Spelling and grammar errors on CVs

Barry Barry

Fishooks12 wrote: »

That should actually be:

Examples being, candidates using i instead of I

Don't be so anal in future if you yourself are prone to a grammatical error or two.

haha, anal..

Neewbie_noob

Red About Town wrote: »

I spent most of a last week at work interviewing a large number of candidates for new roles my company were advertising. The roles are junior positions and most of the applicants were in their early 20's. The candidates had to send in a CV and answer an online questionnaire prior the interview.

The one thing that stood out to me was how many very basic spelling and grammar mistakes were made by the vast majority of applicants on their CVs and applications. Examples being candidates using i instead of I, spelling words like 'college' wrong and not using full stops.

The majority of the candidates also had a third level education/qualification.

Why has basic English spelling and grammar become so poor among today's youth? Is there as much focus on it in school as there used to be? Do young people think it even matters any more?

Their not that bad, I mean im in collage meself

dizzywizlw

srsly78 wrote: »

Sure why bother applying at all? Live a comfortable life on the dole!

I'm currently working on a temporary contract (thanks be to jahsus I found something) and will never go on the dole, rather go back to selling burgers, no shame in honest work if you can get it. My point is that if employers think that they will get the best and brightest through a CV they are sorely mistaken, it's a factor, but no the primary one. It's a two way street and the level of effort applicants such as myself put in just to get a chance to show our skills dwarfs the effort employers actually put in in picking who to attend interview.

steve9859

dizzywizlw wrote: »

I'm currently working on a temporary contract (thanks be to jahsus I found something) and will never go on the dole, rather go back to selling burgers, no shame in honest work if you can get it. My point is that if employers think that they will get the best and brightest through a CV they are sorely mistaken, it's a factor, but no the primary one. It's a two way street and the level of effort applicants such as myself put in just to get a chance to show our skills dwarfs the effort employers actually put in in picking who to attend interview.

I'm not looking to identify the best and brightest from a CV. Leaving any required skills aside, which will vary from job to job, I'm looking for people who care enough, and respect the job enough to make sure there aren't any basic mistakes in their CV.

I am not sure what you expect employers to do. I had around 50 CVs to go through a couple of weeks ago, and I don't have unlimited time. There has to be some kind of filter

Queen-Mise

Does it bother you (the people who read the CVs) whether words that are ended with a 'sion' or spelled with the 'zion', e.g. rationalisation or rationalization. The 'z' is typically an American spelling - I use them interchangeably.

Is that one of the things that would annoy you on a CV?

steve9859

Queen-Mise wrote: »

Does it bother you (the people who read the CVs) whether words that are ended with a 'sion' or spelled with the 'zion', e.g. rationalisation or rationalization. The 'z' is typically an American spelling - I use them interchangeably.

Is that one of the things that would annoy you on a CV?

Something like that wouldn't specifically bother me. That is taking the grammar thing to an extreme. It certainly would not change it from a 'yes' to a 'no' for interview

But what I would say is that the impression that the cv gives is important. That isn't something I can necessarily put my finger on. It is stuff like how it flows, how easy it is to read etc. Stuff that might just leave me with a better overall impression without being something I can pin down. And I would suggest that inconsistent use of zion and sion might fall into that category

Queen-Mise

steve9859 wrote: »

Something like that wouldn't specifically bother me. That is taking the grammar thing to an extreme. It certainly would not change it from a 'yes' to a 'no' for interview

But what I would say is that the impression that the cv gives is important. That isn't something I can necessarily put my finger on. It is stuff like how it flows, how easy it is to read etc. Stuff that might just leave me with a better overall impression without being something I can pin down. And I would suggest that inconsistent use of zion and sion might fall into that category

Very true - when writing I always write 'sion', but the spell checkers really don't like words being spelled that way. So I have a choice of adding every word individually, seeing red underlined words constantly or spelling with a 'z'.

Even spell checkers set to GB English don't like that, and definitely not online ones.

Qualitymark

srsly78 wrote: »

Sure why bother applying at all? Live a comfortable life on the dole!

Have you ever been on the dole? Not trying to start a row, just wondering.

The dole isn't actually enough to live on. I know this will probably get lots of responses from people who think they know better, but I'll just stick 'em on the Ignore list; they have no clue as to the reality.

I've been poor and I've been doing fine, and doing fine is better.

Queen-Mise wrote: »

Very true - when writing I always write 'sion', but the spell checkers really don't like words being spelled that way. So I have a choice of adding every word individually, seeing red underlined words constantly or spelling with a 'z'.

Even spell checkers set to GB English don't like that, and definitely not online ones.

Slán? You can add words to a spell checker, and you can also add languages.

By the way, the z/s thing isn't American/British or American/European English; classically, words derived from Greek use 'z' and from Latin use 's', though they were standardised when the educational level of newspaper sub-editors declined.

Wibbs

It also depends on the nature of the job. Cubicle jockey, clerical work, dealing with the public by written communications et al, then yep I'd be very careful on checking the quality of grammar and spelling in a CV. It's part and parcel of their job. Car mechanic, carpenter, builder, graphic designer, truck driver, entrepreneur, product designers and a host of other careers significantly less so.

As for using the spelling the sea that separates Europe from Africa as a yardstick? Pffft. I'd file that under "Arse" for the most part and pretentious arse with it. I knew a chap who was/is a very talented cabinet maker. Sells his stuff all over the world to rich feckers and he'd furrow his brow if you asked him the capital city of Germany and I'd lay good money down he'd be fooked trying to spell "mediterranean". I can think of quite the number of talented and successful men and women that would be the same. Also they're less likely to be dry shítes with it. As opposed to "Ohhhh you conjugated that incorrectly" which I have found tends to be a good indicator of terminally beige people, people you really don't want to get stuck in the corner of a party with.

That said "I seen" does my head in so colour me slightly beige too.

Qualitymark

Wibbs wrote: »

It also depends on the nature of the job. Cubicle jockey, clerical work, dealing with the public by written communications et al, then yep I'd be very careful on checking the quality of grammar and spelling in a CV. It's part and parcel of their job. Car mechanic, carpenter, builder, graphic designer, truck driver, entrepreneur, product designers and a host of other careers significantly less so.

Yes, there's no need to demand that everyone, in every trade, should be required to have the same academic talents. I've known wonderfully talented sculptors who regarded marmalade as a tough word to spell.

But as for the Mediterranean, knowing how it's spelled is kind of a good guide: if you split it up, it's the sea that's in the middle (Medi) of land (terra). Knowing that is a guide to a limber mind.

But not the only guide; Yeats wouldn't have got a job in that tech support cubicle.

poeticseraphim

Clarehobo wrote: »

Dyslexia has nothing to do with grammar - it impacts a person's ability to read.

My little brother is dyslexic and he is impeccable when it comes to spelling.

It is a broad term covering many learning difficulties ( i am obviously no expert).
It is generally thought of as a reading developmental disorder.
I think there are different degrees and types of dyslexia. Some people have short term auditory memory problems or even problems rhyming.

I think most people accept three subtypes auditory, visual and attentional.

Most people seem to organize a career around it. I have a friend who is dyslexic and became a photographer.

Adult dyslexics can read with good comprehension, but they tend to read more slowly than non-dyslexics and perform more poorly at spelling and nonsense word reading, a measure of phonological awareness. Dyslexia and IQ are not interrelated as a result of cognition developing independently.

Dyslexia has no baring on IQ.

It was actually something mentioned earlier in the thread itself that made me think about it. Someone mentioned Yeats as a famous 'bad speller'....and this was what made me think about it in the first place..Yeats was dyslexic and obviously brilliant. So was Agatha Christie. Infact she said " Writing and spelling were always terribly difficult for me. My letters were without originality. I was . . . an extraordinarily bad speller and have remained so until this day. ”

Da Vinci was also dyslexic. Infact Leonardo's spelling is considered quite erratic and strange.He had trouble learning to read and write and his spelling was erratic in adulthood. But he was a genius.

Some very intelligent people are bad at spelling and some very stupid people are convinced of it's importance as a benchmark of some bastion of intelligence.


You may say it is about taking are with an 'official' C.V ...but the implication is there otherwise why would it matter on your C.V?


I am not saying i myself would submit a C.V with mistakes. I hope i would not.

By the way mistakes happen even after much proof reading...I have a friend who has one on a degree from Uni. They gave him a replacement but he has the incorrect one framed.


Einstein was a bad speller....dyslexia....genius...

Qualitymark

I completely agree with poeticseraphim.

But I think we're talking at cross-purposes.

Someone who knows s/he's dyslexic (in its various forms) will probably get a professional to check and correct and tidy up the CV.

What the OP was talking about was sheer laziness - CVs that are sloppily presented, with careless spellings giving the appearance of stupidity.

poeticseraphim

Actually for much of history spelling was entirely uniform now that i think of it.

Shakespeare spelled his own name differently on different official documents and no one seems to have thought any worse of him for it.

I was reading Mozarts letters to his wife Constanze...or Conztanze i can't remember....and his spelling is all over the place.

Much of the aristocracy at the time had bad spelling...

It has been very un-uniform until recent history i think.

http://englishspellingproblems.co.uk/html/history.html

Infact it seems we owe much of the English langauge to bad spelling.:-)

It was the invention of the dictionary that made it 'LAW'.

No on thought before then that it mattered at all....so HA YOU HAE BEEN BRAINWASHED INTO BUYING DICTIONARIES HAHAHAH


And by the way Virginia Woolfe actually thought dictionaries killed vocabulary in people as langauge and linguistics did not work like that. She lamented English becomig the tool of pen pushers and being limited to their rules ...as do I.

"Perhaps then one reason why we have no great poet, novelist or critic writing today is that we refuse to allow words their liberty. We pin them down to one meaning, their useful meaning, the meaning which makes us catch the train, the meaning which makes us pass the examination…"

This is what Virgina Woolfe had to say ...IN HER OWN VOICE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8czs8v6PuI


The un-uniformed rules of previous ages actually gave people a bigger vocabulary

Words do not live in dictionaries but in the mind....how do they live in the mind ? Strangely..

That recording of Virginia Woolfe is well worth listening to.

steve9859

poeticseraphim wrote: »

Actually for much of history spelling was entirely uniform now that i think of it.

Shakespeare spelled his own name differently on different official documents and no one seems to have thought any worse of him for it.

I was reading Mozarts letters to his wife Constanze...or Conztanze i can't remember....and his spelling is all over the place.

Much of the aristocracy at the time had bad spelling...

It has been very un-uniform until recent history i think.

http://englishspellingproblems.co.uk/html/history.html

Infact it seems we owe much of the English langauge to bad spelling.:-)

It was the invention of the dictionary that made it 'LAW'.

No on thought before then that it mattered at all....so HA YOU HAE BEEN BRAINWASHED INTO BUYING DICTIONARIES HAHAHAH


And by the way Virginia Woolfe actually thought dictionaries killed vocabulary in people as langauge and linguistics did not work like that. She lamented English becomig the tool of pen pushers and being limited to their rules ...as do I.





This is what Virgina Woolfe had to say ...IN HER OWN VOICE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8czs8v6PuI


The un-uniformed rules of previous ages actually gave people a bigger vocabulary



That recording of Virginia Woolfe is well worth listening to.

Try telling all that to the HR department that's just binned your CV because of the 'alternative' spelling....

2 stroke

My boss placed an employment add which listed a mobile phone number for replies. This was the first reply. "I 1nt 2 aply 4 d jb"

Qualitymark

steve9859 wrote: »

Try telling all that to the HR department that's just binned your CV because of the 'alternative' spelling....

And they probably should bin it. It's not difficult to get someone superliterate to read your CV, and make sure it's acceptable. Not every bad speller is Yeats or Da Vinci.

steve9859

2 stroke wrote: »

My boss placed an employment add which listed a mobile phone number for replies. This was the first reply. "I 1nt 2 aply 4 d jb"

Ha! Probably will go in and tell social welfare that he applied for a job this week...

The King of Moo

poeticseraphim wrote: »

Actually for much of history spelling was entirely uniform now that i think of it.

Shakespeare spelled his own name differently on different official documents and no one seems to have thought any worse of him for it.

I was reading Mozarts letters to his wife Constanze...or Conztanze i can't remember....and his spelling is all over the place.

Much of the aristocracy at the time had bad spelling...

It has been very un-uniform until recent history i think.

http://englishspellingproblems.co.uk/html/history.html

Infact it seems we owe much of the English langauge to bad spelling.:-)

It was the invention of the dictionary that made it 'LAW'.

No on thought before then that it mattered at all....so HA YOU HAE BEEN BRAINWASHED INTO BUYING DICTIONARIES HAHAHAH


And by the way Virginia Woolfe actually thought dictionaries killed vocabulary in people as langauge and linguistics did not work like that. She lamented English becomig the tool of pen pushers and being limited to their rules ...as do I.





This is what Virgina Woolfe had to say ...IN HER OWN VOICE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8czs8v6PuI


The un-uniformed rules of previous ages actually gave people a bigger vocabulary



That recording of Virginia Woolfe is well worth listening to.

That doesn't help your argument.

Just because spelling wasn't generally as standardised in the past doesn't mean
that it's not important at all. We did manage to get by, but it's generally much easier to communicate clearly with proper spelling to avoid any ambiguity or lack of flow to one's writing.

poeticseraphim

Qualitymark wrote: »

I completely agree with poeticseraphim.

But I think we're talking at cross-purposes.

Someone who knows s/he's dyslexic (in its various forms) will probably get a professional to check and correct and tidy up the CV.

What the OP was talking about was sheer laziness - CVs that are sloppily presented, with careless spellings giving the appearance of stupidity.

But to equate 'bad spelling' with the appearance of stupidity must mean that we buy into it in some way.

Previous centuries have town records and official documents with horrendous spelling and grammar. And all made by very intelligent people , some of whom were famous. And people of the time had huge vocabularies compared to us.


And we often see signage with errors.

Sometimes even literary masters need their grammar corrected.

Maybe the issue is not always grammar but bureaucratic hubris.

If we were really to take time to show English skill in a C.V the structure would be literary and not a C.V infact the document called a C.V would not exist as it is a tiny mockery to English. It is a series of notes and references to your career life. It is a list. Infact it would be very difficult to display a working knowledge of language in a traditional C.V now that i think of it.

Hmm what would i think of someone who handed me a piece of prose filled with errors? I would think YUM because correcting it is partly how i earn my living at times.

But if i send a piece to an editor ..yeah i make sure it is error free. I have been brainwashed into obeying the rules....

poeticseraphim

The King of Moo wrote: »

That doesn't help your argument.

Just because spelling wasn't generally as standardised in the past doesn't mean
that it's not important at all. We did manage to get by, but it's generally much easier to communicate clearly with proper spelling to avoid any ambiguity or lack of flow to one's writing.

There is much great poetry does the exact opposite.

Qualitymark

poeticseraphim wrote: »

Previous centuries have town records and official documents with horrendous spelling and grammar. And all made by very intelligent people , some of whom were famous. And people of the time had huge vocabularies compared to us.

But in previous centuries education was only available to the upper classes. Now it's available to everyone.

The King of Moo

poeticseraphim wrote: »

There is much great poetry does the exact opposite.

I wholeheartedly agree.

I have no idea why any employer would look for poetic sensibilities in their potential employees, however.

I'm not suggesting that correct spelling is necessary for great works of literature.

What I am suggesting is that correct spelling is important in jobs where clarity of meaning is vital, not one's ability to create wonderful similes or craft situations of dramatic irony.

poeticseraphim

The King of Moo wrote: »

That doesn't help your argument.

Just because spelling wasn't generally as standardised in the past doesn't mean
that it's not important at all. We did manage to get by, but it's generally much easier to communicate clearly with proper spelling to avoid any ambiguity or lack of flow to one's writing.

Oh and i rarely have an argument....too didactic for me... i am not engaging in the dialectic....( rational argument)...i am just broadening the discussion. I have no antithesis really ....it is just stuff about language that i think has bearing on the topic and is interesting. I have nothing that i think i am right about. I just wanted to make others think and open up the discussion.

It is not to do with communication or ease of communication alone. What was once nothing to do with one's education or work ethic etc has become so. And one might argue that this situation has never really resulted in a more intelligent population that was better at language and English.


Is it middle class insecurity that makes grammar so important in modern times?

Chomsky argued the theory of Universal grammar....

But a growing number of language acquisition researchers argue that the very idea of a strict rule-based grammar in any language flies in the face of what is known about how languages are spoken and how languages evolve over time.

Creoles are languages that are developed and formed when different societies come together and are forced to devise their own system of communication. The system used by the original speakers is typically an inconsistent mix of vocabulary items known as a pidgin. As these speakers' children begin to acquire their first language, they use the pidgin input to effectively create their own original language, known as a creole. Unlike pidgins, creoles have native speakers and make use of a full grammar.


The above is situation whereby the ability of the human mind to break out of grammar rules is necessary and indeed genius. Then over generations minds seem to put rules back together again.

Maybe in modern society internationalism and different mediums are breaking up the rules.




There are a lot of arguments bandied about as rationales for any given grammar prescription. Most of them are spurious, but a few have some merit. But do most people even know why some structure may be wrong or right? Or that it is debatable. If you have heard it used .

You said that communication may be easier with certain rules. Well The problem with this argument is that it’s quite often used in situations where the ambiguity is somewhere between negligible and non-existent. The argument is called ambiguity avoidance and sometimes it does have it's place. Certainly, sentences like every child knows two words are bad if it’s important that the reader know whether the children have to know the same two words. But this argument is too often invoked for phantom ambiguities or misunderstandings.

There are some people who claim language is not a logical system. But then some ask why shouldn't it be???

You seem to be saying 'Language isn’t math, but like math it works because it follows a set of rules. The only way to justify favoring an illogical construction over a logical one is to show that people have a harder time with the latter, but that’s only because they aren’t used to it; once they learn it, see the logic in it, and practice it until it comes naturally, they’ll be better able to express themselves, which is the purpose of language.' But when you work with language every day and you talk to people and you have worked with different TYPES of language or colloquialisms you start to question this....well not exactly question it. But well in philosophical or legal language or other technical languages they have there own structures whih people have to learn....and yes it is still a set of rules...but a susbset..


Sorry i am rambling and ranting and totally not making sense

Descriptivists love the democratic notion that what’s correct is what the majority uses. I don't know if thy are right or if it applies to the OP's situation...but it is interesting to think about.

poeticseraphim

The King of Moo wrote: »

I wholeheartedly agree.

I have no idea why any employer would look for poetic sensibilities in their potential employees, however.

I'm not suggesting that correct spelling is necessary for great works of literature.

What I am suggesting is that correct spelling is important in jobs where clarity of meaning is vital, not one's ability to create wonderful similes or craft situations of dramatic irony.

This is very true.

In literature ...spelling helps...publishing houses like it....generally ..i am not sure if they should or not ..but they do..it's cheaper and less laborious to work with:) The printers have less work for a start :-)

The rules which govern clarity of meaning in each profession may be different also.

I notice progammers speak/write strangely... it is fascinating to me.

I used to be a grammar and spelling nazi..then i became less right wing....:^)

dizzywizlw

steve9859 wrote: »

I'm not looking to identify the best and brightest from a CV. Leaving any required skills aside, which will vary from job to job, I'm looking for people who care enough, and respect the job enough to make sure there aren't any basic mistakes in their CV.

I am not sure what you expect employers to do. I had around 50 CVs to go through a couple of weeks ago, and I don't have unlimited time. There has to be some kind of filter

You'd be a minority, at entry-level I have found most employers look for experience (even if they don't state it as necessary) then the grammar/structure of the CV.

Qualitymark

dizzywizlw wrote: »

You'd be a minority, at entry-level I have found most employers look for experience (even if they don't state it as necessary) then the grammar/structure of the CV.

I don't think the OP is talking about entry level, though. She or he is talking about professionals.

Apanachi

Red About Town wrote: »

The majority of the candidates also had a third level education/qualification.

Why has basic English spelling and grammar become so poor among today's youth? Is there as much focus on it in school as there used to be? Do young people think it even matters any more?

It's not just the "young people".

I did honours English for my Leaving Cert in '92 and I have friends on Facebook who were in my honours English class, so I know they were taught how to spell correctly, which is why I am so flummoxed as to why their spelling is so bad when they post stuff on their wall (and I'm not talking about txt spk)

One friend wrote that she was going back to "collage", OK, I thought maybe it was a typo - stuff like that happens, right? But no, she continued to spell college with an "a" in it numerous times. (and that is one of the more "harmless" examples)

OK, so it may be no big deal making spelleing mistakes on FB, but in a CV as the OP posted, well their they're there is no excuse for that.

If I was in charge of choosing a candidate for a job, and found spelling mistakes in their CV, they wouldn't stand a chance, how hard can it be to proof read and get a second opinion?

btw, kindly ignore any possible spelling mistakes/typos in my post

dizzywizlw

Qualitymark wrote: »

I don't think the OP is talking about entry level, though. She or he is talking about professionals.

Even more prevalent in that case no? Actually remember being told to read out CVs to someone doing selection, first thing I had to read was qual and experience, then they went into the interview pile.

steve9859

dizzywizlw wrote: »

You'd be a minority, at entry-level I have found most employers look for experience (even if they don't state it as necessary) then the grammar/structure of the CV.

I wasn't suggesting I don't look for relevant experience. That is a given, and the requirement for the amount of experience varies between jobs. But the grammar / structure requirement is common across all.

Any applicant, whether for the most junior or most senior position, needs to demonstrate that they actually want the job.....and a lack of attention to detail, as manifested in spelling and grammatical errors, shows that they aren't too bothered.

Obviously it's not black and white. The most experienced candidate is not going to get binned because of a single typo. But at the same time, it isn't difficult to get it right.

dizzywizlw

steve9859 wrote: »

I wasn't suggesting I don't look for relevant experience. That is a given, and the requirement for the amount of experience varies between jobs. But the grammar / structure requirement is common across all.

Any applicant, whether for the most junior or most senior position, needs to demonstrate that they actually want the job.....and a lack of attention to detail, as manifested in spelling and grammatical errors, shows that they aren't too bothered.

Obviously it's not black and white. The most experienced candidate is not going to get binned because of a single typo. But at the same time, it isn't difficult to get it right.

That's true but there is always the off chance of overlooking what is being said by focusing too much on how, obviously I'm not talking about 'Im looking for wrok in the ITSector after college this yeatr 2012'' errors. Swings and Roundabouts really.