Have you ever applied for a job, waiting with bated breath and hoping to get a call, only to open your inbox a few days later and receive a rejection email?

More than likely its because there maybe gaps in your work history or, unfortunately, the skills you have developed are not suited to the role advertised.

Here are five suggestions to help you spruce up your resume and increase your chances of getting a call from your recruiter or potential employer:

Just like your old school teacher or professor, we can normally detect when you’ve copy-pasted directly from the internet. If you are doing this, make sure that you actually edit the passage, so it makes sense in context. Copying random sentences that sound fancy or professional and lumping them altogether, simply looks disorganised.

The answer to that question is a resounding no . It may seem logical to proof read your CV before applying for a job, but often we tend to glaze over our own mistakes and leave very small yet obvious errors. Ask a trusted person to have a read through your resume; or at the very least, use an online grammar editor. This is important, because you need to demonstrate you have put in the effort into presenting your resume in the best way possible. Just as you want to be able to present yourself in the best way possible, at your interview.

We don’t need to know if you’re single or married with 3 kids, always remember this is a professional profile, not your Facebook account (which also should be set to private). Your name, address, contact number and email are more than sufficient.

When a recruiter or line manager is required to read through a high volume of resumes, having to tackle huge slabs of paragraph or a very long resume, can be daunting to say the least. Elaboration is good, but when it goes to the extreme, can give the impression of overcompensation. Is there something you’re trying to hide between the lines? Try and put yourself in the place of the resume reader, what would you prefer?

On the opposite end, responsibilities described in one word, or clichéd phrases like ‘Team Player’ is too little. How were you a team player? During your company’s Soccer matches every second Friday night? The key is to be specific and relevant, especially with regard to the role for which you are applying.