professional CV writing service

s4ch117

s4ch117

s4ch117

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
3,051
Location
London
Can someone recommend me a CV writing service that they have used. My CV is not to bad but I was thinking of sending it to a professional company to give it the once over to see if there is anything that i can add/take away from it to make it better.

Looking for a company that specializes in the financial sector.

Google gives me: http://www.financialcvwriters.com/

anyone used them?

Thanks
 
Career Profile

A self-motivated, conscientious and focused individual with, looking to build on key skills of analysis, problem solving and business awareness. A keen interest both personally and professionally, and desire to work within the Financial industry. Possessing excellent interpersonal skills with a natural ability to communicate at all levels and a willingness to accept responsibility. Key attributes include creative and decision making qualities which ensure good teamwork and an energetic and productive working environment.

Key Skills

•An innovative problem solver with aptitude in providing logical solutions
•Proven ability to make decisions quickly and effectively
•A keen team player with a flexible approach
•Responsible for planning, managing and delivering projects on time
•Highly competent in adapting to new and challenging situations

Employment History

PROPRIETARY TRADING

NOV 2009 – PRESENT


FUTURES TRADER


Working for a start-up trading business - trading a variety of different futures contracts. Building upon past experience. The key responsibilities include:
• Executing transactions in short term interest rate contracts, Bonds (Bunds and Schatz) and Indices trading (FTSE, DOW JONES, and DAX)
• Trading with strategies of both short term and long term views as required
• Continuously monitoring markets to identify viable opportunities
• Follow macro economic trends to create trading bias
• Trading within set limits to minimize risk by using stop orders and monitoring P&L
• Use of technical analysis to forecast price movements and future trends

Personal trading during this period includes:

• Trading on UK Equity markets, with an interest on alternative investment markets

• Currently implementing and developing an automated order execution system to work on different spread betting platforms


MET TRADERS LTD

OCT 2008 – OCT 2009


GRADUATE FUTURES TRADER


The primary focus for this position is the electronic trading of futures contracts on LIFFE and EUREX exchanges. The key responsibilities include:
• Proprietary trading the company’s assets
• Executing transactions in short term interest rate contracts (STIR’s) on Euribor and Short Sterling, in order to maintain profit target whilst complying with risk limits and trading procedures
• Extensive product knowledge of futures and associated trading strategies
• High level of quantitative ability and risk analysis skills

• Producing daily P&L reports

• Monitoring market news and financial commentary

• In depth exposure to market making facilities on Euribor, Short Sterling and Eonia

• Knowledge of Trading Technologies, Stellar Trading and PATS trading platforms


LOOMIS CASH MANAGEMENT

JULY 2006 – OCT 2008


CASH PROCESSOR: PART TIME


The primary work for this position involves using electronic equipment to separate different denominations, counting and verifying contents of individual customer’s bank deposits and consolidating into one deposit. The key responsibilities include:

• Daily cash reconciliation

• Producing reports dealing with errors and transfer of money

• Working efficiently within a productive team to reach monthly targets and goals

• Verifying work carried out by team members to ensure that all tasks are accurately completed

• Consolidate multiple location customer deposits


AUTO SAFARI

JAN 2004 – FEB 2006


SALES ASSISTANT: PART TIME


Working as part of a very successful team in a car audio store selling a variety of items. Key responsibilities included:

• Customer facing role which continuously strengthened my communication skills

• Researching new technical developments available on the market

• Providing excellent service and help to a wide range of customers

• General administration; customer queries; handling of complaints

• Managing staff, organising bookings and allocating work
Education History

Queen Mary, University of London :
BSc (Hons) in Mathematics and Statistics with Finance – 2.1
SEPT 2005 – JUNE 2008


Modules studied include:

Level 1:

- Macroeconomics
- Microeconomics
- Probability
- Calculus
- Principles of Economics

Level 2:
- Financial Markets and Institutes
- Financial Accounting
- Statistical Modelling
- Actuarial Mathematics
- Fundamentals of Statistics

Level 3:
- Investment Analysis
- Financial Management
- Introduction to Mathematical Finance
- Differential Equations
- Cryptography


COOMBE 6TH FORM : 3 A-LEVEL GRADES
ICT (A) Mathematics (B) Business Studies (B)
AS-LEVEL GRADE
Government and Politics (C)

SEPT 2003 – JUNE 2005


RUTLISH SCHOOL : 10 GCSE PASSES (10 A-C GRADES)
Including Maths (B), English (B) and Science Dual Award (B)

SEPT 1999 – JUNE 2003

Professional Qualifications

Investment Management Certificate (IMC)
Currently studying IMC through 7city - Passed Unit One (UK Regulation & Markets)

Additional Technical Skills

Operating Systems
Windows (2k, NT, XP, Vista, 7) and Mac OS

Software Packages
Microsoft Office Suite: Word, Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Project, Publisher, Outlook

Interests & Hobbies

Volunteer work: An active volunteer at the local community organisation helping to organise and co-ordinate indoor and outdoor religious functions and events.

Sports: A keen cricketer, and an avid tennis and snooker player. Enthusiastic and competitive footballer, who organises games regularly.


References

Available on Request

_____________________________________________________________

Thats all the text in the CV. Obviously the layout looks a lot nicer in word. Is there anything that you guys think i should add or take away from it?
 
It's a finance CV mate,

It should be 1 page and 1 page only, end of story, no more than 1 page.

You have been a trader, AKA making money, where are the numbers in your CV? How are you going to impress anyone of your trading skills if you don't shout about your P&L ?????

Don't expand on your education, just the course title and result is enough - you have more than necessary experience for trading and THAT is what they will look at. They dont care about your uni since you have experience (they would only care if you went for the grad role).

finally, people care only what you did in the last 3 years in regards to work experience, not what you did in 1995 (unless it was something amazing). So stick to 2008+ where you experience is relevant to trading jobs (always assuming you are looking for a traders job).

sorry if ive missed sth but dont have time to read all your post. hope this is helpful

no more than 1 page, its a finance (IB or HH or PE) job, they dont spend more than 30secs per CV.
 
I'd steer clear of pro-cv writing services - they all stand out a mile...and not in a good way.

As for the content, just to echo the previous post. It's way too long. No-one cares about your Uni modules. The first bit of your "blah blah aren't I awesome" section is missing something...a word or two possibly:

A self-motivated, conscientious and focused individual with, looking
Click to expand...

"with" what?

Be careful of overselling yourself, you were a graduate futures trader for one year, I doubt you have "Extensive product knowledge of futures and associated trading strategies". It's just a year, you can't get that sort of knowledge in a year. I'm studying for my CFA, I know just how much stuff is out there that I don't know (some of D.Rumsfeld's "known unknowns"). I've been working on financial systems for over 15 years and I'd hesitate now to say that I have extensive product knowledge, especially around trading strategies. Algo trading would take about 4-5 years to get a good knowledge of...if you did nothing else...and then that would only be a handful of algo trading strategies, and there are 1000s and 1000s of them.

What was your bottom line from that graduate job? Did you end up in profit? Oct-08 to Oct-09 was a pretty rough ride, if you made a profit during that time that would be something to put down.

Leave out anything else not relevant. At a push leave in Microsoft Excel, it's pretty much a basic requirement for any sort of financial job these days.

:)
 
I'll just say that you don't want to put too much jargon in there, keep it simple and concise. Also, as said above, try to keep it to one page if at all possible, two pages absolute maximum.
 
Just some suggestions on stuff you could cut down on - take with a pinch of salt as I'm just spouting off a personal opinion on how I'd do it...

I'm assuming you'd be looking at other trading roles - if so perhaps don't bother putting too much detail in about your previous unrelated roles IMO - I doubt that anyone cares that you gave excellent customer service or were good at reconciling cash etc.. you don't need to waste 5 lines or so explaining a random joe job you had before you went into trading.

s4ch117 said:
• Currently implementing and developing an automated order execution system to work on different spread betting platforms
Click to expand...

presumably they might imply from that that you have some coding skills - I don't think you need to state that you can use windows 2k, XP etc.. and Microsoft office... you're not applying for a job as a secretary. If you're good with VBA/Excel then that is worth advertising - if you're not good with VBA/Excel then buy a copy of Walkenbach now.

Also bit of a different choice trying to automate something to work with spread betting providers as I don't believe they generally offer APIs to clients. If you've got some coding skills though perhaps you should include them on the CV.
 
and focused individual with, looking to build on key skills
Click to expand...

first line has an obvious typo/grammar mistake, cv in the bin.

CV is a marketing document, first line should be a lead in to reading the second line. You have if you are lucky 10 seconds to sell yourself, make sure that first 10 seconds of CV sell you.

Education section should read:

Queen Mary, University of London : BSc (Hons) in Mathematics and Statistics with Finance
SEPT 2005 – JUNE 2008

no one gives a **** about your modules, and even less about your GCSE's.

Too much garbled, meaningless management speak in the CV.

Dont write in the third person, it lacks self confidence.

Take a day of your time to learn fontography and layout, make the CV *snap* before they even read a word.

"Career Profile

A self-motivated, conscientious and focused individual with, looking to build on key skills of analysis, problem solving and business awareness. A keen interest both personally and professionally, and desire to work within the Financial industry. Possessing excellent interpersonal skills with a natural ability to communicate at all levels and a willingness to accept responsibility. Key attributes include creative and decision making qualities which ensure good teamwork and an energetic and productive working environment. "
Click to expand...

I am a highly motivated and positive young man with the desire to work in the highly charged and challenging trading environment. I'm confident I can bring my exceptional analytical and problem solving skills to the team and bring a well honed creative & decisive mind. I'm looking forward to working in a highly charged environment and studying the trade.

First 2 sentences, I have BIG balls. 3rd sentence. You are the boss. Don't use wishy washy language, make it strong. The whole point is to show you are not a gray average jobseeker, but not too much scare them off.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom