You begin your job search, because you believe it is time to leave and you believe you can earn £10,000 more a year. Eager to make the move to a new job, you begin sending out the same CV to hundreds of employers without an invite to an interview. After a few months of searching you begin growing frustrated, not understanding why you are not receiving invites to job interviews.
Making a career change in the United Kingdom is not easy, it is terrifying, and it not recommended without a clear strategy. Did you know, on average it takes approximately 9 weeks from the start of the process until you receive an offer? Also, did you know other factors such as your industry, if you are currently employed, and economic conditions influences hiring decisions.
This thoughtful guide will provide you with 15 reasons you are not receiving invites to interviews and how to improve your chances. Remember, Exclusive Career Advice does offer a CV review service.
Below are a few free online salary estimator tools.
In order to set your expectations about your job search, you will need to intimately understand your skills and what they are worth in the marketplace. Below are a few online salary estimating toools.
Please be aware by clicking on the link you will be taken to a 3rd party web site that is completely independent of UK Career Advice. Advice provided is based on the information you supply. UK Career Advice is not responsible for the information contained on the site, UK Career Advice does not share information with the sites, and is not liable for any information that may not be accurate.
https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Salaries/estimator-salary-SRCH_KO0,9.htm
https://www.totaljobs.com/salary-checker/average-estimator-salary
https://www.monster.com/salary/
Overstating experience
Have you ever thought a little ‘white lie,’ on your CV will not hurt anyone? Maybe, when applying for a job you overstate your experience? Overstating your experience and hurt you. Hiring managers know the skills required for the role they are hiring they are advertising and understand the skill of their applicants. By overstating your experience it will create an incongruency on your application that a hiring manager will identify.
Therefore, when applying for a job or interviewing, it is important to focus on your contribution from a factual standpoint.
Even if you can get past the application stage and interview stage to get the offer, once you are in the role you will be found out because you will not be able to work at the level required.
Understating your experience
I know when applying for a job or during an interview, it is easy to use the word ‘we.’ Also, I know when applying for a job or interviewing there is a feeling of ‘erroring on the side of caution,’ in order not to overstate your experience. So, by using “we” it is a protection mechanism and a way of showing that you are team player. It is way of conveying you think about the team over your achievements.
In an interview the interviewing panel does not care what others did. They only care what you did.
Easiest way to fix this is to keep a log of your job successes and when you apply or interview, using your successes to answer the questions you are being asked.
Not aware interview etiquette
You have spent time preparing your application and it meets the company’s requirements. A CV will get you the interview but understanding interviewing etiquette will help ensure you get the offer. Being aware of interviewing etiquette is vital. Examples of interviewing etiquette includes:
Speaking negatively about former employees or colleagues
You are asked why are you leaving your company for this role? The is a ‘knee-jerk,’ reaction to be blatantly honest at this point and say, ‘I am having issues with a work colleague who is taking credit for my work.’ Alternatively, you may want to say, ‘The company treats me poorly and I want to get out before they go under.’
Whilst, being honest in an interview is required. It is important to understand the technique of reframing. Reframing is viewing the event from the perspective of the company you are applying. If an interviewer asks you why you are leving your job, you could state for example,”It is a hostile enviornment where I feel under-valued and not appreciated,” or you can say, using reframing, for example “I feel as though I have gone as far as I can in my current position, and I am exploring other opportunities.”
So, saying, “I feel as though I have gone as far as I can in my current position, and I am exploring other opportunities,” is not a lie. Instead, it is an analysis of your current situation that examines, feelings and motivation that is put positively.
Sending out generic CVs and cover letters
In the United Kingdom, the Job Centre ask those unemployed to send out speculative CVs to employers.
There is nothing wrong with sending out speculative CVs because they let employers know you are looking for a job and are interested in working for them. This means you have to chase and wait for an appropriate position to open before the company will consider your CV.
However, when you send out a generic CV for a job advertisement it easy for a recruiter to spot because it does not match the requirements and from my experience, it is a CV that will get rejected.
Not reading job description
This relates for closely with sending out generic CVs.
Reading the job description is vital. If you know the role, for example, administrator. There is a temptation to use your perceived knowledge of the role and write your CV based on your belief about the role. This can be a fatal error in the CV since you may miss unique skills required for the role.
To be successful in your job search, requires matching your experience with the job being advertised. You need not just read the job description but really understand the role. This typically comes from doing some research into the company.
Not targeting the right jobs
I come from an IT project management background. There is a slew of generic roles that match my experience such as change manager, project manager, contract manager, business analyst, business manager, incident and problem manager, training manager, and service manager to name a few.
If I look at the generic role titles, it appears I have a wealth of opportunities. However, it is not until I begin reading the role descriptions and begin matching my skills, I can correctly identify the roles most suited for me.
In order to increase your chances of getting your CV noticed, means, understanding your skills and then matching them to job requirements.
Moving roles too quickly
Depending on the role and the company, the expected time in the role is typically 1 – 3 years for someone who is permanent before you look for another internal role. Whereas, 2 years is the minimum before you begin looking externally.
If you are an agency worker or working on a fixed-term contract, then it is important that you communicate that in any application or interview you may have. Otherwise, it may appear you leaving roles too quickly.
Moving roles too quickly can raise a ‘red flag,’ about job stability and how long you will remain in the role.
Not setting aside enough time for job searching
The more time you put aside for job searching the quicker you will find it. A while ago I came across a rule for job searching that I find, tends to be true.
The rule state, for every $10,000 in salary you seek, you will be job searching for 1 month. For a $30,000 / year job you can expect to search 3 months.
This means, you may be searching a while before you are successful, and you need to be putting regular time aside.
Social Media is not appropriate
Check your social media accounts and remove anything that could be taken as offensive or creating a negative image of yourself.
Reason being, it is possible an employer may do a search for you on the internet and look at your accounts. Their search of your social media accounts may factor into a decision to invite you for an interview or extend a job offer.
Not networking
Networking is a great way to develop leads about jobs and to develop relationships. By networking you are putting yourself helping yourself to gain inside information to help you progress your role.
Not developing / outdated skills
It is important to keep your skills up to date. Having outdated skills can act as a barrier for advancement or obtaining a new job.
Poor communication skills
Poor communication skills come in different forms, such as writing, verbal, or presenting. When applying for a job or interviewing, being clear and concise is vital. Taking time to spell check, reading out aloud, and rehearsing are important in developing strong communication skills.
Relying on one source
One way to jeopardise your job search is relying on one source of information for you job search. Look at various options such as the internet, newspapers, your company’s intranet and other sources. Avoid using just one website for your job search.
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Hits: 91
I experienced this a lot but in my case it was just or could be the fact that my school is not well known compared to others it really does happen where I am from. Or it can be luck as people say if it aint for you it aint gonna happen.
This is a very good explanation of why CV is rejected even if someone is having those skills. I agree with the points said and will take care of it.
Hi Alex,
Sorry to read that your CV is being ignored. Hopefully, this guide has helped you. Let us know if there is anything else we can do for you.
Hi Aman,
Thank you for your reply. If there is anything Exclusive Career Advice can help you with please let us know.
This is really informative, I sometimes wondered why my CV was totally ignored. Because sometimes I don’t even get a response from some of the companies I applied. Will have to work on these different areas.
The above tips are really an eye opener. I would say I am guilty of not setting aside enough time for job searching. I will have to devout more time for this going forward.
I send out generic CVs all the time and that greatly affected the number of interviews I’m invited for. I guess I need to tailor my CV to suit the job role
I think this has pointed every reason why our CV is been ignored and it is well detailed and I guessed I think we all guilty of some or even all, and I appreciate that this post is not just about the reasons but it also gives insight on how to go about them. This is really nice a job, thanks for the help admin
Social Media is not appropriate. Agree on this. Social media holds quite important role nowadays since recruiter also put it as their consideration before hiring us.
Wow, what a nice article. Just figured out the reason why people are being rejected after interview. Need to work on those areas
Wow, sending out generic CV’s is one reason I can relate with. We should always restructure our CV to suit a job offer, all CV doesn’t work for all jobs. And importantly our grammatical expressions checked
Wow! I love this because outdated skills can make one not fit for the job applied for. Therefore, it is very good and important for a job applicant to continue developing his/ her skills while keep on searching for the job in order for one to meet up with the job demand
I am guilty of sending generic CV and cover letter. I guess you really need to have a unique cover letter and CV if you really want your CV get noticed. Thanks for this. It’s really a great help!
I have always known this fact for long but people tends not to be observant about it.Thanks for this article and I hope people learn from their mistakes after reading this.A well constructed cv helps get a job.
This is a very insightful article, really Learn something valuable. Most time we only send same c.v to different organization and one do not get invite for interview. Thank you for this article.
Like my dad will always say, you not trying to impress anyone with you CV, try go as easy as possible with you grammar. Because any grammatical error is bad for you.
You are right about poor communication skills. I know I have lose jobs because my communication skills was poor. But I’m working on it now
Sometimes it really necessary to read through Job description before sending out your CV to different organization.. because it has to meet the requirements of what they are looking… In most cases that is what attract a winning Job offer.
I’ve learned that in creating CV, one should know the job description that they are applying into. Not just sending a generic CV to everybody. I agree to all points in this article.
These advice about which type of CV can be ignored is really helpful i am also a collage student and i have to get the job and this will really help me.