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Future Worker

Beginners level

Unit 2: Creating your resume and cover letter: Make a difference!

AIMS & OBJECTIVES

  1. The purpose of this Unit is writing a good resume and cover letter and  promoting oneself through social media

  2. The goal of this Unit is the usage of the Europass tools

LEARNING OUTCOMES

LOut1: Understand the importance of enhancing your soft skills for labor market and describe all intercultural skills, needed for workers in the 21st century

LOut2: Create a suitable CV and Cover letter, explaining why you are suitable for a future job

KEYWORDS

  • Soft skills
  • Intercultural skills
  • CV/Resume
  • Cover letter
  • Social media

TABLE OF CONTENTS

2.1 Introduction

  • In Latin, the phrase “Curriculum Vitae” (mostly mentioned as CV) means “course of life”. When it comes to job search or training, the CV is the first and most important step. It is a formal document that outlines a person’s academic and professional history. It includes contact and usually biographical information and it offers a more or less detailed presentation of a person’s studies, skills, working experiences and accomplishments, while many times also includes career goals and objectives.
  • Another term often used instead of CV is “Resume” (the French term for “summary”). This is a shorter version of a CV, usually about one or two pages long, listing a person’s education, experience and skills. It is standard in the USA and most of the times doesn’t include biographical information.
  • A document, usually sent along with the CV is the so called “cover letter”, providing additional information on the candidate’s skills and experience, usually answering the question “why are you appropriate for this job?”.
  • This Unit offers useful guidance on how to prepare an appropriate CV and cover letter, opening the way to a face-to-face interview with a future employer.

2.2 Writing your “European CV”

The CV in Europass format, also known as “The European CV” or just “Europass”, is a resume-style document that candidates use to apply for jobs in most European countries. For people looking for a work in Europe, it’s a useful tool, since it is a quick and easy way of creating an attractive personal profile, which most employers are familiar with.

The new Europass platform has been launched in July 2020 and is available in 29 languages at https://europa.eu/europass, offering free guidance in CV and Cover-letter writing, while it also suggests tailored jobs, learning opportunities and provides information on skills’ trends.

Important note: To save your information and use all the tools that Europass offers, you should register (for free). You may continue as a guest without registering, however you should know that in that case the information you enter will be deleted after 48 hours.

Photo credits: https://www.my-resume-templates.com/europass-cv

The new Europass (https://europa.eu/europass/) offers a range of online “e-Portfolio” tools and information for people of all ages, at all stages of their lives, to manage their learning and career such as:

EURES is a cooperation network designed to facilitate the free movement of workers within the EU countries plus Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

  • For people creating the CV for the first time, it is strongly recommended to create a Europass profile and follow the instructions, filling the required fields.

2.4 Cover letter

Job seekers should view their cover letter and CV/resume as a complementary but unique pair of documents. A cover letter may not be required, however including one when you apply for a job might help your chances of getting selected for an interview.

It is written in a letter format including a salutation, 2-3 paragraphs, and a closing. Unlike a resume, you should use first-person writing and reveal your “professional enthusiasm” (however, avoid using “I” too much or very emotional expressions).

As Doyle (2019a) mentions:

  • Think of your resume as a general summary of your work experience and your cover letter as a summary of your work experience as it relates to the job at hand. 
  • A cover letter conveys more subjective information like the basis of your interest in a position, how your values motivate you to pursue a job, or why the culture of a company appeals to you.

Synopsis

This Unit summarizes the basic structure of Europass, in view of helping learners to:

  1. understand the importance of using it in a daily basis
  2. creat professional CV

 

List of References

Further Reading

  • Neuliep, J.W. (2017), Intercultural Communication: A Contextual Approach Seventh Edition, SAGE Publications, Inc; Seventh edition.