Interior Design CV: Important Things and Most Common Mistakes

Are you struggling with your interior design CV? Is it hard for you to come up with creative ideas even though creativeness is your way of earning money?

No worries – you are not alone. For the majority of interior designers selling themselves is a huge problem. Yet, the lack of a killer CV makes damage to your career and lets other less-qualified candidates pass you over.

In this post, we would like to share the top 5 secrets on how to create a killer CV for interior design as well as discuss the most common interior design CV mistakes.

Know What Your Target Audience Is

Working on commercial interior design, start from focusing on the ultimate customer – the person who will visit the store, work in the office, or rent a flat. Try to understand what appeals to this person and create your design with this image in your mind. If you are designing a home for a client, the same process is involved. What is important for him or her? How is this person going to use the home? What are this person’s values and interests?

When writing a CV, the same process is on-the-go. If you are aware of who is going to read it, you can write your CV accordingly. Reading an interior design CV sample is a good way to get an understanding of how it should look like.

For this, you should consider the company type you would like to work for. Is it a large enterprise and you will be one of the designers‘ team? Or would you like to work in a small company and be the sole creative? Is the culture energetic or entrepreneurial? Is it structured or traditional?

After having built a picture of a perfect company, you can target your CV. You will know what experiences and skills to emphasize, which words should be used and what parts of your experience the reader will be interested in.

What Is Your Unique Value?

You possess a unique mix of skills, experiences, and characteristics that will make you separate from the rest of the candidates. To create a really perfect CV, you should define what is your unique mix is. Let‘s call it your value proposition.

Ask yourself what makes you different from other interior designers? Is it the success you gained in designing well-known restaurants? Is it your sense of color? Or maybe you‘ve got a natural talent for multi-tasking in crazy environments?

Now you know why it is so important to decide on a perfect company. Your value proposition fully depends on the company type you are targeting.

All the interior design CV examples demonstrate that their authors know what their unique value is.

Develop a Strategy

Now you know what your target companies are and what makes it appealing to them. It‘s a high time to plan how you would like to inform about it.

You should think about the following points:

• Which interior design CV format showcases your unique value in the best light?
• Which keywords should be included when you apply to your ideal company? To get some ideas, you can look at interior design CV examples UK.
• How to showcase your unique value through success stories?
• What CV design to select in order to reinforce your message?

Make all these decisions before starting to write. It will help you ensure that when your recruiter is reading your interior design creative CV, he/she will instantly realize why you are the best candidate ever.

Attach Client Testimonials

We hope that you still have emails and letters from satisfied clients and they will make a powerful attachment to your interior design CV.

Marketers often use testimonials while they are aware of their effectiveness. If you see that a company raves about its products, it is understandable that they say it because of the self-interest. But if you hear a couple of positive reviews from the same product, you will believe them.

The same goes with including testimonial quotes on your CV. To see how to use the quotes, examine interior design CV samples.

Ensure Your CV Contains Important Keywords

Nowadays the majority of the recruiters take advantage of applicant tracking systems to screen out the CV before having it being read by a real person.

Including keywords is especially important when writing a CV for interior design students, because students often lack experience in the field. The computer program scans every CV for relevant keywords that are chosen by a recruiter and either „passes” or „fails” the candidates.

It means that you should include all the related keywords in your interior design graduate CV. To do this, list all the interior design skills you possess.

If you have chosen the desired position already, take a look at the job description and include the requirements listed in it. They should guide you through the whole CV, especially when it comes to the keywords.

Three Main Mistakes When Writing Interior Design CV

1. Failing to Design Your CV.  Surprisingly, many designers fail to compose their CVs in an appropriate way. Some of them use a basic Microsoft Word interior design CV template. But you should create a CV format that works because this one is too old-fashioned. Your CV should be a perfectly matched set. It is the first impression you make on your recruiter, so make it shine like a five-stars hotel room.
2. Including Extra Fluff. Remove all the work experience that is not related to design. The fact that you have managerial experience is great, but your interior design CV should look like you have devoted your whole life to it. Imagine an interior design CV example that includes work experience as a salesman, a cook, an assembly, and a freelancing designer. It demonstrates you as a person not focused on design. It is better to exclude the three first positions and leave only „freelancing designer”.
3. Exaggerating. Best interior designer in the US. The most successful designer in the industry. Widely regarded as an important figure in the field of interior design. Writing such phrases on your CV may kick you out of the candidate list straight away. They look too embarrassing in the real world. Instead of proving your value to employers, they remain humble.

Bottom Line

Any interior designer should be skilled at creating an instant impression. This is exactly what you should do with your CV. Follow the above tips and avoid the mentioned mistakes. It will help you impress recruiters in your target companies.