The difference between CV & Resume

CV Resume:  What is the difference between them?

The main different between CV and Resume will be discussed here and you are going to know which one should be used in which situation in English language and you will learn not to be confused on knowing which one is correct for you, CV or Resume.

In the first glance we can understand that British people mostly use CV, and Americans use Resume, while Australian people use both of them. It looks very strange, but there are a few differences between the two types of application documents and this article will show you your queries and it is trying to tell you where in the world you are likely to use which document.

CV:
CV (Curriculum Vitae) is a Latin phrase which means course of life. It is an in-depth document that can be in two or more pages which contains details about your achievements, your education, accomplishments like publications, awards, honors, etc. In other words a CV is a biography about your education, career, and success points of your professional life.

It must be set in a chronological way and which should be easy to get an overview of your full working career. It should be static and doesn’t change for different positions while any changes should be in the cover letter.

Resume:
Resume or Résumé, is a concise document typically in one page (and no more than 2 pages) and it is intended not to dwell the reader on your document for very long time. The goal of a resume is to make an individual stand out from the competition. It doesn’t need to cover your whole career, nor to be to be ordered chronologically, and it is a highly customizable document. The job seeker should adapt the resume to every position they apply for. It is in up to your interest to change the resume from one job application to another.

Differences:
As you can see in the above explanations, there are three major differences between CV and Resume:

• length
• purpose
• layout

• Resume is a brief summary of your skills and experience in 1 or 2 pages, but a CV is more detailed and can be arranged in two pages or more.
• Resume can be prepared to any position whereas the CV is not so and any changes should be in the cover letter.
• CV has a clear chronological order and it usually arranged in a listing style which contains your whole career whereas Resume’s information can be shuffled around to best suit the applicant.

CV	Resume
long	short
covering entire career	no particular format rule
static	highly customizable

In a very brief explanation we can say that the main difference between Resume and CV is that CV is intended to be a full record of your career history while Resume is a brief, targeted list of skills and achievements.

Resume and CV’s usage around the world:

People in the US and Canada mostly prefer to use Resume instead of CV, while CV is used in all contexts in the UK, Ireland and New Zealand instead of Resume. CV is mostly used in mainland Europe and even there is a European Union CV format to be used for applying any jobs for job seekers. In Germany CV is more commonly known as a Lebenslauf (true to the Latin origins) while in Australia, India and South Africa, both Resume and CV are used interchangeably. Resume is used more for jobs in the private sector and CV is more commonplace when applying for public service positions.

Source: the undercover recruiter

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