Faculty of Engineering

GSOE9011 Engineering
PGCW Research Skills
A03 CV Development (10%)
Individual Task | Due: Week 6 – Friday, 22 Mar 2024, 23:55/11:55pm

Overview and motivation

Preparing a strong Curriculum Vitae (CV) or Resume showcasing research and technical skills is a
core competency required to enter and advance in the academic and industrial workforce in an
engineering and/or research role. A CV is often the first impression that an employer receives from
a candidate when being considered for a position. A poorly assembled CV may eliminate
candidates from consideration in initial job selection processes. Producing an effective CV and
presenting research skills can be challenging, particularly for graduates entering the workforce in
their early career phase. This assessment task is designed to help students consolidate their
research and technical experience into a document that effectively communicates their capabilities
and skills to a future employer; thereby enhancing their career-readiness and future employability.

Learning outcomes
Upon successful completion of this task, you will have:
 identified the elements required for an effective engineering and/or research CV and
implemented all elements for the CV tailored towards an industry or academic role;
 analysed an active job listing to extract key details communicating the needs of the employer;
 presented your research and technical skills, professional experience and achievements
effectively and succinctly for the targeted job listing;
 enhanced your understanding of future engineering/research career prospects in industry and
academia that align with your skills and experience.

Format
As an individual, select an online job advertisement for an engineering and/or research industry
or academic role relevant to your skills and career goals. Complete the ‘A03 CV Development -
Job Listing Attachment’ document available on Moodle to summarise the details of the job
advertisement. This document is designed to help you identify and analyse the key aspects of the
advertised position and is also used to assess the suitability of your CV for the job listing.
Develop a CV to apply for the position. The CV must include:
 A heading (including your name and current position)
 Contact details (email address, phone number and address)
 Summary statement (highlighting your top skills/experiences relevant to the role)
 Education history
 Experience (detailed summary of industry/research/work experience)
 Achievements/Awards
Your CV may also include (but is not limited to):
 Technical Skills

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GSOE9011 Engineering PGCW Research Skills A03 CV Development

 Extra-curricular Activities
 Publications
 Professional Memberships
 Referees

Note: For this assessment, the terms ‘Curriculum Vitae’ and ‘Resume’ are used synonymously and are
referred to as ‘CV’. You may choose to develop either an extended or concise version of your ‘CV’
depending on whether it is appropriate for your targeted job listing.

Advice
There are many resources available online to help you develop your CV, including example CVs
and academic profiles available on the Moodle course page, and info sheets provided by
Engineers Australia. Some helpful advice on the key sections of your CV is provided below.
Summary Statement
The summary statement is designed to provide the employer with a brief outline of your key
strengths and experiences and helps you stand out from the other applicants. This section should
only be a few sentences long and should highlight the main elements of your CV, much like an
executive summary. Mention your most relevant experiences, impressive qualifications, career
highlights, achievements, technical specialties etc. Summary statements are often followed by a
list of key skills linked to your experiences that you want to showcase to the employer. This may
include leadership, time management, project management skills, etc.
Experience
This section of your CV highlights the outcomes and skills obtained from your previous
engineering or research roles and experiences. Often this can be a dealbreaker for employers
comparing multiple candidates that have met the fundamental requirements for the role.
The style of writing in this section of your CV is important. This should not be a general recount of
your activities, but rather a strategic and carefully worded summary of the technical role that
showcases your capabilities for the job. A useful technique to ensure this section is impactful is to
use action statements. These statements include action verbs to describe your role in an activity
and include the outcome or purpose of that activity. Be specific and quantify where possible.
For example: Programmed and installed a data acquisition unit to enable automatic data collection
during plant operation, thereby reducing the extrusion time by 10 %.
Learn more about the use of action statements here.
Presentation and Layout
Employers look over CVs quickly and capture key details to assess your suitability for the role and
compare you to other candidates. It is thus important that your CV looks professional and is easy
to follow. Some useful tips are provided below.
 Ensure that the elements of your CV are clearly distinguished and have headings.
 Format each section of the CV consistently e.g., if you used bold size 12 for a heading then
ensure all headings are the same style.
 Use an appropriate font e.g., Arial, Times New Roman, Cambria and Calibri.
 Proof-read your CV to ensure there are no spelling or grammatical mistakes.

Submission
Submit by the due date and time a PDF copy of your CV with job listing attachment appended to
CV (as a single PDF file) through the submission tool on Moodle (this will be made available
closer to the due date). Note that computer-based submission offers no discretion, even one
second. If you feel you will be making a late submission, you need to notify the Course
Coordinator. You will need to provide a valid reason for lateness or you will incur penalties
(20% per day or part thereof) for late submission.

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Assessment Criteria
The following marking rubric has been compiled based on several published rubrics to assess CVs and aligns with the guidelines provided by
UNSW Careers and Employment. The CV is not assessed on the level of professional experience held by the student, but by the format and
content of the CV assessed using the rubric below.

Criteria Incompetent Partly Competent Competent Mastery

(<40%)
Heading, Contact No heading or contact details
Details (5 marks) provided.
Summary No summary statement provided,
Statement (15 or statement offers no valuable
marks) information about the candidate.
Education (5 No education history provided, or 3
marks) or more of the elements described
for the top band is missing
Experience (30 Experience listing is missing, or
marks) listing does not provide any useful
details on the candidate’s
professional experience.
(40% to 60%)
3-4 elements of the heading are
missing.
Summary statement is included;
however, the statement lacks
impact and does not effectively
summarise key strengths and
experience.
2 of the elements described for the
top band is missing.
At least one experience listing is
provided, however, the role
description is mostly superficial
and the specific contribution of the
candidate in the role is unclear.
Action statements are not used
consistently. The listing is missing
one or more of the following
details: name of organisation,
location, position title, date. Verb
tenses are inconsistent.
(60% to 80%)
1 or 2 elements of the heading are
missing.
Good summary statement that
highlights key skills and experience
of the candidate.
1 of the elements described for the
top band is missing.
At least one experience listing is
provided. Candidate attempts to
use action statements to describe
key roles, however, role
descriptions are not specific or do
not clearly convey candidate’s
contribution and skills. The listing
identifies all of the following details:
name of organisation, location,
position title, date. Verb tenses are
consistent.
(80% to 100%)
Heading stands out through use of
font, style and/or separator and
contains full name. Address
including city and post code,
contact number, and professional
email address is provided.
Impactful summary statement that
introduces the candidate and
highlights experience relevant to
the advertised role. Includes key
skills relevant to the role.
Includes tertiary education and
other relevant educational
qualifications. The official name of
the degree including major, the
name of the institution and its
location and date
completed/expected to be
completed. If grades are
mentioned, GPA is above 3.0/
WAM above 65.
Includes at least two previous
experience descriptions with key
roles listed in bullet points. Roles
are described using action
statements that specifically
identifies the contribution of the
candidate, and the purpose and/or
outcome of the contribution.
Contribution is quantified where
appropriate. Roles are organised
by relevance with the most

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Presentation, More than 5 of the elements
Organisation and required for the top band are
Layout (20 marks) missing/partially completed.
Spelling and 5 or more spelling or grammatical
Grammar (10 mistakes and/or some of the
marks) content is confusing or
abbreviations are used
unnecessarily or there are errors
on the page.
Suitability to job No job listing attached, or CV is not
listing (15 marks) appropriate for job listing; it does
not reflect any of the skills or
experiences required for the role.
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3 or 4 of the elements described
for the top band are
missing/partially completed.
3 or 4 spelling or grammatical
mistakes.
Job listing is attached but CV is
mostly generic. The basic
education and/or experience
and/or skills requirements for the
position are met.
A03 CV Development
1 or 2 of the elements described
for the top band are
missing/partially completed.
1 or 2 spelling or grammatical
mistakes and personal pronouns
are not used.
Job listing is attached and
completed. There is evidence that
the CV has been tailored to the job
listing in the summary statement.
The requirements of the role are
met in the education, previous
experience and skills description.
relevant mentioned first.
The experience listings identify the
name of organisation, location,
position title and date. Verb tense
is consistent and appropriate.
Two-page limit is followed if the
document is presented as a
concise resume. Pages do not
have large unused space, nor are
they overcrowded. Page margins
are balanced. Appropriate font and
font size is used. All writing styles
(i.e., italics, bold, underline, etc)
are used consistently across the
document. No unnecessary or
unprofessional graphics are used.
All elements of the document are
clearly distinguished, easy to follow
and in the appropriate order.
Reverse chronological order by
date is used when listing. Key
words and ideas are highlighted
using font styles and bullet points
to draw attention to candidate’s
strengths. Overall document is
visually appealing.
Free of spelling and grammatical
mistakes. Personal pronouns are
not used. Abbreviations are not
used unless necessary and
appropriately communicated.
Job listing is attached and
completed thoroughly. It is evident
from the profile summary that the
CV is targeted to the job listing.
The CV addresses all key
requirements needed for the role.
The CV presents a strong case for
the candidate’s suitability for the
advertised position.