What extras do you put on your CV

[Rantor]

Hi
I was just wondering what extras do you think you need to make you cv stand out.

Do you go out of your way to get certified and keep your certifications up to date?
Someone else mentioned training, whitepapers? Do you do things like post articles to dev sites or list all your training courses.

how much study do people do at home? I know just learning java isnt enough anymore Spring and Hibernate are on most jobs.

How about mentioning beta sw? MS has a pile of new stuff like Expression/silverlight which havent been released but I'm looking into. Would you put them on your CV?

And how much influence would saying that you study certain areas but dont have much commercial experince in them help..I've noticed WPF and Ruby are slowly appearing in job ads here.

The main problem is that if you mention anything on your cv that stupid iProfile says you have experience in it. I did VC++ 10 years ago and i still get calls on it. I removed it from the last version of my CV as it had fallen onto page 4 and i only ever send 3 pages.

How many pages is the average CV?

Cheers
BC

When I read the title it conjured up and entirely different type fo "extra service" - maybe thats what WPF is?

A "Ruby" - How very dare you.....

I put Certifications on there but interestingly no-one has ever, ever verified them even in the (rare) cases when they are using it as a basic filter for a role.

[Xenophon]

part time beaver trainer

Salsa dancer (beginner)

[Zippy]

Doesn't really matter. Judging by the majority of conversations I've had with recruiters they don't read the damn thing anyway.

[wendigo100]

Only put things on your CV you want calls about - if you did VC++ ten years ago but have no interest in doing it now change it to read just "software development" or similar for that role. Should stop the keyword database search monkeys.

I had "real time embedded" on mine from a role I did over 15 odd years ago and I still get calls about it... doh!

Sound advice, but you should tune your CV for each job you go for.

For example, if you go for a job as a java developer that says some VC++ is desirable, add a sentence that you have used it in the past.

[swamp]

Notepad.

[angusglover]

3ft 1" and hung like a baby carrot.

Never fails to get my CV past the HR birds.

Can't imagine why!!!!

[NoddY]

part time beaver trainer

Only part time?

[kramer]

Only part time?

can't get enough beaver to participate...

[alreadypacked]

can't get enough beaver...???

The Brazilians took them all !

[OwlHoot]

If in doubt, get it reviewed by someone who does it for a living...(not me) but I know a man who does...

Tried that, and it was a complete waste of time and money (only about £30 though). The lady couldn't seem to grasp the concept of an IT contractor not having career ambitions to speak of and all her comments were geared towards bringing my character out and all that permie career aspirations guff.

If anyone knows a good _contractor_ CV reviewing and reworking service I'm sure some people here would be interested (I didn't get any useful feedback when I asked here a few months ago, so I won't hold my breath).