One of the most critical career documents for a finance employee is their CV followed by an excellent LinkedIn profile.
With a CV being a crucial part of the financial hiring process, what should you look out for as you review CVs that land on your desk pre your decision to invest more time and interview the person in question?
Important
For some of you reading this post, you might be reflecting that isn’t this a part of the process (CV sifting) that a “finance recruiter like you” is supposed to do?
The answer is of course yes.
However, we aren’t naïve enough to think that everyone is using the amazing Rebus financial recruitment service yet.
Which is why we are sharing our system for you here.
The interview process is time-consuming yet pivotal to the decision making process. Therefore it is critical to make sure that the right individuals are brought to interview in the first place.
Appropriate CV analysis, therefore, is key.
The team at Rebus have looked at thousands of CVs and now know what the essential facts are that you must pay attention to. We share them with you here in this week’s post.
Formatting Typo’s and Basic Grammar
Let’s start with something fundamental which is a massive signal about your potential employee’s motivation for the role and attention to detail.
If you are working with Rebus, we will have already removed CVs that are rough and ready and signpost that the particular candidate doesn’t hit the mark when it comes to fundamental financial employment criteria, like attention to detail.
To clarify; I am not a crazy grammar geek. However, if a prospective employee is sending a CV for review and is keen for the role they will have checked their spelling and had someone else run an eye over it; surely?
If a CV, you are reviewing has typos and lack of attention to detail you must wonder where else does this pattern play out in the candidates work life. Fact: If they make errors in such an important document, it is this likely to happen in other areas of their work and life.
Relevant Qualifications
The applicant tracking process is the recruitment industry jargon for how to identify relevant CVs for your financial role.
Few organisations have this as part of their process.
For instance, if a qualification or skill is a deal breaker, then it must be a no to moving any further forward if this isn’t listed on their CV.
As an example, if the position requires an ACA, ACCA or CIMA qualified person or at least an individual working towards this and it doesn’t appear, or they are unable to demonstrate a significant QBE number of years, you can’t waste your time interviewing this person, which leads me onto the next part of the process.
Yes, No and Maybe Folders
It’s easy when you are reviewing multiple documents to forget who you have looked at and rejected and who is a maybe or ‘must’ see.
Back in the day, you probably had individual piles on the desk? Now with so many cover letters and CVs coming via email create folders on your hard drive and place them there.
Create yes, no and maybe folders; trust me it helps to streamline the process for companies that don’t have access to the systems and software a professional recruiter does.
Important: Though it is time-consuming, consider sending rejection emails to those individuals that aren’t successful. This is critical when it comes to your employer brand that we touched on in a previous post.
What Results Have They Delivered
Though their introduction statement might shout out that they are “results driven and focused”, have they listed their achievements on their CV?
If they sailed through their CIMA modules with an excellent result how is this now translating into tangible results for current employers?
Remember the finance team is recruited into an organisation to provide value, not only financial compliance.
E.g. “I set up a new payroll system and integrated this with our current workflow to ensure our HMRC compliance was handled.”
Scan for statements such as this listed on their CV.
Look Out for Consistency Versus Inconsistency
Inconsistent dates, sudden career changes or lots of movement from company to company in a short period is an area of concern, especially in a finance employee.
CV scanning and assessment is vital if you want to move the conversation forward to an interview. It is time consuming so be warned.
An alternative is to work with a professional finance recruitment company like ourselves, who is likely to recognise the CVs you are looking at anyway. To arrange a quick call, email us here or call our friendly team on 01282 930930.
Thanks,
Rachel Mitson
About Rebus Financial Recruitment
Rebus Financial Recruitment provides a specialist and focused recruitment service to its customers, which historically range from a wide variety of organisations including SME’s to large PLCs.
We strive to offer both the client and candidate a seamless recruitment experience. Using our expertise, we get to the heart of employer and employee needs; and, in doing so, we match the two perfectly. To get in touch call us on 01282 930930.
