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The University of Sheffield

How to Succeed at: Writing Applications

The University of Sheffield via FutureLearn

Overview

Prepare for a new career with $100 off Coursera Plus
Gear up for jobs in high-demand fields: data analytics, digital marketing, and more.

Experts from The Careers Service here at The University of Sheffield share their top tips to help you write exceptional applications, CVs (or résumés), covering letters and personal statements.

You’ll also hear from employers and admissions tutors to find out what they really look for in a candidate. And once you’ve written that perfect application, prepare for the next stage with our course: How to Succeed at: Interviews.

This course is designed for anyone applying for jobs or courses. It will be of particular interest to those in the early stages of their career, or those who are out of practice and need to update their skills. No prior knowledge or expertise are needed.

Syllabus

  • Preparing to apply
    • Welcome to Week 1
    • Understanding yourself
    • Understanding jobs and courses
    • Making the match
    • Summary of the week
  • CVs and covering letters
    • Welcome to Week 2
    • Create an effective CV
    • Develop a professional online profile
    • Sell yourself in your covering letter
    • End of week summary
  • Application forms and personal statements
    • Welcome to Week 3
    • Outstanding application forms
    • Brilliant personal statements
    • End of course summary

Taught by

Hilary Jones and Pamela Hafekost

Reviews

4.7 rating, based on 441 Class Central reviews

4.7 rating at FutureLearn based on 405 ratings

Start your review of How to Succeed at: Writing Applications

  • Anonymous
    It was a nice course, helps me to know what i need to put in my cv, helps me to know how organisate my thoughts in the personal statement, a good tool to give examples of experiences like the STAR tool, and others stuff i think its very usefull for the life.
  • I've taken a lot of writing courses in my life, but I must confess that "How to Succeed at: Writing Applications" organised by the University of Sheffield via FutureLearn is exceptional. The course teaches modern approaches to preparing applications that guarantee employment at workplaces and admission at institutions. We, the course-takers, are provided with real-time materials to assist us to gain insights into the world of applications and sell ourselves to recruiters. If anyone is looking forward to "upping" their application writing skills, the course is a must.
  • It's a very easy course to prepare resumes, linkedin profiles and job / courses applications. It's well documented with recruiters interviews.
  • Ih San
    - A wonderful course! - I liked the pedagogical approach the course used to attract attention from the first till the last step, with various activities (videos, articles, exercises and successful samples with analysis - I liked the discussions, th…
  • Naif ALHEMYARI
    This course is really beneficial for recruiters either who is going to apply for new work/course or for who would like to improve his application CV and covet later. For me I gained a lot of tips and information that were missed in this field, on the other hand, I feel I get more confident about my CV and cover later. Thank you so much
  • Anonymous
    A good course for all rounded preparation of an application of almost any kind. I give it four because I feel that it may be too much and a little bit frightening for young lads to prepare applications. Otherwise, it is an "all in one ' course and I am grateful for the organizers.
  • Anonymous
    It is quite a useful course for people pursuing their new careers. You can get handy templates used for your applications for jobs or courses. Through quizzes or exercises, you can test your learning results. Highly recommended.
  • Anonymous
    This course takes one step by step on how to write applications for jobs or courses.
    This makes it easy to understand and identify your strengths and the mistakes made by oneself.
  • Anonymous
    Hi, I enjoyed a lot to knew excellent skills with this course I hope this course skills absolutely explore me through future life.

    Thank you.
  • Anonymous
    This course helped to understand basic important point to write application best ways. You can understand what's active style , and brand yourself in a better way on front of any organizations / recruiters /manager . You can also learn basic important principal of writing application . It's very helpful specially for biggner . Must be checked it . learned to write proper application methods . In this way you can build confidence to show yourself on paper form of writing style . I like it . Thanks future learning .
  • Anonymous
    If you are struggling with job applications or university/college applications then I would highly recommend this course as it provides a great deal of useful information such as preparing CVs and covering letters, STAR, the type of questions you might be asked at an interview and the best way to answer them. It provides information on how to approach an application form, sample CVs and covering letters.
    The videos are quite good too. The people involved know what is expected of potential candidates whether it's for a job or an application to a university or college. I would definitely recommend listening to what they have to say and taking onboard their advice.
  • Anonymous
    Writng application must be accurate , clear and related to the a job . First of all write clear info. about youself. List of education , date ,grade and format specified in the instruction.Then give brief details of each period of employment and wo…
  • It is an effective course to develop your skills.It shares tips ,techniques and ways to write best applications.If you learn it ,your chances of getting a job might increase significantly.Good luck!
  • Anonymous
    I'm a mature aged professional looking to make a career change. I found the course a valuable exercise as it has helped get up to date with current recruitment trends, writing application, especially streamlining them). The STAR model a very useful tool. I would recommend this course to all age groups.

    The handouts very helpful.

    Thank you for giving me the opportunity to join the course.
  • Martha Njoki Muthoni
    I have enjoyed every bit of the course. I have tried most of the tasks and loved the results. This is a rich course that I would highly recommend to students and even adults and everyone who wants to stand out in their career. It is well organised,…
  • Anonymous
    I greatly appreciate your valuable insights on how to approach introducing oneself to a new company in a logical and motivating manner. Your solutions have proven to be incredibly helpful and I am grateful for the guidance you have provided. Thank you for sharing your expertise with me.
  • Anonymous
    I liked this course very much. This course was to my expectation level. I can see the guidance through out the course to improve writing application. I hope this will enable me to qualify for the job position or phd study.I can see the postgraduate, research and phd opportunity at the last part of your program. I hope that this course will provide me the guidance for opportunity to advance in my academic and professional career. Thanks for allowing me to be a part of the programme and I would be very grateful if I get the opportunity to join the advance programme to get advance research and phd to broaden my knowledge at your prestigious university. Please help me and guide me.
  • Chunfang Zhang
    I very much like the course “How to Succeed at: Writing Applications” provided by the University of Sheffield via FutureLearn, the duration of which is 3 weeks. There are 51 sections, including 22 articles, 16 videos, 3 quizzes, 6 discussions and 4 exercises. I am happy to have completed the course and do appreciate the diligent, friendly and excellent course team, attractive instructional design, helpful contents, rich resources, and diversified teaching methods. I have benefited a lot from the tips and techniques, together with the brilliant samples and detailed analysis for making more effective applications. I do recommend you to attend the course.

  • Anonymous
    Excellent course. The content is the complete package of drafting profile, written and video CV and cover letter. Moreover, the questions regarding the process of drafting CV, profile and cover letter and their answers analysis are really very important.
  • Anonymous
    The course is very good, very useful and quite complete, but you have to be really committed if you want to get the most out of it and not forget the knowledge they give us. They really teach you what fits reality and give you good examples
  • Anonymous
    This course has been wonderful as it has added a lot of knowledge and understanding about writing applications. So many tips that I had not known before I can confidently portray them now and I'm so grateful indeed. The resources provided were very rich in information and very clear for everybody to understand. This is a very wonderful course that you cannot afford to miss as it accelerates your energy to have confidence while doing your applications. I recommend this course to anybody willing to learn more on writing applications and thank all the organizers for the success of this course, I can't thank you enough.

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