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Create ResumeCV keywords by job are the specific skills, tools, responsibilities, qualifications, job titles, industry terms, and outcomes that match the role you are applying for. In the UK job market, recruiters and applicant tracking systems do not read your CV like a story. They scan it for relevance. That means your CV needs to show, quickly and clearly, that your experience matches the job advert, the hiring manager’s priorities, and the language used in that sector.
The mistake I see candidates make is treating CV keywords like magic words to sprinkle in. That is not how hiring works. Keywords only help when they are backed by evidence. A CV that says “stakeholder management” once is forgettable. A CV that shows which stakeholders, what decisions, what pressure, and what result is much harder to ignore.
CV keywords by job means adapting your CV language to the role you are targeting, not sending the same generic CV to every employer and hoping someone reads between the lines.
Recruiters are usually looking for signs of fit across a few areas:
Job title alignment
Core responsibilities
Required technical skills
Sector or industry knowledge
Tools, platforms, systems, or software
Qualifications, licences, or certifications
Seniority level
In the UK, many employers use applicant tracking systems to store, search, filter, and manage applications. The ATS is not usually the scary robot rejecting everyone in the dramatic way people imagine. The bigger issue is more ordinary and more frustrating: if your CV does not contain the language recruiters search for, you may simply be harder to find.
Recruiters may search for terms like:
“Payroll”
“CIMA”
“Sage”
“B2B sales”
“NHS”
“case management”
“Python”
Commercial impact
Leadership or stakeholder exposure
Evidence that you have done similar work before
This matters because hiring is not only about whether you are capable. It is about whether your CV makes that capability obvious fast enough.
That last part is where many good candidates lose out. They may have the right experience, but their CV describes it in language that does not match the job advert. A recruiter is then forced to translate, infer, and guess. Some will. Many will not, especially when they have a shortlist deadline and too many applications that look roughly similar.
In recruitment, relevance usually wins before brilliance gets a chance to speak.
“procurement”
“risk assessment”
“people management”
That does not mean your CV should be stuffed with random keywords. It means your CV should use the same professional language that hiring teams use when describing the role.
Here is the real hiring reality: recruiters often begin with the job brief, not your potential. They have been told, “We need someone who has used X, handled Y, and understands Z.” So when they open your CV, they are checking whether X, Y, and Z are visible.
If those terms are buried, missing, or described too vaguely, your CV creates friction. And friction in hiring is dangerous. Not because recruiters are lazy, but because the process is built around comparison. Your CV is rarely being judged in isolation. It is being compared with others.
When I review a CV, I am not asking, “Is this person generally impressive?” first. I am asking, “Can I confidently put this person in front of the hiring manager for this specific job?”
That is a different question.
A candidate may be impressive and still not look right for the role. Another candidate may have less overall experience but look more relevant because their CV mirrors the job requirements clearly.
Recruiters usually scan for three layers of relevance.
This is the basic fit. Does the CV show the job title, skills, responsibilities, systems, and experience requested in the advert?
For example, if the job advert asks for “accounts payable experience using SAP,” and your CV says “finance administration,” you may be underselling yourself. If you have accounts payable and SAP experience, say it clearly.
This is where the recruiter checks whether the keyword has substance. Anyone can write “project management.” Fewer candidates show budget ownership, delivery timelines, stakeholder groups, risk control, and measurable outcomes.
A keyword without evidence feels thin. A keyword with context becomes credible.
This is the deeper layer. The recruiter is thinking, “Will the hiring manager recognise this as relevant?” Hiring managers often have specific pain points. They may need someone who can stabilise a process, manage difficult stakeholders, improve reporting, handle high volume work, or bring sector knowledge.
Your CV keywords should not only match the advert. They should match the problem behind the advert.
That is where strong CV positioning begins.
The job advert is usually your best keyword source, but you need to read it properly. Most candidates read job adverts like a list of demands. Recruiters read them like a map of what matters most.
Start by separating the advert into different keyword types.
Look at how the employer describes the role. A “Customer Success Manager” may overlap with “Account Manager,” but the expectations can be different. A “People Partner” may overlap with “HR Business Partner,” but the language matters.
Use the closest honest version of the target job title in your CV headline or profile if it reflects your experience. Do not invent a title you have never held, but do make your positioning easy to understand.
Weak Example:
Experienced professional with strong communication skills.
Good Example:
HR Advisor with employee relations, case management, policy guidance, and line manager support experience across multi site UK teams.
The good version is not fancy. It is useful. That is the point.
Skills keywords are usually found in the “requirements,” “essential criteria,” or “about you” section.
Look for terms such as:
Financial reporting
Stakeholder management
Data analysis
Diary management
Contract negotiation
Performance management
Lead generation
Safeguarding
Audit preparation
Complaint handling
Do not copy every skill into a skills section and call it a day. Skills need to appear where they make sense, especially in your profile and work experience.
These are often very important because they are easy for recruiters to search.
Examples include:
Excel
Power BI
Salesforce
HubSpot
SAP
Workday
Xero
Sage
Google Analytics
Jira
A practical tip: write tool names exactly as employers write them. If the advert says “Power BI,” do not only write “dashboard reporting.” If the advert says “Salesforce CRM,” include both “Salesforce” and “CRM” naturally.
UK employers often care about sector exposure more than they admit. They may say they are open to different backgrounds, but when the shortlist gets tight, sector familiarity often becomes a deciding factor.
Useful sector keywords may include:
NHS
Local authority
Financial services
FMCG
SaaS
Construction
Retail banking
Higher education
Charity sector
Legal services
If you have relevant sector experience, make it visible. Do not assume the employer will work it out from company names.
Some roles have non negotiable requirements. If the advert asks for a qualification, licence, clearance, or compliance knowledge, include it clearly if you have it.
Examples include:
CIPD
ACCA
CIMA
AAT
NEBOSH
IOSH
Prince2
Scrum Master
DBS
GDPR
This is one area where being vague can genuinely cost you. If a recruiter has to search your CV for a required qualification and cannot find it quickly, they may move on.
Keyword stuffing is when your CV reads like someone emptied a job advert into a blender and poured it into your profile.
Recruiters can see it. Hiring managers can see it. ATS systems may pick up the words, but humans still decide whether the CV is convincing.
The goal is not to use as many keywords as possible. The goal is to use the right keywords in the right places with enough evidence to make them believable.
Your profile should quickly position you for the job. It should not be a personality paragraph full of “hard working,” “motivated,” and “excellent team player.” Those words are not harmful because they are bad English. They are harmful because they tell me almost nothing.
Weak Example:
I am a motivated and reliable professional with excellent communication skills and a passion for delivering results.
Good Example:
Commercially focused Account Manager with experience managing B2B client portfolios, renewal conversations, CRM pipeline tracking, and revenue growth across UK and European accounts.
The good example contains keywords, but it also tells the recruiter what kind of candidate they are looking at.
A skills section is useful, but it is not proof. The work experience section is where keywords become evidence.
Weak Example:
Skills: stakeholder management, reporting, project coordination, Excel, communication.
Good Example:
Coordinated weekly project reporting for senior stakeholders, using Excel dashboards to track delivery risks, budget updates, supplier actions, and milestone progress.
The good example shows the keywords in action. It gives the recruiter something to believe.
You do not need to copy the advert word for word. In fact, copying too much can make your CV feel unnatural. Use the same terminology where it matters, but write in your own clear professional language.
For example, if a UK job advert asks for “high volume recruitment experience,” and your CV says “managed multiple hiring campaigns,” both may be relevant. But I would still include “high volume recruitment” somewhere if that is genuinely your background, because it matches the employer’s language and likely search behaviour.
The best CV keyword use feels natural. It should read like a strong candidate wrote it, not like an SEO plugin had a nervous breakdown.
Placement matters. The same keyword can carry different weight depending on where it appears.
Your headline should make the target role obvious.
Examples:
Finance Assistant with Accounts Payable and Sage Experience
HR Advisor with Employee Relations and UK Policy Experience
Marketing Manager with B2B Campaigns and HubSpot Experience
Data Analyst with SQL, Power BI, and Reporting Experience
This helps both the recruiter and the ATS understand your positioning quickly.
Use the profile to combine your target job, core strengths, sector exposure, and level of experience.
Do not make it too long. A strong profile is usually compact and specific.
The key skills section is useful for ATS visibility and quick scanning, but only if it is focused. Avoid dumping twenty five vague skills into it.
Better skills sections are grouped around the role.
For example, a project coordinator could include:
Project coordination
Stakeholder updates
Risk and issue tracking
Supplier liaison
Meeting actions
Budget administration
Excel reporting
Document control
This is much better than “communication, teamwork, organisation, leadership, problem solving,” which could belong to almost anyone.
This is the most important area for recruiter trust. Use keywords inside achievement bullets and responsibility descriptions.
The strongest work experience points usually show:
What you did
Who or what you worked with
Which tools or processes you used
What changed because of your work
The scale, volume, value, or complexity involved
For example:
This is strong because it has role specific keywords and evidence.
Include required qualifications clearly. If the role asks for CIPD Level 5 and you have it, do not hide it under vague “professional development.”
Use additional sections only when relevant. For example, technical projects can help for data, software, engineering, and digital roles. Publications may help for research roles. Volunteering may help if it adds sector or leadership relevance.
Do not add sections just because someone on the internet said every CV needs them. Most CV advice becomes nonsense when applied without context.
You do not need the same keywords for every job. A retail manager, software developer, HR advisor, and finance assistant should not sound like they all downloaded the same CV template from 2012 and changed the name at the top.
Below are practical keyword patterns for common UK roles.
Relevant keywords often include:
Diary management
Inbox management
Meeting coordination
Document preparation
Data entry
CRM administration
Travel booking
Minute taking
Supplier liaison
Office management
Purchase orders
Confidential information
Microsoft Office
Excel
Recruiter insight: for admin roles, employers often say they want “someone organised,” but what they really mean is someone who can reduce chaos without needing constant supervision. Your CV should show systems, volume, accuracy, and reliability.
Good Example:
Managed diary coordination, meeting preparation, travel bookings, purchase orders, and confidential document handling for a senior leadership team of five.
Relevant keywords often include:
Complaint handling
Customer queries
Call handling
Live chat
Email support
CRM systems
Service level agreements
Escalation management
First contact resolution
Retention
Recruiter insight: customer service hiring managers are not only checking whether you are friendly. They are checking whether you can stay calm when customers are not. Show pressure, volume, systems, and resolution.
Good Example:
Handled high volume customer queries by phone, email, and live chat, resolving complaints, processing refunds, updating CRM records, and escalating complex cases within service level agreements.
Relevant keywords often include:
Lead generation
New business
Account management
Pipeline management
CRM
Salesforce
HubSpot
Revenue growth
B2B sales
Client retention
Recruiter insight: sales CVs often fail because they describe activity instead of commercial impact. Hiring managers want to know what you sold, to whom, at what value, and with what result.
Good Example:
Managed a B2B account portfolio worth £1.2m, leading renewal conversations, pipeline forecasting, CRM updates, and upsell opportunities across UK mid market clients.
Relevant keywords often include:
Campaign management
Content strategy
SEO
PPC
Email marketing
Social media
Google Analytics
HubSpot
CRM segmentation
Lead generation
Recruiter insight: marketing candidates often list channels but forget outcomes. A hiring manager wants to know whether your campaigns actually moved leads, traffic, engagement, revenue, or brand visibility.
Good Example:
Delivered B2B email and SEO campaigns using HubSpot, Google Analytics, and CRM segmentation, improving qualified lead generation and reporting campaign performance to senior stakeholders.
Relevant keywords often include:
Accounts payable
Accounts receivable
Credit control
Bank reconciliation
Month end
Payroll
VAT returns
Management accounts
Financial reporting
Sage
Recruiter insight: finance hiring can be keyword sensitive because systems, reporting cycles, and qualifications matter. If a role needs month end experience, say “month end.” Do not hope “finance support” covers it.
Good Example:
Supported month end reporting, bank reconciliations, accounts payable, invoice processing, VAT preparation, and Excel based financial analysis using Sage.
Relevant keywords often include:
Employee relations
Case management
Recruitment coordination
Onboarding
Absence management
Disciplinary process
Grievance process
HRIS
Workday
Policy advice
Recruiter insight: HR CVs need to show judgement, not just process. Employers want to know whether you can handle sensitive issues, guide managers, protect confidentiality, and keep cases moving properly.
Good Example:
Provided HR advisory support across employee relations cases, absence management, policy guidance, onboarding, and line manager coaching within a UK multi site business.
Relevant keywords often include:
Python
SQL
Power BI
Azure
AWS
JavaScript
React
API integration
Data modelling
Dashboard development
Recruiter insight: technical CVs often go wrong in two directions. Some are too technical for non technical recruiters to understand. Others list tools without showing what was built, improved, automated, or secured. You need both clarity and substance.
Good Example:
Developed SQL queries and Power BI dashboards to automate weekly reporting, improve data visibility, and support operational decision making for senior stakeholders.
Relevant keywords often include:
Project delivery
Stakeholder management
Risk management
Budget tracking
Governance
Project planning
RAID logs
Supplier management
Agile
Waterfall
Recruiter insight: project management CVs should not just say “delivered projects.” What kind of projects? What budget? What stakeholders? What risks? What changed? Hiring managers need the shape of the work.
Good Example:
Supported project delivery across multiple workstreams, maintaining RAID logs, budget trackers, supplier actions, stakeholder updates, and governance documentation for a business transformation programme.
Job adverts are not always written clearly. Some are excellent. Some are a strange mix of wish list, recycled job description, internal politics, and someone’s dream candidate who may not exist.
So when reading job adverts for keywords, you need to decode the language.
When an employer says “fast paced environment,” they often mean the workload is high, priorities change, and they need someone who can operate without constant instruction.
Useful CV keywords might include:
High volume workload
Prioritisation
Deadline management
Process improvement
Stakeholder updates
When they say “strong stakeholder management,” they may mean the role involves difficult internal relationships, conflicting priorities, or senior people who need careful handling.
Useful CV keywords might include:
Senior stakeholder engagement
Cross functional collaboration
Escalation management
Influencing
Conflict resolution
When they say “commercially aware,” they often mean they want someone who understands cost, revenue, margin, risk, or customer impact.
Useful CV keywords might include:
Revenue growth
Cost control
Budget management
Margin improvement
Customer retention
When they say “must be proactive,” they usually mean they do not want someone who waits to be told every step.
Useful CV keywords might include:
Process improvement
Problem solving
Initiative
Ownership
Continuous improvement
This is where recruiter judgement matters. Do not only take the words literally. Look at the business problem underneath them.
Most CV keyword mistakes are not technical. They are positioning mistakes.
Words like “motivated,” “organised,” “hard working,” and “team player” are not strong CV keywords. They are personal qualities, and they are only useful when supported by evidence.
A better approach is to show the behaviour.
Instead of saying you are organised, show that you managed diaries, deadlines, documentation, reporting cycles, workload planning, or project trackers.
If your most relevant experience is from a previous role, make it visible. Recruiters do not always read every line of every role with equal attention. Put important keywords where they can be found.
If you are applying for HR Advisor roles and your employee relations experience was two jobs ago, you may need to mention it in your profile and key skills, then support it in that older role.
Candidates often use terms from inside their company that outsiders will not understand. Internal project names, team names, and process labels rarely help unless translated into market language.
For example, “managed Phoenix workflow across Blue Team operations” means nothing to most recruiters.
Say what it actually was: “managed workflow allocation, service reporting, and operational issue tracking for a customer support team.”
A “Coordinator” role in one company may be administrative. In another, it may involve project ownership. A “Manager” role may mean people management, account management, or process management. Do not rely on the title alone.
Your CV keywords should clarify the actual nature of your work.
This is a quiet but serious mistake. If you add “strategic leadership” to your CV but your examples only show task support, the mismatch becomes obvious at interview.
Keywords should stretch your positioning, not manufacture a different career.
A strong keyword approach does not mean rewriting your entire CV for every application. It means adjusting the emphasis.
Use this practical framework.
These are the requirements the employer is unlikely to compromise on. They may include qualifications, systems, sector knowledge, legal requirements, or essential technical skills.
Put these clearly in your CV if you have them.
If the advert mentions stakeholders in three different places, that is not accidental. If it keeps returning to data, compliance, customers, leadership, or transformation, those themes should be visible in your CV.
Repeated language usually signals priority.
A junior CV should not pretend to be strategic if the experience is mainly support based. A senior CV should not drown in basic task descriptions.
For a senior role, keywords might include:
Strategy
Leadership
Budget ownership
Transformation
Governance
Board reporting
Commercial performance
For a junior role, keywords might include:
Administration
Coordination
Data entry
Customer support
Reporting support
Scheduling
Documentation
Both can be strong. The problem is when the level is unclear.
For each important keyword, ask: where is the proof?
If the keyword is “stakeholder management,” show the stakeholders. If the keyword is “Power BI,” show what you used it for. If the keyword is “recruitment,” show role types, hiring volume, sourcing methods, or ATS use.
This is the part candidates resist. A CV is not a storage unit for every professional thing you have ever done. If a detail does not support the target job, it may be taking attention away from what matters.
Good CV tailoring is not adding everything. It is choosing what deserves attention.
A keyword focused CV works when it helps the recruiter reach the right conclusion quickly.
What works:
Clear role positioning in the headline and profile
Keywords taken from the job advert and sector language
Evidence placed inside work experience
Specific tools, systems, qualifications, and responsibilities
Measurable scale where possible
Natural language that still sounds human
Focus on the target role rather than your entire career history
What fails:
Keyword stuffing without evidence
Generic soft skills replacing role specific detail
Hiding important experience in vague wording
Using internal company language recruiters cannot decode
Applying with the same CV for every role
Listing tools you barely used and cannot discuss
Overloading the CV with irrelevant older experience
Here is the uncomfortable truth: many rejected candidates are not rejected because they are incapable. They are rejected because their CV does not make the right argument. Hiring is full of imperfect decisions made under time pressure. Your CV needs to reduce doubt, not create more work for the reader.
Before you send your CV for a UK job application, check it against the job advert like a recruiter would.
Ask yourself:
Is the target role clear within the first few seconds?
Have I included the most important job title, skill, tool, and sector keywords?
Are the essential requirements visible without digging?
Do my work experience bullets prove the keywords, or just list them?
Have I used the employer’s language where it genuinely matches my experience?
Have I removed irrelevant details that distract from the role?
Can a recruiter understand my fit without needing to guess?
Would the hiring manager recognise the experience as useful for their team?
This final question matters most. ATS visibility may get your CV found. Recruiter screening may get it shortlisted. But hiring manager confidence is what moves you closer to interview.
CV keywords are not a hack. They are a relevance signal.
The best candidates do not simply add more keywords. They make their experience easier to recognise. They understand that recruiters and hiring managers are not reading in a calm little bubble with a cup of tea and unlimited time. They are comparing CVs, checking requirements, managing risk, dealing with imperfect job briefs, and trying to avoid putting forward someone who looks wrong for the role.
Your job is not to manipulate the system. Your job is to make the match obvious.
That means using the language of the job, proving the claims, and cutting the vague filler that makes recruiters work too hard. A strong CV does not shout “I am perfect.” It shows enough relevant evidence that the recruiter thinks, “Yes, this person is worth speaking to.”
That is the real value of CV keywords by job. They help your CV move from generic to relevant, from searchable to credible, and from possible to shortlistable.
Written by Simar Malhi, a recruiter and headhunter with international recruitment experience. I write about CVs, job applications, hiring decisions, and the reality behind recruitment processes. My goal is to help candidates understand more honestly how employers, recruiters, and hiring managers actually select candidates.
ServiceNow
Python
SQL
Adobe Creative Cloud
Manufacturing
Public sector procurement
FCA regulation
SMCR
Right to work in the UK
Refunds
Order tracking
Customer satisfaction
Renewals
Negotiation
Forecasting
Territory management
Conversion rate
Brand positioning
Marketing automation
Reporting
Xero
SAP
Excel
ACCA
CIMA
AAT
Line manager support
Talent acquisition
LinkedIn Recruiter
ATS
CIPD
Cyber security
Incident management
Agile
Jira
Git
Stakeholder requirements
Prince2
Change management
Programme support
PMO
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