{"id":1214,"date":"2018-12-04T08:30:39","date_gmt":"2018-12-04T08:30:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/?p=1214"},"modified":"2025-10-22T15:56:31","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T14:56:31","slug":"cv-tips-to-profile-or-not-to-profile","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/2018\/12\/04\/cv-tips-to-profile-or-not-to-profile\/","title":{"rendered":"CV Tips: To profile, or not to profile?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1216\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1.jpg 1037w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/personal-profile1-322x215.jpg 322w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A \"personal profile\"\u00a0is a\u00a0short section at the top of\u00a0a CV (usually following the contact details section) that\u00a0is used to describe and summarise\u00a0a person's\u00a0unique selling points.<\/p>\n<p>I've recently had a number of discussions with students about whether or not they should include a profile section and how best to write one.\u00a0 Profiles are hard to write, partly because most students are in the early stages of their career.\u00a0 And it isn't\u00a0<em>expected<\/em> that you should include it on your CV (unlike education and relevant skills \/ experience).<\/p>\n<p><strong>When should you use a profile section?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Personally, I think profiles can\u00a0work well\u00a0if:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>You have decided not to pursue a career directly related to your degree.\u00a0 The profile is a good opportunity to highlight transferable skills (as long as you do it well - see below!)<\/li>\n<li>You are applying for\u00a0further study or a research role,\u00a0and want to summarise your interests, skills and \/ or career aims<\/li>\n<li>You are working with a recruitment agency, and would consider a range of different roles and want to highlight your key skills<\/li>\n<li>You are applying to roles which are highly sought-after.\u00a0 The profile is another opportunity to really sell yourself and grab the attention of the recruiter.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Writing your profile - how to stand out<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/Standing-out1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1217\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/Standing-out1-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/Standing-out1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/Standing-out1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/Standing-out1-322x215.jpg 322w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2018\/11\/Standing-out1.jpg 796w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>It's actually\u00a0quite a\u00a0challenge to write a good personal profile.\u00a0 When writing your profile, think about what the employer wants to know.\u00a0 What would be most impressive and useful to know about your education, skills and experience? Is it your academic ability? Your proficiency in a certain kind of skill?<\/p>\n<p>When\u00a0trying to\u00a0articulate\u00a0their key skills, students often fall into the trap of using commonly-used words and phrases like \"hard-working\" and \"excellent communication skills\". But imagine how many times an employer has seen those phrases.\u00a0Most employers would\u00a0say that being \"hard-working\" was a pretty basic requirement for a role....! Here's an example of the sort of profile that we commonly see:<\/p>\n<p><em>\"I am a hard working, motivated and enthusiastic final year Computer Science student from the University of Bath. I have excellent programming skills gained on placement and am able to work independently and as part of a team.\"<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The above statement would probably apply to most students studying Computer Science!\u00a0 It's not personal enough and doesn't make the student stand out.\u00a0 Here's another one:<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cI am a University of Bath Computer Science finalist with 12-months programming experience gained at Decision Technology.\u00a0I am confident using languages such as JavaScript, CSS and HTML, and have worked in an agile environment with a team based in the USA.\"<\/em><\/p>\n<p>This student has managed to tell us many of the same things as the first example, but perhaps\u00a0with greater effect.\u00a0 Why?<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>They have\u00a0briefly given specifics of\u00a0their industry experience - quantifying practical experience is a good idea.<\/li>\n<li>They have briefly listed languages in which they are competent - it's immediately clear that they have a good range of skills.<\/li>\n<li>They have\u00a0briefly given\u00a0a piece of evidence about working in a team (rather than just stating that they can work in a team), which simultaneously shows that they have good\u00a0knowledge of\u00a0industry practice.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So you can see that the impact can be much bigger if you\u00a0tweak\u00a0your language slightly!<\/p>\n<p>If you're having real trouble coming up with something that is\u00a0snappy, and personal to you, then\u00a0don't include it.\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/2015\/09\/16\/personal-profiles-on-cvs-yes-or-a-no-no\/\">Take a look at this great blog on whether or not to write a personal profile (or career objective)<\/a>.\u00a0 If you want to discuss your CV, then do make an Applications Advice appointment via MyFuture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A \"personal profile\"\u00a0is a\u00a0short section at the top of\u00a0a CV (usually following the contact details section) that\u00a0is used to describe and summarise\u00a0a person's\u00a0unique selling points. I've recently had a number of discussions with students about whether or not they should...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1176,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[748],"tags":[156,22,155,411],"class_list":["post-1214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive","tag-career-objective","tag-cv","tag-personal-profile","tag-profile"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}