Your ability to summarize your skills and experiences is essential to obtaining any job, be it academic or otherwise. However, there are distinct differences in the type of document that you would submit for a non-academic position versus one in academia. Understanding these differences is elemental to your success in the job search process.
Let’s review some basic distinctive differences. A CV, or curriculum vitae, is a document used to detail your professional background in the academic job search. It provides a one-dimensional portrait of your skills and work experience. It focuses only on your academic work. It also is complete in that it can reach as far back as your undergraduate years. It lets the work speak for itself, and therefore is quite objective. It can be several pages in length. It usually does not need modification for different academic job postings. And its content is more important than its style.
Comparatively, a resume is a document used to detail your professional background in the non-academic job search. It is quite different from a CV, in that it is a targeted overview of your most relevant skills and experiences for a particular job. It is not comprehensive, but instead includes selected experiences that best showcase your relevant skillset. It may highlight not only academic work, but other experiences. It contextualizes your experiences through the construction of accomplishment statements. It should be limited in terms of length, it should be customized for a specific role or function, and its layout should be sleek and simple.
When identifying experiences to add to your resume, think carefully of the breadth of skills you bring to a given position. Non-academic employers hold transferrable skills in high regard, and in some cases, higher regard than the intricacies of one’s research or investigative work. When considering a given experience for your resume, make sure to do a thorough inventory of all your accomplishments and contributions in order to fully identify the transferable skills gained through that experience. Minimize jargon where not relevant to the job itself.
When writing a resume, always remember that you are using this document to present yourself in a specific context and to highlight your fit for a specific role. Only use the information that can help tell a particular story. Use the following sections, in order, to craft this narrative, and ideally achieve success.
With these basics covered, you can now move forward in the transition of your CV into a resume. Good luck, and we hope to see you at the Office of Career Strategy for a review.