Preparation

There should be at least three parts to your application, i.e. 1) A covering letter, 2) A current Resume, and 3) A statement or statements about how you meet the selection criteria for the position. These are detailed below.

Covering Letter

First impressions count. The covering letter is you introducing yourself to us. It should be concise, provide a summary of the reasons as to why we should consider you for the position and be written in such a way that will make us want to read more about you. The covering letter should include:

• The title of the position you are applying for;
• The date and media source (ie where you saw the ad); and
• A brief summary of why you are applying for the position and what qualifications and experience you have that is relevant to the position.

Resume

A resume is a short chronological statement of your work history and your qualifications. Your resume can include other relevant information. As a minimum it should cover the following areas;

• Your employment history
  Starting with your current or most recent position including details such as employment dates, the capacity in which you were employed, your position and brief outline of your main areas of responsibility. Don't put information here that can't be supported. 
• Your qualifications
  If the position asks for qualifications and/or training you must identify that you have them. If you have any other formal qualifications - list them. Again, the most recent first identifying title, year awarded and Institution. You will be asked to prove these if you are offered the job. 
• Other information
  Such as referee details (make sure you seek their permission), your hobbies, any achievements and any other information you want us to know about you. We don't need to know everything about you, just the things that relate to the job. Again keep it short, preferably in dot point form.

Qualifications and experience about the job

There is no right or wrong format for this, just be sure that you demonstrate to us that you can do the job. As a suggestion, the position description contains information clustered under various headings. For each of these headings think about what you have done, how you have done it and what you achieved.

Write it all down as if you were telling someone about it and then cut it back by at least half. Be concise and tell us the most relevant information - not everything. Depending upon the job, about half an A4 page per heading is sufficient. The more senior the position, the more detailed the response.