Your resume should demonstrate your strengths and skills. Professional experience is particularly important here. We’ll tell you how to use them effectively.

When presenting your professional career, you will be convincing if you make it clear to the potential employer that you already have relevant professional experience . Therefore, a considered and thorough elaboration of this rubric is an essential step for your argument. It is by no means a matter of just stringing career stations together without love. With such an unimaginative design you will not earn any plus points. Instead, you have to make a selection of your most important professional stations and enrich them with details.

Pay attention to the relevance of the experience

An important rule of thumb for working out your professional career is therefore: The more current and relevant the professional station is, the more detailed you should describe it. A HR manager is not interested in a part-time job during your studies or a job change from 20 years ago, as these say nothing about your current skills. Therefore, you should only summarize past and short-term employment.

How should I indicate individual professional positions?

You should always indicate an employment relationship with the employment period in the left column and the job information in the right column. Please remember to choose a uniform format for specifying the period of employment. The monthly specification has proven itself, for example:

In the job information, first state the job title and then the name of the employer and the place of work. Ideally, you can visually emphasize the job title by making it bold .

Jobs represent skills and experience

This is followed by a brief description of the main activities carried out. Keywords that are neither too general nor too detailed are already suitable here. The only important thing is that the HR manager gets a good impression of your expertise. Above all, concentrate on the activities that are in demand for the potential position. You can easily find this out by analyzing the job advertisement .

You do not have to state short transitional phases in which you were unemployed in your CV. However , periods of two months or longer are gaps in the CV .

Experience abroad in the CV

Stays abroad are a big plus on your CV. On the one hand, experiences abroad make a CV more individual and offer a good basis for the interview, on the other hand they signal experiences with other cultures, intercultural openness as well as language knowledge and skills . Since companies are increasingly active in other countries due to globalization, both language skills and experience with other cultures are becoming increasingly important.

These are relevant stays abroad:

However, not all vacation trips should be listed. Instead, stays during which you could gain experience or that are relevant to a desired position are suitable. These include, for example, language trips, semesters abroad, a position as an au pair or work and travel. This makes it clear that you not only got to know the hotel bar, but also the culture. In addition, such trips signal practical experience with foreign languages, but also personal qualities such as openness and flexibility .

Work experience FAQ

• Do I mention my education in the “education” or “work experience” section?
  • The education is given in the “Education” section.
• Should I state part-time jobs, marginal employment or temporary work?
  • Anyone who has not been in the workforce for long can state part-time jobs as practical experience. In this way, the HR manager sees that the applicant was not idle, but rather motivated and hardworking.
• Should I report internships?
  • Career starters can also enter internships in the “Professional experience” section, since internships teach you skills that can also be useful for future jobs. In addition, internships provide information about interests and talents.
  • School internships should only be mentioned in post-school applications or in certain exceptional cases.
• What do I write in the CV if I am still employed now?
  • If your current employment contract has not yet expired, you can indicate this on your CV by not specifying an end date. This tells the HR officer responsible that your employment relationship is still ongoing. In addition, you can also indicate in the cover letter that you would like to reorient yourself professionally.
• Example 1: 2005 – presentExample 2: Since 2005
• Specify unemployment in the area of ​​work experience?
  • Yes, periods of unemployment are listed in the work experience section, just like periods of employment. As unemployment is not necessarily associated with the acquisition of work experience, the expression may be misleading. In this area, however, it is about presenting the professional career and this also includes the gaps created by unemployment .
• How do I declare my freelance work?
  • State the period of your self-employment and briefly describe the most important areas of responsibility or exemplary assignments.
• Do I have to and should I mention starting a business?
  • If your own company affects your working hours, you should mention your freelance part-time job on your resume. After all, the new employer has to assess the extent to which you are available and resilient .
• Trial period failed – what should I write in the CV?
  • A CV should give the HR officer an overview of your professional career. For the sake of clarity, only facts are given here and no justifications. So it is completely sufficient if you list the period of your probationary period in the field of professional experience . The examiner can see that you have completed a short probationary period. The data does not show which party terminated the employment relationship.

Experience abroad FAQ

• Why is experience abroad so popular?Experience abroad is evidence of independence, flexibility and assertiveness. In the best case, it also documents the ability to acquire languages ​​and open-mindedness. A certificate or job reference serves as credible proof.

  Living and working abroad also requires organizational skills and adaptability – HR managers are very happy to fall back on all these skills when it comes to filling a managerial position.

• How and where is experience abroad mentioned in the CV?The experience abroad is only mentioned in a separate section if there were several stays. Otherwise, it can be listed as an additional qualification under “Professional experience”, “Education” or under “Language skills”  .

  Pupils, high school graduates and students use it to show that their education is comprehensive. The acquisition of soft skills such as communicative competence, self-confidence, team spirit, self-discipline, curiosity and assertiveness can be credibly conveyed to the HR manager.

  In the case of experienced professionals, this only makes sense if the stay took place in a timely manner or directly relates to the corresponding work profile of the application.

• Do vacations count as experience abroad?Basically no. The only exception is so-called educational leave.
• Should I mention a student exchange in my CV?Only for applications after graduation or for a student internship. After that, it rarely makes sense. When you’re in your mid-forties, when you apply for a position as a manager in the textile industry, it doesn’t make much sense to specify a three-week student exchange in Italy.

Examples of international experience

experience abroad	competencies
Work & Travel, Volunteering, Farm and Ranch Work, Au Pair, Summer Camps, Summer Jobs, Work Experience (Internships), Hotel Work, etc.	convey mainly practical skills according to the work areas different levels of language proficiency high degree of teamwork and self-organization
Student exchange, high school year, summer session (probationary studies), semester or study abroad	Guided expansion of school knowledge or study content high level of language skills
Language trip, language year, demi-pair	Focus on high language acquisition, enhanced by teamwork, empathy and self-confidence
academic year	Broadening and deepening of course content and excellent language acquisition
home stay	Living and experiencing the culture of the host country Good language acquisition depending on the length of stay
language course	Focus on high language acquisition and teamwork

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Tags: Work experience on CV