Pick me! Pick me!

Christine Priestly on writing the writerly CV

My professional CV has been in circulation in one iteration or another for well over a decade: a catalogue of passionless buzzwords. But when it comes to trying to break into the literary world, that lack of passion slaps me in the face.

I have spent years trying to sell my studies and writerly pursuits as relevant in the professional non-writing world. Now I need to do the exact opposite.

All that business-speak, reams of flow-charts and mission statements, all that jargon-riddled documentation, needs to somehow morph and be moulded into experience that is pertinent and relevant to the literary world.

I need to show why I should be picked above all the other budding 'industriests', that I am dedicated, conscientious, able to work to deadlines, enthusiastic, and that this enthusiasm will translate into producing f-off awesome work.

It’s harder than I thought.

I read over my newfangled CV. Everything turned topsy-turvy, Magic Faraway Tree-style. What will they make of my extra-curricular activities, the stuff that usually sits in the ‘yes, I do have a life outside of work’ category, suddenly thrust into the centrepiece? How can I make the transition from ‘hobby’ (read: die-hard passion) into ‘career’?

And then there are those ten prominent years of analysis and techie-speak, climbing the corporate ladder, which somehow seem like a waste of time, irrelevant, barely transferable. How can I make them fade into the background?

But I know they can't be faded, nor should they be. Those years haven't been wasted and those skills are transferable. If I've learned nothing else, I know I can pick up the ball and run with it when I need to.

So pick me, I say, let me learn and work from the bottom up, because everyone has to start somewhere.

-CP