HAVING RECENTLY DISCOVERED that my 16-year-old had far too much time on her hands, which was leading her to find any and all kinds of trouble that exist in the world, we decided that it was finally time for her to get a part-time job.

To be fair to her, she has wanted a job ever since she realised that employers give you money in exchange for your time, and that this money could then be converted into clothes, make-up, concert tickets and matcha.

She had already sent her CV out to a couple of local businesses since turning 16, but hadn’t heard anything back, and I didn’t really push the issue either. I was reluctant for her to take yet another step into adulthood, and also far too aware that she will spend enough summers working in her lifetime.

Anyway, she really enjoyed Transition Year this year and basically had an entire year off, so we thought a little hard work over the summer might do her some good. I decided to help her with the recruitment process, and give her the benefit of my expertise, and actually within seconds of opening her CV realised that she had misspelled her email address, and also entirely forgotten to include her phone number.

This probably explains why no potential employers had contacted her previously, and also prompted me to quietly delete the line where she claimed to have ‘excellent attention to detail’.

Stepping into the big, bad world

It’s hard to do a CV for a 16-year-old because there’s only so much filler you can add. Work experience was, obviously, a little thin on the ground, so we mostly tried to focus on her strengths.

And then I just… adjusted them slightly. So, ‘will argue to the death if asked to unload the dishwasher when it’s her sister’s turn’ became ‘excellent........

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