How to Make an Effective Resume (CV) in 2024

To succeed in your quest for a job or scholarship, an effective CV is important. It’s that single important document that may either open doors for you in places you haven’t been yourself, or shut the same door right on your face.

Sometimes, it can be very hard for some students or jobseekers to write an Effective Resume or CV themselves. Hence, today I am going to share some useful tips about writing effective CVs and Resumes, particularly for the academic purposes.

Here, we are going to learn How to Make an Effective Resume (CV) that will land you the job or scholarship of your dream in 2024.

So if you are wondering how to write a perfect CV, and other documents to attach with and more importantly what information to highlight inside, I am going to make it easier for you in this guide.

There are different CV formats respective to each country/university. However, they all share nearly similar information and writing styles.

You can follow this link to get free access to an archive of over 1,000 CV templates, Cover letter samples and other career and educational documents.

Write a little summary about yourself (recommended).

Don’t get this wrong. No one is asking for your family history or your childhood tales. What is needed here is your accomplishments; what you have been able to do for yourself and others in the professional world.

Include your major accomplishments here. You can also add your skills. (1 to 2 lines).

You have to write your accomplishments that are relevant to the position you are applying for

For example, if you have done a research project on the topic that you are going to study, you can write about it. You can also write about the awards that you have won.

Mention your experience here, starting with the most recent ones. Make sure whatever you write is relevant to the scholarship program or the job which you are applying for. And do not go into too many details about your past experience.

If you have professional experience such as internships and graduate trainee programmes, you can write about them in this section too.

Add your responsibilities and accomplishments in that company/organization. Make 3-4 bullet points. Also, explain if you had supervised a group of people (to show that you are a team player), also write about how did your contributions impacted the organization and the appreciations you received.

Include these details with some numbers. This way you can attract the attention of the organization. Take this as example,

“the plan was to complete a research project in 5 months and I completed in 2, I was awarded as the best intern of the month, I represented my organization in a conference…”

Provide your study details, starting with the most recent one. When you put your marks, always provide the maximum obtainable Marks/CGPA as well. This way they can rank you better. However, if your CGPA is low, skip that part. Instead, you can make an additional bullet point stating that you are among the top 5 or top 10 students of your class (no one will ask for proof)

State all of your education and relevant training in this section. Many students ask that if they need to provide any proof of this information.

No you don’t need to provide (except education if asked), but do remember if you don’t have any accomplishments to write in your CV at all, be realistic in writing.

For example, don’t write excellent talents in all sections, because they might think that you are lying. Similarly, if you are writing about a conference or internship, don’t write about companies, organisations or conferences that doesn’t exist at all. In summary, try not to grow suspicions about yourself.

You can also add an additional information section, where you write about the conferences, certificates and presentations that you have given. Make sure to write only those who are relevant to the scholarship program you are applying for. Do not bombard them with a lot of information which may not be useful.

As mentioned above, they will not ask for proof, but don’t just write any conference that you attended, make sure that whatever you are writing, exists in real life.

If you are applying for a scholarship and you have written IELTS/TOFEL, you can also place the test score at the bottom, stating individual bands in each module. If you don’t have the results, you can skip this part or write about the English proficiency letter stating that you received your education in English.

Do remember, that presentation is the first thing which will matter to the reader at first glance.

If you don’t have anything to sell yourself with at all, you can present your 2, 4 or 6 years of education in a way that the reader gets so impressed by you. And if by any chance, you have nothing to express them with at all, take 6 months to get some certificates online by enrolling in courses such as these, do internship and get some good experience to depict in your CV. This is mainly for getting admission in a high rank university and also for the scholarships and the jobs of your dream.

Best of luck!