CV GUIDE FOR CABIN CREW APPLICATION
by Lavinia Gherman, Editor in Chief
Once you decided to attend a Cabin Crew Open Day recruitment or submit your application for an Assessment Day, your Curriculum Vitae will be one of the keys to successfully pass the interview. Every time I was doing a prescreening or even during the interviews for future cabin crew, I got firstly a close look to the CV and then to the Intention Letter, as I considered the CV an overview of the candidate skills, abilities, educational and experience background. The clearer and concise was the document, the easiest was for me to see if the person attending the interview is a highly-skilled one for this job or not. Also remember that recruiters will always look for the key words like: age, punctuality, team, customer service, genuine, punctuality, ambitious, dedicated, creative, sympathetic and so on.
Style
Usually a simple, one or two pages CV, rather than an European-Pass style is easier to go through, however check the airlines or recruiting agencies requirements regarding this issue. Keep it to a maximum two pages, printed double-sided.
Photo
A passport type photo can be attached to the CV. Make sure your hair is neatly arranged (in a bum or short ponytail for ladies, proper cut for gentlemen) and you do wear business attire (shirt – not translucent for ladies and with a tie for gentlemen). There were times when I got photos of the ladies taken in malls, wearing a Japanese traditional dress, in a park or even worse, in sensual strike a pose look alike.
Header
Your name should be the first detail that would appear on your CV in a large bolded font. Other personal details like address, contact numbers, e-mail address, age, nationality and sometimes height and weight (if required) should be written clearly, without using any underlined or Italian style. Use professional e-mail addresses. (I have got several time applications with contact e-mails like pissy_missy, beautifulme, mypussycat_yourpussycat which can only make the recruiters ignore any other information you included in your application.
Profile
A short profile summary or testimony of why you want to become a cabin crew can be displayed and written right at the beginning of your CV. Use your creativity and incorporate some keywords in order to get the best description of yourself, including any information especially if you have already got aviation experience.
Previous experience
Work experience doesn’t have to be necessary related to aviation, however working before in hospitality and tourism industry, sales departments or customer service areas will bring you an extra point ahead of other candidates. Start with the most recent job to the last recent one and if you worked for more than 4-5 companies, try to keep the ones you worked for a longer period of time. Start with the job title, department and name of the company you worked for, location of the office (city or country), the period of time (the month and year you started to work and same for the time you left the job). Also write a list of at least three responsibilities, activities and tasks for each job in a concise manner, including the results you had if it’s the case. If you never had a job, try to include volunteering activities or your participations in any projects.
Education
This section should start with the highest level of education you followed, like university or any other post-secondary education. In this case there is no need to add the high school, instead write down any training or certificates related to customer service, security or first aid courses you have attended. Start with dates of starting and ending the classes, the institution name and location, degree or certificates.
Language skills
Include your mother tongue first, then the language that you are fluent in and continue with the one you know on a medium level. Never lie, as you never know when the recruiter can address you a question in any of the languages you declared as fluent.
Other skills
Job related skills should highlight some of your best qualities and features. Summarize your transferrable abilities and skills you have that can be applied for a job in aviation, keeping it to a maximum in 3-4 rows. You can include creativity, compassion, spontaneity, empathy, dedication, ready to adapt to change and innovation, team player, problem solving, taking initiative. Also mention any airline-specific abilities required, like swimming, computer literate and driving.
References
Statement like Recommendation Letters/References available upon request should be included in the footer if required by the airline. The persons you give as references should know about your application and agree on being part of it. (It happened once to get through e-mail a reference questionnaire about an ex-crew member that I worked with and was applying for an airline is Australia immediately after he informed me about his application.)
Review your CV and all the necessary documents before the interview day and keep 2-3 copies of them. If you need to submit them on the airline career page for an assessment day, review all the application fields and apply few days before the deadline. If you don’t know how to do your, we can give you a hand. Check our CV upgrade services here: https://nicoletagherman.ro/cv-upgrade/