Feb 17, 2021
CV Writing for Web Developer
Special Edition for Students, Fresh Graduates, and Career Shifters
A piece of paper that acts as a ticket for you to companies to interview and hire you as a Web developer. Yet many applicants do a horrible job writing a good CV to win them this interview.
I will show you here what you need to take care of while you write your CV. I have interviewed and looked over 100+ CVs for applicants, friends, and coaching.
📄 One Page
I used to have a three-page CV and I was somewhat egoistic about it and I thought I knew a lot of things and companies should hire me but yet I failed to get an internship during college.
Now after been programming since 2014, I have a single-page CV with all the experience and information that is needed. The trick is to remove all unnecessary and irrelevant experiences from your CV. Keep it simple, focused, and sharp like a Katana sword.
Ah, and don’t use a small font to add more stuff. Small font means it would be hard to read which leads to making it difficult for recruiters to understand it.
👔 Make it neat
What makes any recruiter goes off is bad formatting, incorrect grammar, weird colors, or just not structured well to inform the other party about what you know and what you can bring to the company.
I would suggest you use LaTex to do and build your CV, they are ready-made documents written with a language similar to HTML. Many of them are well-structured and organized:
I use this one for myself:
🔂 DRY in CV
Use the concept of “Don’t repeat yourself” as well in CV writing. Collect all the technologies you have learned in one place. Don’t re-mention similar contributions you did in one project or company in another one.
Each line and each section should be unique in itself and everything has certain information to tell and show.
🍖 Describe Your Value
Some people list their duties in their CV or their job description. Instead, you should list your contributions that you did, what is the value that you have brought to the company or project that hired you.
If you are a fresh graduate, mention your side projects and what you did to make them come to life. Don’t have one? Go build one :D
The main objective is to show the hiring manager that you are qualified enough and you will be a great member of your future team.
😎 Personal Branding
Some people would be a little shy to mention in their CV what they have done elegantly. It would be for some out of good intentions to be humble.
Don’t do that! Kill your imposter syndrome and promote your uniqueness!
You need to learn how to do personal branding.
Learn how to market yourself as a professional developer who knows what they are doing. I like to refer to this Quora question to give an example although it is over-exaggerating
🤥 Do not Lie
If you ever committed this and the interviewer found out, I assure you, you will not only be rejected but also you will be put on an automated blocked list for this company.
You can not fake it until you make it. We can spot a liar so easily and you will probably be humiliated on the spot because this shows how dangerous your personality is for the company.
Employers hire for attitude, not just talents. If you don’t know something, be honest about it and don’t worry. The company will support you to learn it as long as you have the passion to learn and improve.
👨🔬 Experience
If you don’t have experience or hands-on projects, go build them first!
Side projects, Github links, freelancing; all are a huge boost to your CV especially if you have never worked in a software company before.
Every time I was checking someone’s CV and find a link for their Github or Netlify, I always check it and see their coding and styling.
You won’t be judged based on them, on the contrary, they show how passionate you are about software and your craft and you do it to learn, gain experience, or maybe just for fun
✨ Bonus
These are a few of the things you should take care of when writing your CV:
- No weird fonts. Use something like Arial or Roboto or something similar in the family of sans-serif because it is more comforting to the eye
- No graphs, no colors, no images
- Always use the Past Tense and in passive form. No “I” in your CV
- No personal information like date of birth, driving license, or marital status; really who needs to know this 🤷♂
- Avoid time gaps between jobs or projects
- Do not add social media accounts unless you use them professionally
- Check correct contact information
- Always send CV in PDF format as an attachment, not an external link
- Name the PDF with your name, not some weird “myCoolCv_1.pdf”
- Use proofreading like Grammarly
And always improve each time you apply and get rejected. Practice makes perfect!
And Good Luck :)
