Kickstart your career: CV and cover letter
With our career advisor, Dr. Sylvie Fišerová, we have written a two-part mini-series of articles for you that will help you gain your first work experience. In the first part, you will learn how to put together an attractive CV and what goes into a motivation letter.
You can’t do without a CV and a motivation letter. Prepare your CV interesting enough that it leads to a personal meeting, where you can then better convince the employer of your qualities. Everyone had to start somewhere and it’s a good idea to make use of all the experience from school internships, short-term projects, part-time jobs and volunteering. All this shows what you are able to do and can be just as valuable as work experience.
If you don’t have any experience, it might be good to think about volunteering opportunities – for example, you can participate in organizing events of student clubs or in the Dobrocentrum of Charles University. Just a few activities and you’ll have bonus points for your CV. Don’t forget about internships too – some companies don’t advertise paid internships, but you can arrange a short-term unpaid internship, which can lead to subsequent paid cooperation or at least experience that you can present when looking for another job. A trip abroad with the Erasmus+ program or Erasmus+ practical internships can also work well.
Employers want up-to-date and clear CVs. Always imagine that they will receive fifty CVs for one position and they have limited time to read them. Therefore, your CV should be brief, concise and graphically clear. Do not use any cute fonts, so that it is easy for HR professionals to read, and take into account someone printing your CV. Also be careful about the name of the attachment you attach to the email, for example CV_first_last_name_2025 in pdf format is suitable.
At the beginning of your career, one page is enough, two pages is the maximum. Always tailor your CV for a specific offer and position. Of course, provide truthful information, but it is possible to describe some experiences more and others less depending on what is relevant to the given job offer. The data is ordered from the most recent to the oldest, both for work experience and studies. At the beginning of your career, the education section usually comes before work experience, after several years of experience you can reverse it. Watch out for typos and grammatical errors – you can ruin your chances. This is quite common, so let someone else proofread your CV.
And what about a photo? It depends on you, but if you add a photo to your CV, it should be appropriate for the position and CV – a cutout from a photo from a vacation is not suitable. It is common to include 3-4 sentences of summary at the beginning of a CV, a brief description of yourself. It is good to explain gaps in your CV and the combination of activities, for example, two temporary jobs at the same time or a year’s stay abroad. You can also add a link to your portfolio and LinkedIn. You can have more detailed roles for given positions on LinkedIn.
CV templates can also help you, such as zivotopisy.cz or Canva. Get inspired by the templates, but always edit your CV in your own way, it is your chance to impress.
If the employer mentions it in the advertisement, it is also a good idea to send a motivation letter. Try to write a letter tailored to the company and position – do not send a unified motivation letter, the HR person will usually recognize it and it has zero effect. Write positively and confidently, but don’t be “overly motivated”. State what interested you about the position and why it interested you and what previous experience you would use for the position. If you consult with AI, fine, but take it only as inspiration. The HR person will recognize a motivation letter written by a chatbot and it will definitely not give you any plus points.
In the next part, we will look at where to look for job offers and how to use both your contacts and the services that the faculty and university offer to students for free. Don’t forget that you can also book a consultation with our career counseling advisor. If you only need to consult your CV, contact sylvie.fiserova@fsv.cuni.cz