Tailoring without rewriting the whole thing
By the FreeCVWriter team · · 2 min read
Tailoring a resume is mostly reordering, not rewriting. Read the advert, work out the two or three things it actually cares about, and make sure those are visible in the top third of the first page — in the summary if you have one, and in the first bullets of your most recent role.
Find what the advert actually cares about
Adverts list a dozen requirements, but only a few decide who gets an interview. Clues: what is mentioned first, what is repeated, what appears in the job title, and anything marked essential rather than desirable. Underline those. Everything else is secondary.
Match their language, honestly
Match their language where it is honest to do so. If the advert says “stakeholder management” and you wrote “worked with other departments”, their phrasing is the one a recruiter will search for. Do not adopt words for work you have not done.
Keep a master version
Keep a master version with everything in it, and cut down from that for each application rather than building up from scratch. It is faster and you stop losing good lines.
A fifteen-minute routine
- 1.Copy your master CV into a new draft named after the employer.
- 2.Mark the two or three requirements that decide the shortlist.
- 3.Reorder bullets under each role so the relevant ones come first.
- 4.Adjust your summary, if you have one, to name the role and the matching experience.
- 5.Swap your wording for theirs wherever it describes the same work.
- 6.Cut whatever is now pushing the relevant material down the page.
- 7.Run the job description through the ATS checker to catch missing terms.
The cover letter is where the rest of the tailoring goes: the one or two things about you worth the reader’s time for this particular advert. See how to write a cover letter.