{"id":6766,"date":"2022-04-20T16:03:48","date_gmt":"2022-04-20T15:03:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/?p=6766"},"modified":"2022-04-20T16:03:48","modified_gmt":"2022-04-20T15:03:48","slug":"6-quick-guides-to-achieving-your-goals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/?p=6766","title":{"rendered":"6 quick guides to achieving your goals"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Andrew-1-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"100\" height=\"150\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-6768\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Andrew-1-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Andrew-1.jpg 259w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 100px) 100vw, 100px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Struggling to break through with your CV and job applications? Need help with your interview technique? I\u2019m Andrew, a Careers and Employability Consultant based in Scotland, and I help students and graduates in this position all the time.<\/p>\n<p>OU Careers and Employability Services can help make your CV, LinkedIn, applications and covering letters stand out and give you advice, tips and practice to boost your confidence in handling interviews, assessment centres, and psychometric tests.<\/p>\n<p>To make all our support quick to find, I\u2019ve put together 6 easy-to-digest infographics on each stage of the recruitment process.<\/p>\n<h3>Ace your applications with these six quick guides<\/h3>\n<ol>\n<li>Our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/pluginfile.php\/674653\/mod_resource\/content\/1\/Quick Guide to Covering Letters %28Final Version%29.pdf\">Quick Guide to Cover Letters<\/a> points you to information in Your Career Planning Guide and where to sign up for cover letter workshops, which will help you feel confident that employers will read your application.<\/li>\n<li>Our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/pluginfile.php\/674651\/mod_resource\/content\/1\/Quick Guide to Making a CV %28Final Version%29.pdf\">Quick Guide to CVs<\/a> contains links to CV examples, CV builders, and our CV360 reviewer which assesses your CV based on common algorithms used by employers. We also host workshops to boost your CV so that they always end up on the \u2018yes\u2019 pile.<\/li>\n<li>Our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/pluginfile.php\/674652\/mod_resource\/content\/1\/Quick Guide to Application Forms %28Final Version%29.pdf\">Quick Guide to Application Forms<\/a> directs you to information on presenting your skills and understanding the questions, as well as resources such as recorded webinars and our application form checklist.<\/li>\n<li>Our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/pluginfile.php\/674657\/mod_resource\/content\/1\/Quick Guide to Assessment Centres %28Final Version%29.pdf\">Quick Guide to Assessment Centres<\/a> will prepare you for typical activities that could be involved.<\/li>\n<li>Our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/pluginfile.php\/674655\/mod_resource\/content\/2\/Quick Guide to Psychometric and Aptitude Tests %28Final Version%29.pdf\">Quick Guide to Psychometric Testing<\/a> features links to information on preparing for tests and understanding the types of test you may face.<\/li>\n<li>Our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/pluginfile.php\/674658\/mod_resource\/content\/1\/Quick Guide to Interviews %28Final Version%29.pdf\">Quick Guide for Interviews<\/a> features links to information, advice, and our Interview360 simulator to build your confidence to show your best self at interviews.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Have you taken your Career Readiness Pulse? At Careers and Employability Services, we find it useful to break the career journey into four stages \u2013 discover, explore, achieve, and progress. You can find short, 5-minute webinars and a quick PDF resource pack for each of these stages on our <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/mod\/connecthosted\/view.php?id=22867\">Goals on the Go<\/a> page. Learn your career readiness stage using <a href=\"https:\/\/openuniversity.careercentre.me\/members?openPulse=N3A0NCtoaUNURjc3NFZkS2VnM3pidz090\">Career Readiness Pulse<\/a>, an intelligent self-diagnostic tool which will direct you to confidence-building tools and advice tailored to your responses.<\/p>\n<p>Keep up to date with our latest opportunities, resources, and events in your monthly <a href=\"https:\/\/learn1.open.ac.uk\/course\/view.php?id=100172&#038;cmid=24435\">Careers Express newsletter<\/a>. Check your spam folders to ensure you receive it.<\/p>\n<h5><a href=\"https:\/\/help.open.ac.uk\/browse\/careers\">Careers and Employability Services<\/a><\/h5>\n<ul class=\"ou-list ou-list--social ou-list--social--icons\">\n<li class=\"ou-list__facebook\"><a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/CESFacebook19\">Facebook<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"ou-list__twitter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/CESTwitter18\">Twitter<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"ou-list__linkedin\"><a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/TOUCaN19\">LinkedIn<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"ou-box ou-box--info\">\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Andrew-2-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"75\" height=\"75\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-6769\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Andrew-2-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Andrew-2.jpg 171w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 75px) 100vw, 75px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><em>Andrew Hadden is an OU Careers and Employability Consultant based in Edinburgh. He helps students achieve their ambitions and fulfil their potential through one-to-one appointments and by designing events and resources for the OU. Explore the rest of our blog for more articles from the Careers and Employability Services team.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Struggling to break through with your CV and job applications? Need help with your interview technique? I\u2019m Andrew, a Careers and Employability Consultant based in Scotland, and I help students and graduates in this position all the time. OU Careers and Employability Services can help make your CV, LinkedIn, applications and covering letters stand out [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":6789,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[89,87,6,69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-achieve","category-career-readiness-stages","category-cv","category-interviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6766"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6766\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6787,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6766\/revisions\/6787"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/careers\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}