University of Manchester Careers Blog

Want some quick tips to make the format of your CV look eye-catching and contemporary? Mildred Talabi writes some good stuff about careers, and she’s put together a short screencast, showing you how to take a very common basic CV and give it a more modern feel.

CVs have fashions, and it’s always a good idea to keep up to date with what recruiters are expecting to see today, rather than what your teacher told you at school. (Don’t laugh – many students seem to start with their school CV and just add a line about their degree – and some even forget to add that!)

The screencast specifically shows a more modern format, and doesn’t try to address the content. Don’t feel you have to follow it rigorously (there aren’t any fixed rules with CVs) but it could give you ideas for giving your own CV a spring-clean – think it’s about time I had another look at my own example postgrad CVs!

The video is about 15 mins long (but you can skip the first couple of minutes if you don’t want the ad for Mildred’s CV services and book).

I’ve always got my critical hat on when I see careers advice on the web, but I do like to read Mildred’s advice, even if I don’t always agree with it (though I normally do).