Top 20 Nurse CV Tips

So you think you already have the world’s best nursing CV? Just in case you might have missed something here are our tips for the 20 must-have items in any nursing CV

1. Your name

2. A phone number which you can definitely be contacted on

3. An email address which you check at least once a day

4. Your NMC Pin number

5. When you qualified as a nurse or midwife, where this was and in what nursing specialism you qualified

6. Very brief profile. Make this more about your experience and skills than personal traits and please avoid the cliche "work well in a team and on my own"

7. Total years healthcare experience

8. Total years qualified nursing experience

9. Date you started your current nursing job

10. Current job title, for instance, simply "Senior Staff Nurse Outpatients" is fine

11. Current place of work

12. Bullet point your responsibilities

13. List (separated by a comma) some of the most important ‘key-words’ (see below)

14. Be sure to list all the jobs you’ve had

15. Use bullet points throughout

16. Keep the same format

17. Then list the courses you’ve taken and completed. Keep it simple: Course name, where, when

18. Education

19. References

20. If you like, and we like... why not also add in your Desired Job Title and Location. It's really helpful for the recruiter to see what you would like

CV Key-words

We think this is a great tip. It gets you thinking about your job and your most important skills. Don’t be afraid to use nursing jargon here for activities or medication or practice.

For an RMN nurse job, for instance, we might expect to see this:PICU, Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit, ward rounds, staff management, PMVA, safe administration of medication, stabilisation, therapy, NHS Trust, qualified practitioner, and also add any additional vocational courses taken in this role

What, no Interests or Hobbies?

You'll have noticed we've not included 'Interests and hobbies'. It's a bug-bear for us. We strongly feel that unless you have a noteworthy interest or hobby it's a waste of time writing it.

This is because everyone writes: "Reading, walking, socialising with friends and going to the cinema". It says nothing different about you, or helps to enhance the picture of you that you need to paint: your nursing career profile.