There are two kinds of job seekers, those who take the time and actually read the advert and fully understand what it asks of them, then post their CV with a covering letter explaining why they feel the job would be an excellent career move for them and what they have to offer and there are those that completely ignore everything and just post their CV.

From an employers point of view as well as recruiters the latter just wastes time, money and energy. Yet still we find candidates applying for vacancies at the rate of 10 to the dozen. For an experienced recruiter the volume of CV's screened daily can be quite horrendous, sifting and sorting and deleting sometimes 100 a day. Even the ones without a covering letter are read through, "just in case"!

But the successful candidates don't follow this pattern, they grab the attention of the recruiter/employer with the covering letter, pointing out briefly the reasons they applied for the job, no more than one or two sentences is required. The CV should be between 2 and 4 pages long, although styles do change. No pictures, business logos or overly fussy font styles. The CV should represent you the way you want to be seen, focused, to the point and a high achiever.

THE CV (Curriculum Vitae)
Here is an example of a successful CV format.
Name
Contact details
Profile
Professional Experience
Job title
Present/most recent employer
Start/leave dates
Company profile
Responsibilities
Achievements

Then repeat for up to 10 years work experience
job title
employer
start/leave dates
company profile
responsibilities
achievements

If more than 10 years work experience just list briefly other industry work experience.

Then
Accreditation (education/work related qualifications, driving licence)
Date of birth (here or under contact details at the top)
Finally interests/hobbies.

Why this format?
To be honest it's not the only format you can use, but it works well as it is simple, direct and keeps the CV focussed.

Profile: Explained
You should be highlighting your skills in a brief format, i.e. you are "dynamic, enthusiastic, sales-orientated, strong communication skills". You have work experience in "Media Sales, Telecoms, IT CRM database sales, property, call centre, recruitment".

Professional Experience: Explained
You work in "your specialist" industry generating new clients, account managing key clients, using IT skills including Powerpoint, or apple works, Internet, intranet, you achieve your targets monthly, weekly or/and quarterly.

Job Title
Company Profile: Explained
This demonstrates your knowledge and understanding of your employers business in what it does and who to.

Responsibilities: Explained
What you do every day, every week, every month, who you report to, who reports to you (or how many).

Achievements: Explained
Sell yourself here, did you win any awards, commendations, break sales records, manage any well known clients, generate any new clients, retain and improve existing clients.

Why are you leaving is not always required on a CV, but because you achieved you want to expand your horizons is a perfectly OK way to explain yourself.

Accreditation: Explained
By now the employer/recruiter should be already interested in you so keep your education, work related qualifications to the point, no need to enhance your CV here as it becomes superfluous and unnecessary.

Interests: Explained
Some employers want team players who captained their school team others want to know you are a socialite and some look for a character fit. Don't suggest anything other than who you really are, if it's gardening and surfing the internet or playing football or Mountain bike riding then great, just keep it real.