Prepare your CV for the UK Job Market

Your CV is your first and only opportunity to market and sell your finance career. You are writing it for a potential employer so put yourself in their shoes. Before finance professionals arrive in the UK, tailor your CV to the current UK accountancy job market. Tips to secure high quality finance jobs in the UK include:

• Make sure you are easy to contact - by telephone and online
• Do not use an inappropriate email address for professional applications
• Ensure your CV contains key words - usually qualifications, key skills or previous experience - recruitment consultants use key word searches to find suitable individuals for their finance and accountancy jobs
• An effective and targeted CV contains words that are associated with the role you are applying for. For example, for a financial accountant role you should include words such as month end, year end, audit, regulatory reporting, statutory, financial preparation etc.
• Accounting Standards to mention include: UK GAAP, US GAAP, IFRS, SOX.
• Key Financial Accounting skills include: balance sheet reconciliation, reviewing the general ledger and profit and loss accounts as well as preparation of monthly and yearly financial reports.
• Key Management Accounting skills include: budgeting, forecasting, analysing, management of cash flow and variance analysis.
• List all software packages you can use to maximise your chances of coming up in database searches.

To create an effective CV for a UK finance position, read our top tips on how to construct your CV .
Use or refer to our CV template used by UK employers to improve your CV layout and read our cover letter for inspiration. Our list of CV keywords consultants and clients use will help your CV visibility when being searched on for finance vacancies.