Moving To Australia? Here’s How To Format An Australian Resume

If you’re moving to Australia, or just looking for your first job in the country, then you might not know the best way to format your resume for Australian employers.

As you might expect, Australian employers have expectations as to what your resume should look like, what information should be included in it, and in what order.

To help you navigate this potential employment minefield, we’ve got some tips to help you properly format your resume for Australian employers.

And just so you know, in Australia resumes are also called CVs.

How To Write A Resume For The Australian Job Market

The first thing you need to know about creating a resume in Australia is that it is completely acceptable, and expected, for experienced professionals to have a resume longer than one page.

In fact, three to four pages is the norm here.

Though there are three main resume formats that employers in Australia are accustomed to seeing, the Reverse Chronological format is the one most commonly used by job seekers in the country.

The Reverse Chronological format resume has five main sections to it.

They are:

• contact information
• summary of skills and expertise (objective)
• work experience
• skills/certifications acquired
• education

As you can see, this is a pretty basic format that is also used frequently in the United States.

So, let’s break this down by looking at each section.

Contact info

As you might expect, this is just basic information on how the employer can contact you.

Though not required, it’s good if you can include your LinkedIn URL in this section.

If you’re coming from abroad, then you might be tempted to clip a photograph to your resume.

Do not do this.

Australian employers do not require photographs of job seekers with their resumes.

Summary info

This section should be treated as an “at a glance” area, meaning the potential employer should get a good overview of you as a candidate by glancing at this area.

Sell your skills and experience here, and you don’t have to leave out the outdated “objective” that you see on old school resumes.

In fact, many Australian resumes still call this section the Objectives section.

Work experience

This is the meat of your resume where you list your previous work experience in reverse chronological order.

Yes, it’s basic and boring but it must be included.

Be sure to give a two to three point bullet list under each job about the position and your responsibilities.

Skills and certifications info

If you have any special and relevant skills, then this is where to list them.

Don’t have anything to list here? That’s okay too.

Just omit this section from the resume completely.

Education info

This is where you’ll want to list your degree info and details on where you obtained the degree.

If you completed your education outside of Australia, then you should include some information about the Australian equivalency of your degree/diploma.

Things To Not Include In An Australian Resume

Now that you know how to properly format a resume for a job in Australia, you might be wondering if there are things to avoid.

The answer is yes, there are.

First, make sure that you’re not writing in American English.

Instead you need to write in Australian, or British, English because that is what they use in the country.

As previously mentioned, you should never include a photograph of yourself with your resume when you send it out to a potential employer in Australia.

In fact, no personal information at all should be included on your resume – including date of birth and marital status.

You should also avoid including any charts, graphs, or tables in your resume or cover letter.

Grades and scores should not be included in the skills or education sections, especially if they are in a format that is not native to Australia.

Instead, you can say something like “ranked 3rd out of 700” or a similar statement.

Summary

As you can see, creating an Australian resume is a lot like creating one in the United States.

A reverse chronological format is the mostly commonly used by job seekers throughout the country.

Just be sure to only include truthful information as using a fake resume in Australia is not a good idea.

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