 

Eh? What? You just woke me from a nice snooze....

I don't even have a current CV. I got this job because I phoned a friend when I lost the last job after a take-over, and the reponse was "When can you start?".

I'm not sure I even know the correct way to write one these days......

Harry.

 

Don't think of it as opposition, think of it as those that are in positions of being potential employers offering their thoughts.

We are all in IT because we want to be, or at least we should want to be. We are simply trying to offer advice based upon our own experiences and expectations.

 

in all fairness, if you dont meet it here, you will meet it when a HR manager drops your CV in the cylindrical file recepitcal because it trys to be too flash

there was a time i had logos on my cv, they were all watermarked and barely visable, took up no space and didnt detract from the actual text, i still decided it was a bit OTT, and im sure many of the HR manager who dont understand the difference anyway agree

if your doing desktop support knowing office backwards is indeed a handy skill to have, and thats a reason to persue certification in office, not the logo or the percieved benefits it will give your CV over the others in the pile.

 

I don't use logos or anything like that, but I certainly use a bit of colour on my CV to get it noticed. I agree with Quarky in that an initial first visual impression is all important.

Think about it, you advertise a job, 70 people apply, so you have 70 sheets of white paper with black text on it. As you're sifting through them, one with a splash of colour (say a logo) is going to catch your eye, and you are going to read some of it before you know you are doing it. I don't know if IT is any different from other industries in this aspect, but I have been told so many times by employers, career specialists etc that getting noticed is half the battle (and I have just produced a book on the subject, 'How To Get A Job You Love' by John Lees, a very good read!!!!)

Sorry, shameful plug there

 

I've got logos on my CV as well. They're relatively small, and confined to the top right corner, across from my name and address particulars where otherwise blank space would be. Very tastefully done, if I do say so myself. In any case, my CV has been largely successful.

 

This thread has been invaluable to me already, thanks guys.

I agree with Brainbeacon though, thats exactly what i was proposing, some small logos at the top, tastefully done with a high impact value. I am a newbie, all the advice i have had concerning my CV so far has been to use logos at the top.

I do take the thoughts of the IT 'veterans' seriously and with alot of respect - but perhaps they have forgotten what it's like to be trying to get a job in IT from the bottom, we don't all have the experience to call on to fill a CV out. (not yet anyway)

I believe that you can learn something from everyone, no matter whether it's good or bad.

Just in these few short posts i've learned a great deal already. If i were to submit my CV to 100 possible employers with logo's at the top, it would work on some of them, and some others would think i'm a knob (in the words of simongrahamuk - nothing taken personally there, honestly - i understand what you were saying)

Who knows the percentages of it all - i guess its down to a personal choice and i'm sure that its the rest of the CV that REALLY matters.

Thanks again guys,

Carl.

 

Have a search for 'CV' on the forum mate.
We've had some cracking threads in the past about CVs and covering letters - all with some great tips on.

 

Cheers Jonny,

I'll do that.

 

Actually if a CV looks too polished and too well done it makes me think it has been written by a professional CV writer and I won't trust the content.

I prefer to read a CV that looks like it has been produced by the person themselves. It's far more likely to contain factual information rather than buzz words and hype.

If I received a CV with logos on it, a knob would definitely spring to mind but I wouldn't necessarily bin it at that point. During the interview process I would determine the extent of the knob factor within a minute or two - strangely the handshake says a lot about a person, especially Masons

 

lol.

Some great views into peoples opinions here, and some valuable info.

That means that i'd better hope that i'm crap at presenting my CV because if i do it too well then it will seem that a professional CV writer has done it and that i couldn't possible hope to achieve that level of presentation. Can't work that out myself, but i get what you are saying. Perhaps the 'standard' of a normal CV should be taken into consideration. Don't break the mould, so to speak.

Thanks, i really do take on board your thoughts - it's all good help.

 

CVs are such a pain in the 'arris. When I was in my final year in uni, I managed to set up two meetings for CV advice, one with the global marketing director of Diageo and the other with the UK director of Symantec. Now obviously these guys see thousands of CVs, but gave me completely different advice, the Symantec lad saying he wanted nothing more than one page with short, sharp bullet points detailing work history, the Diageo lad saying he liked 2 pages with interests, hobbies etc included as he liked getting to know what people are like.

As troublesome as it is, I personally think the best thing to do is literally make a custom made CV for every (or as many as you can) company you apply for, tailor make it if you will. For example, if I go for a job involving design or graphics, I make sure my CV is colourful, has little designs and swashes on it etc, and if it's for a project management role, I make it very formal and sincere with greyscales or dark blues

(design tip: greys and blues are seen as good, 'serious' colours in the business world as they by and large represent business colours thanks to the colours of suits that people mostly wear)

Sorry, I know this has skewed away from the original point, but it may help

Cockles

 

That is actually very good advice. I've got a couple of CVs that I use. One is my 'IT Geek' one which goes into things like certs and practical IT experience etc.
The other one is my 'Management' one which has basically the same stuff on it but written from a project management slant and has nothing to do with crawling under tables.

The only time I would use a template CV is if I was desperate and just wanted to send 200 CVs across the country. If I'm actually applying for a job that I want, I take the time to rewrite my CV a little based on the sort of company I'm applying for and what the job role is.

It may seem like a pain, but it isn't much work if it gives you a shot at the job you really want.

As an ex-HR manager, nothing turned me off quicker than a mass produced CV and covering letter - as it says right from the start 'I can't be bothered'. If an applicant can't be arsed to write me a personal covering letter, I can't be arsed to read his CV.

 

Project managers also crawl under tables, but for entirely different reasons.