Your CV objective or summary, is the opening paragraph at the top, which provides a brief overview of your skills and experience.
This part of your CV can make a huge difference in your job search, because it is the very first thing that recruiters see upon opening your CV.
If you want to get job interviews, your summary/objective needs to hold readers’ attention, and encourage them to read the rest of your CV.
I’ve compiled a list of 12 powerful CV objectives below, to help you make a big impression on employers, and land the jobs you want.
Admin CV Objective/summary
What makes this summary/objective work?
In summary This administration candidate has provided a punchy paragraph that gives recruiters an instant insight into their level of experience and expertise.
They express the types of office environment they have worked in previously, and give a summary of the tasks they excel at, such as data collection, record maintenance, and report writing.
Anybody reading this can instantly see that this candidate would be a good fit for administration roles, and understand the benefits they could bring to an office function.
Customer facing CV objective
What makes this CV summary/objective work?
Employers looking for good customer service candidates want to know several things about them before making a hiring decision:
- What types of companies they have worked for
- What customers do they deal with (large business customers? casual retail customers? etc.)
- What are their core customer service skills (transaction processing, complaint handling, product knowledge
The above candidate has summarised all of the above points well, within their objective – so that a recruiter can get a good understanding of their offering within a few seconds of opening the CV.
Accounting CV summary
What makes this CV summary/objective work?
This accounting summary does a great job of providing readers with an easy-to-digest paragraph that showcases the important facts that employers want to know.
The intro is only a few lines long, but it tells recruiters the candidate’s; experience level, industry exposure, financial specialisms (like commercial finance and forecasting) – and crucially, it gives an idea of the type results they can bring to a new employer.
Check out my video guide on how to write a CV objective/profile:
Digital CV objective
What makes this CV summary work?
This CV summary draws recruiters in by providing a nice mix of essential digital marketing skills, along an overview of the industries the candidate is familiar with, and the types of results they deliver.
The length is short and sharp to ensure that the message gets across quickly, to excite readers and ensure they stick around to read the rest of the CV.
Events management CV objective/summary
What makes this CV objective effective?
This events manager objective highlight the top level benefits of hiring this candidate, such as their level of experience within events management, their relevant qualifications, the type and size of events they work on, and companies they have worked for.
They also provide a snapshot of their most in-demand skills, such as planning, negotiation and project management – and tie them into the results they drive, like delivery of events and happy clients.
Overall, this objective is perfect method of quickly showing recruiters that this CV is worth reading.
Quick tip: Research your target roles before writing your CV, and ensure that you include the most important candidate requirements in your objective.
IT manager CV summary
What makes this summary work?
This IT CV summary gives a nice round of the candidate’s most important skills and experience within IT management, to show recruiters they have a good match within seconds of opening the CV.
They include their IT specialisms within Infrastructure and give employers the essentials they need to know; What projects can this person deliver? And how much experience do they have in doing it.
Executive assistant CV objective/summary
What makes this CV objective work?
This personal assistant CV objective is easy to digest, and quickly shows readers this person’s ability to support business leaders within an office environment.
They detail the types of business and managers they have worked for, along with key business support skills, like diary management, reception operating, and transcription.
Anybody picking up this CV can quickly see where this candidate is comfortable working, and the tasks they can carry out – a perfect first impression.
Graduate CV summary/objective
What makes this CV objective so good?
As a graduate, you are up against lots of competition, so it’s crucial to ensure as many recruiters stick to your CV as possible – and your objective (or personal statement) is the only way to achieve this.
This candidate has done a great job of summarising their most impressive achievements, such as their degree, career desires, passion for law, and the workplace skills they have already picked up.
See some more personal statements here.
HR manager CV objective
What makes this objective so effective?
This CV objective does a great job of highlighting some of the most important things that recruiters look for in an HR candidate… Things like:
- Level of experience
- Expertise within HR (Onboarding, employment law, recruitment etc.)
- Industries worked in
- HR qualifications
Senior CV objective
What makes this CV summary work well?
At senior level, it’s important to quickly show employers the bigger picture of your work – such as the types of companies you work for and the results you garner for them.
This CV summary packs a punch by detailing the candidate’s impressive length of experience, and some impressive numbers they have achieved during their career.
Marketing CV objective
What makes this CV objective/summary so good?
This marketing CV objective provides a clear summary of the candidate’s high level skills and knowledge.
They highlight the level that the candidate works at by detailing the size, scale and type of marketing campaign they work on. whilst also including key skills such as; social media, team leadership and budget management.
Nurse CV summary
What makes this objective work well?
To give recruiters an instant understanding of this candidate’s value within nursing, they have provided a brief overview of their level of experience, types of organisations they have worked for, patients they deal with, and nursing skills like, end of life care, residential nursing, recording and observing.
Any recruiter opening this CV would be easily encouraged to read on, provided the objective is well tailored to jobs being applied for.
Tips for writing a good CV objective or summary
If you want to write a powerful CV summary/objective, then stick to the following guidelines..
Do your research – Before you type one word on your CV, ensure that you have thoroughly researched the jobs you are applying for, and understand the core requirements.
Tailor your objective – Following your research, tailor you objective to include your attributes that most closely match the skills being sought by employers.
Keep it brief – Recruiters and hiring managers are busy people, who see hundreds of CVs, so you only have a short window to hook them. Keep your summary short, and you can go into more detail in your role descriptions.
Sell yourself – Your objective needs to excite recruiters, so don’t be afraid to brag and talk about why you are the best person for the job.