Career Chronicle: Is CV really that important??! When Ratan Tata had to type a CV to get a job at Tata Group.

Hello friends, first thing first, this is my humble try at newsletter and thus requires your honest feedback and suggestions. Please read to the end.

Recently I came across a story about Mr. Ratan Tata submiting CV to JRD Tata to land a job at the iconic Tata Group.?

So the gist of the story goes like this

"Upon hearing of Tata's potential employment with IBM, JRD intervened, making it clear that he saw a different path for the young Ratan in India. “He called me one day and he said you can’t be here in India and working for IBM," recalls Ratan Tata. In response, using an electric typewriter in the IBM office, he promptly put together a resume and handed it over.

This seemingly small act of creating a resume led to Tata's initial position at Tata Industries in 1962"

( If you want to know more detail about this story link is in 1st comment)

Well this saw the seed for this newsletter

And to answer the question in the title: Yes surprisingly yes, a CV is still that important all these years later.

The recruitment has gone through major changes over the years.

There are fewer job fairs now and more campus placement drives. Many millennials including me, don't know what exactly a cover letter is and how it helps.

Physical interviews have become thing of past. Panel size has gone down, but the rounds of interviews have gone up.

The interview has no longer remained the only criterion for selection but is just a cog in an elaborate scheme of the selection process including psychometric tests, assessment centers, exploration calls, HR round and so on......

So everything has changed except our best friend - CV or Resume or Biodata. Yes, the name has gone through some changes obviously.

But it is still the best and in most cases only way to get our profile in the most detailed way to the ubiquitous recruiter.

Many attempts have been made in the recent past to give it a new form - LinkedIn has its own version of a CV that you can make from your profile. IIMjobs has tried to push a Video? CV. None has come close to the age-old RESUME yet. Hack the format has hardly changed.

What makes CV this time-tested device that is still mainstream and cannot be done away with for any recruitment process?

-It offers a bird' eye view of the entire career

-at the same time it provides all the details about the career

-It highlights achievements

-It shows career transition

-It also gives you a chance to show your personal interests

-Shows your skills.

So how to write a "perfect" (Winning in LinkedIn lingo) CV?

Well, no tricks here. Just make sure all points mentioned above are covered in your CV.

(I will write a detailed newsletter on CV writing guidelines, you can also visit CareerUnique or my profile Pritesh Patel for various interesting posts on the topic)

I like to end the newsletter with an interesting life journey of the CV itself. Enjoy.

Do let me know your thoughts in the comments and need I to say do share this if you like.

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