Hobbies that may badly hurt your CV

In your pursuit of crafting a compelling CV, it's essential to avoid mentioning generic and commonly listed hobbies in CVs that add little value to your professional profile. In this discussion, you'll gain insights into why popular hobbies in CVs should be omitted and which ones are hobbies worth mentioning, or are the best hobbies for CVs. 

Cooking and baking, while enjoyable, and being popular hobbies might not be the best hobbies in CVs to showcase unless you have a unique achievement, like being a national champion in barbecue. Passive activities like reading novels, having pets, or engaging in video gaming, TV watching and other popular hobbies are not the best hobbies for CVs, are no-go hobbies in CVs, unless there's a noteworthy aspect, such as managing an esports league or building a successful game server community, these are hobbies worth mentioning, killer hobbies. 

Outdoor activities, like hiking or mountain climbing, can be acceptable hobbies in CVs if they demonstrate active involvement and skill development. Traveling, while a popular hobby, is suggested only if accompanied by compelling stories or adventurous experiences rather than routine vacation details. 

Engaging in arts or DIY projects, some popular hobbies, may be hobbies worth mentioning if they are specific, competitive, or particularly outstanding, such as exhibiting paintings at a museum, in this case these would be some of the best hobbies for CVs. However, gardening is a no-go hobby due to its passive and anti-social nature, unless there's a remarkable achievement like winning competitions or breeding unique plants, it is not listed among the killer hobbies. 

Socializing hobbies in CVs, like hanging out in sports bars or clubs, are generally no-go hobbies, but organizing events or sports gatherings for the community can be seen as leadership traits, killer hobbies and some of the best hobbies for CVs. Meditation and wellness activities, while acceptable for some, may be viewed skeptically, especially for men, so it's recommended to tread carefully in this area, so these are not the best hobbies for CVs. 

In summary, the best hobbies for CVs are active hobbies in CVs that showcase skills, competitiveness, or leadership traits on your CV. Avoid passive activities that convey a lack of ambition, and if you choose to include a seemingly mundane hobby, be prepared to follow it up with an intriguing story that sets you apart. The key is to create positive associations in the minds of the readers and make your CV memorable for all the right reasons and include the best hobbies for CVs mentioned above. 

Video transcript:

Hobbies in CVs

Today we'll discuss why it's a bad idea to mention the most popular hobbies and leisure activities in your CV. You will also learn what you better mention.

Gabriel Goldbrain SUCCESS Training

I'm Gabriel Goldbrain and if you need to get your CV and your skills in shape to become a Management Consultant visit my website gabrielgoldbrain.com

Cooking and baking

I will now give you my thoughts on some of the most popular hobbies according to a survey conducted by Statista. Let's talk about cooking and baking. For a woman I think it's okay to mention this as a hobby, but usually a guy, a cooking guy, is not perceived as a leader unless he's into something very specific. Maybe he's a champion and barbecuing a national champion for instance. I mean that would be something worthwhile mentioning but just casual cooking, I mean, that's not a hobby for a leader. So guys, don't put it on your CV!

Reading

Next one- reading. Wow, is that all you can? I mean reading it's a very passive hobby and everyone expects that you're able to read. And no one cares that you read novels so don't mention it because it's adding no value to your CV and it just tells everyone you probably have nothing else that you can show.

Pets

Pets- I mean they're sweet definitely but pets are nothing for a CV unless you maybe breed a certain kind of dogs and you win prizes and win competitions. That's where you show ambition and passion, so that you could mention but most of the people if they like pets or have a pet I think I think that's not a hobby to mention in an ambitious CV. That's childish in some way.

Video Gaming

Video gaming in a CV. Are you serious? You could also mention watching TV… I mean these are passive hobbies, you consume something. Usually, these are hobbies that have nothing to do on an ambitious CV unless you have something special about it. Maybe you're in an Court League which is very successful, you built a gameserver where you like manage a whole community, that is something you could mention, but just gaming and watching TV- no forget about it, that's something for losers, it's not for the ambitious individuals building a strong CV.

Outdoor activities

Outdoor activities what does Goldbrain think about that. Depends if you're into marathons, that's a great great thing to mention. If you're just hanging out at a lake that's nothing to mention for sure, so it could be also something like hiking in the mountain climbing mountains which are really hobbies where you need a certain skill. It at least shows that you're active and I think these are hobbies which you can mention on an ambitious CV. Just make sure that they're not passive, that they're active, where you have to think about things, organize things and where you need to build certain skills over time.

Travelling

Next thing travelling it's not a bad hobby but nothing particular these days, so you can mention it because every manager has to travel a lot so it may give you some credits for like an international mindset, but it won't overly benefit your CV, but at least it won't harm. But, nevertheless be prepared that someone asks you oh I see traveling is your hobby, what great journeys did you do and if the best thing that you can say is okay I spent the summer vacation at a lake in the US and maybe at the seaside in Mexico, come on, that's everything? That's your big passion about traveling? You got to make sure if you put traveling there, put some nice story behind it, because people may be curious and ask you to impress with your travel experiences. Rather mention adventurous trips that you did, so talk about your backpacking tour to India, talk about what went wrong, what problems you faced with transportation, what cultural problems you had to face, that you had to sleep a night outdoors, because this or that that did not happen and did not work out, maybe the hotel was over overbooked, you did not catch the last train. These are the stories people laugh so make sure that you tell a story like this instead of saying okay I took the trip to the hotel in Mexico and they organized everything for me, it was all inclusive. How boring! Make sure if you put a boring hobby on your CV that you have a good story to tell.

Arts

Do it yourself and Arts- it may be okay if you do something very specific, very particular. Maybe something competitive or maybe you paint wonderful pictures which you exhibit at a museum, I mean that can be something for a CV, but make sure that it's just something which you can tell a story about. People want to be impressed by hobbies you you have. In general, only mention things that really make you stand out that, not everyone next door is doing because if you're ambitious you should also express this in your CV and tell people why you're different and what you're doing differently.

Socializing

Socializing- whoa that really may be a killer if you put the wrong things there. Do you really want to tell your new boss that you like hanging out in sports bars, watching baseball games, drinking alcohol? Come on… Same with girls, do you want to tell your new boss you like to drink alcohol in bars and hang out in the VIP Zone? Come on that's nothing for anambitious CV. Things that you may mention in the socializing area is that you may organize an event which takes place every year in your local community or you may organize a sports event which is being attended by local community. I mean these are things which show leadership traits and which you could well mention in a CV because they're special, not everyone does that but come on, hanging out in a sports bars or a club, you're kidding me!

Gardening

Another hobby to avoid is gardening it's a rather passive and antisocial hobby which you do alone so it's not really something you would expect a leader to do, it rather puts up some questions- why is he into gardening? And be pretty sure everyone who sees that from a serious manager in his CV would ask why are you gardening? What is behind that? Maybe then you're prepared to tell a story where you say I'm winning competitions with flowers that I breed, or I'm breeding the biggest pumpkin in the in uh state of Mexico. If you have a good story to tell you may mention it, maybe you're the leading Texan pumpkin breeder and you won a lot of competitions with your pumpkins maybe you could mention it, but in most of the cases don't mention gardening it's nothing you would expect from a successful forward driven manager. 

Meditation and wellness

Last one- meditation and and wellness. Hanging out in public baths or in massage studios, I mean, that's nothing for a serious CV. Meditation you could mention it maybe for the ladies listening to this channel, yoga or something like that I think it would be considered okay, but for a guy it may rather be seen like he's esoteric or like have a strange personality. Maybe some people might rise the eyebrows on that in a serious CV so better don't mention it.

Summary: Best hobbies for CVs

To summarize this hobbies discussion, you should go for special and active hobbies which require a certain skill or maybe which are even competitive in a certain way. These are hobbies that you would expect from a manager. Avoid passive hobbies where you do pretty much nothing than just hanging around watching something consuming. Things like these are hobbies which are usually done by less successful persons, it just may trigger the wrong associations although there is nothing wrong, I mean, even the best manager he will hang out every now and then in a bar and do nothing but it's about the associations certain hobbies create in the mind of the reader, so make sure use the hobbies to fuel the right associations in the minds of the readers and that's what you should have in mind. Put a boring hobby in your CV if you want to provoke a question by someone and then blow them away with what is behind it. That could be another strategy where they say this is the guy who went to Africa with his motorcycle and slept outside in a tent where life and wild animals were around him and then in the desert of Namibia he fixed his motorcycle on his own and had to organize a tire for his motorcycle to continue his ride to South Africa, and this sounds pretty much better then his hobby is motorcycling and whenever he's on holiday he rents a motorcycle for 2 weeks.

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