CV & Personal Statement Help
CVs are one of the few documents where the rules genuinely differ by country, and where following the wrong country's convention gets you filtered out before a human reads it.
Short answer
What is cv & personal statement help?
A UK CV is two pages maximum, has no photograph, no date of birth and no marital status, and leads with a four-line personal profile followed by experience in reverse chronological order with quantified achievements. This differs from a US resume (one page) and from the EU-style CV that does include a photo.
What you get
Included in every engagement
- Country-correct format — UK CV, US resume, Canadian and Australian conventions all differ
- Achievement rewriting: from duty statements to quantified outcomes
- ATS-safe formatting so parsers actually read your file
- University personal statement structure for UCAS and postgraduate applications
- Character and academic reference letter structure
- Interview preparation mapped to the role specification
How it works
The process
Target
One CV per role type. A generic CV is a weak CV.
Quantify
Every bullet gets a number, a scale or an outcome.
Format
Country convention plus ATS parsing safety.
Review
A recruiter-perspective read of the first six seconds.
Frequently asked questions
How long should a UK CV be?
Two pages for most roles. One page for early-career applicants with limited experience. Academic CVs are the exception and can run much longer.
Should I put a photo on my CV?
Not in the UK, US, Canada, Australia or New Zealand — it invites discrimination claims and many employers discard CVs with photos. Photos are conventional in much of continental Europe.
How do I write a character reference?
State your relationship to the person and how long you have known them, give two or three specific evidenced examples of the relevant quality, state your recommendation plainly, and provide contact details. Keep it to one page.
Localised
CV & statements by country
- CV & statements in AustraliaAustralian CVs run longer than UK ones — three to four pages is normal — and often include referee details.
- CV & statements in United KingdomThe UK CV is two pages, no photo, with a short personal profile at the top.
- CV & statements in New ZealandNZ CVs follow the Australian convention closely, with referees commonly listed.
- CV & statements in CanadaCanadian resumes follow US convention but avoid any personal information that could enable discrimination.
- CV & statements in United StatesThe US resume is one page for most candidates, achievement-led, with no personal details.
By country
CV & statements in the five markets
Same teaching, different rules. Each market sets its own referencing conventions and has its own regulator, and the law on what a service may provide is not the same in all five.
| Country | What is different there | Common referencing | Integrity regulator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Australia | Australian CVs run longer than UK ones — three to four pages is normal — and often include referee details. | APA 7, Harvard (AGPS) | TEQSA — Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency |
| United Kingdom | The UK CV is two pages, no photo, with a short personal profile at the top. | Harvard (Cite Them Right), OSCOLA | OfS — Office for Students · QAA academic integrity charter |
| New Zealand | NZ CVs follow the Australian convention closely, with referees commonly listed. | APA 7, Harvard | NZQA · Universities New Zealand |
| Canada | Canadian resumes follow US convention but avoid any personal information that could enable discrimination. | APA 7, MLA 9 | Institution-level academic integrity offices (no federal statute) |
| United States | The US resume is one page for most candidates, achievement-led, with no personal details. | APA 7, MLA 9 | ICAI — International Center for Academic Integrity · institutional honor codes |