in a CV, cover letter and application form

How to reflect the same experience in a CV, cover letter and application form

For any application, you should lead with your best, most relevant experience for the role. It is likely, therefore, that you will want to refer to some experiences more than once in different elements of the process.

The paragraphs below illustrate how this might look for Siân Magellan’s TOSCA leadership experience in her cover letter, application form and CV.

1. Cover letter

While participating in The Oxford Strategy Challenge (TOSCA), I developed my leadership skills by leading a team of five students to design and implement a marketing strategy to increase sales for our local start-up client. I organised our meeting schedule, allocated roles to each team member, coordinated with the client, implemented our surveys and ensured that we delivered our recommendations on time. As a result of my team’s recommendations, six months later our client’s sales have increased by 20% and I received excellent feedback both from the client and other members of my team.

2. Employer Application Form (EAF)

Describe a time when you demonstrated leadership skills: Last January I led a five-member team on The Oxford Strategy Challenge (TOSCA), a programme run by Oxford University Careers Service to build commercial awareness and team skills. Within this timeframe, my goal as team leader was to deliver a series of recommendations to our team’s local startup client to increase its sales. First I organised a series of meetings when all or most of us could get together to work on the project. Secondly I asked each team member to share their skills and insights into how they could contribute to developing an effective marketing strategy. Thirdly, and based on the combined skillset of my team, I allocated roles to each member, covering research, survey design and implementation, budgeting and reporting. Having established a way forward, we then agreed a timeframe for each aspect of the project. As team leader, as well as being responsible for survey implementation, I remained the focal point of contact with our client, keeping them up to date with all our project implementation, key findings and asking for any clarifications when required. I also kept in touch regularly with each team member in between our team meetings so that I could deal with any unexpected delays or findings and keep our project on track. We delivered our recommendations on time to our client, who welcomed and implemented them all. Six months later, the client’s sales have increased by 20% and our suggestions are still being followed.

3. CV

EXPERIENCE

Oxford University, The Oxford Strategy 2020

Challenge, Team Leader (Online)

• Led a team of 5 students to develop marketing strategy for local start-up • Designed and executed electronic and phone surveys, engaging 250 participants • Presented recommendations to client; all implemented within 3 months and delivering 20% increase in sales within 6 months