Use your work abroad experience to boost your CV

When you want to score a new job, work experience abroad can be a deciding factor. In today’s job market, standing out in the crowd is important. The fact you have lived and worked abroad can be seen as an advantage, because it tells the employer you have certain skills. The looks of your CV are important, but if you want a company to fall in love with you, looks are not enough. Your work abroad experience can be crucial in matching with a big company.

We tell you how to use your work abroad experience to boost your CV, and upscale the odds for you to land a great job bigger by doing so. 

Why employers think your work abroad experience is important 

If you have worked abroad, employers see this as a positive thing. You show that you can adapt to new situations and that you dare to take risks. It proves that you are not afraid to take a leap and change your routines. When you take a new job, you also have to adapt to a new situation, with possibly another working culture. This could feel similar to going abroad and trying to fit in your new country and its culture. Having experience living abroad on your own shows that you can handle life like an adult. 

Employers connect work experience abroad to the skills we named above, but it really is true. Working abroad evolves you in many different ways. In personal life, these skills are really valuable in your working life too. It’s not just tricking the employer because you worked abroad, having this experience is a real advantage in your future career. So make sure to focus on the skills you have learned from working abroad.

Making your CV and stand out

When hiring a new worker, employers (or recruiters) see loads of CVs. Standing out is important, and having experience working abroad is a thing not everyone has. Use this to your advantage. Don’t hide the fact that you have lived in Lisbon for a year. It can feel weird putting this in your CV, but it truly will help you to stand out. And, it creates a topic to talk about during your job interview. 

If you want to put your experience abroad in your CV, don’t just put “I worked in Lisbon”. Combine this with the job experience you’ve had there. Tell the one who’s reading your CV shortly what you did and in which location you did this. Summarize, so you can tell the entire story during your interview. 

Focus on communication and language skills in your CV. Experience abroad will definitely improve these two factors. Who doesn’t want someone who can communicate with all sorts of people? This is really important, especially in big companies. 

Tailor your CV for every application

Sure, a CV is mostly the same with every application. Still it can be smart to overlook it before submitting. Every employer looks for different things, and every job requires different skills. If you are aware of this, you can make slight changes to your CV. Think about putting other experiences or skills on top of the list. 

For example, if you are applying for a job in sales, use your experience abroad. You have adapted and understood cultural differences. This increases the chance that you will understand the other person, which helps you in selling even more products than other candidates. Cross-cultural communication is a valuable skill you should put in your CV in this case. We give you a few examples of how to tailor your CV for a specific application:

Your future job	How your experience working abroad makes you a better candidate
Account Manager	As a Sales Representative in Valencia I learned working towards KPIs and developed my persuasion and negotiation skills
Customer Support Specialist	Working as a Customer Service Assistant in Malta helped me to evolve patience and empathy in high-pressure situations
Social Media Manager	Being an Online Game Presenter in Sofia learned me to engage and understand diverse online audiences

Don’t tell everything about your experience abroad, but make sure to let the employer know that you gained skills by working abroad. It leaves space for questions during the interview, because saying you worked in another country makes people get curious about the story behind that. 

Use a professional CV builder

At Job Squad, we know how important it is to have a professional looking CV. That’s why we have created our CV builder. In 9 easy steps we can help you to make a professional CV in English in less than 20 minutes. We can’t create the content of your CV, but we can help you make one that looks professional and stands out. Our CV builder is totally free, so there is no excuse not to use our help!

Be proud of your work abroad experience

The main message from this article is that you should embrace those experiences abroad. Having worked abroad gives you so much, so why hide it in your CV? Be proud of it! The challenge of adapting to the local culture in Athens could be a stepping stone to landing that job 

When you put your working abroad experience to use and add it to your CV, employers will see this and get interested. They want to know more about your experience, and they remember you when picking candidates for an interview. That’s the sweet spot you want to hit. And we can assure you that your work abroad experience will not only benefit you in finding a dream job in the future. You will learn so much more about yourself, and the world during this adventure!