Career advice

Research

• Planning: GenAI can support your planning when preparing to apply for a job. Use it to support building knowledge and insights about the organisation and the career opportunities on offer, as well gathering information on market trends.
• Top Tip: The more you understand about the role you’re applying for, the better you can apply your experience, expertise and skills to the role, as well as talk to the growth and impact you can make!

LinkedIn profile

• Photo: Update your LinkedIn profile with a recent photo of you. Putting a face to a name gives a personal touch. Make sure it’s a close shot so that you stand out.
• Headline: Keep the headline up to date (it will appear right under your name). The headline is a fantastic opportunity to make an impactful and concise mission statement. It can also include your job title, but it’s best used to show your inspiration.
• About You: Tailor this section and allow your personality to shine through, this is your chance to tell your story. Remember, your profile helps you showcase yourself, highlighting what you have to offer professionally and represents you – use it to market your skills and experience as well as your education. It's an effective way to highlight your career history, achievements, and passions. GenAI could be a great supporting tool in helping you organise and express your ideas, in a well-structured and coherent way so you communicate your desired narrative.
• Recommendations: Request from your network and gather testimonials that help to bring your profile to life authentically and with credibility.
• Promotion: Ensure you're “Open to opportunities”. This allows recruiters and connections to see that you're proactively looking for your next role.
• Networking: Make connections with friends, peers, colleagues or people already in roles and career paths you're interested in developing for yourself. This is a great way of learning as people often share thought leadership, as well as stories of work and diverse experiences. Connecting with recruiters will also help you find future opportunities. 

CV 

• Personal Information: You don't need to share all your personal information on your CV — your name, contact (email or number), and LinkedIn is fine.
• Tailor: Customise and adapt your CV to the role you're applying for. You can use GenAI to help you do this, as it can structure and highlight relevant skills, experiences, and achievements that match the job description. Don’t forget the research and planning preparation can support this too!
• Achievements: Be concise and include key achievements and the impact you drove across each of your previous roles. Think ‘what legacy did I leave?’ GenAI can help you organise your relevant skills for the job you’re applying to and explore how you can demonstrate the skills you have built from past experiences, so they show up in the best possible way.
• Length: Keep it succinct and relevant. Your CV shouldn’t be longer than two pages.
• Readability: Make sure to check for spelling and grammatical errors. GenAI can help you do this - first impressions count!

Cover Letter 

Your letter should answer the following questions:

• What is your passion and motivation for the organisation and role you're applying to?
• How does your experience and skills match and transfer to the role profile? 
• What impact do you hope to achieve in this role? 

• Ensure your cover letter is set in letter formatting. 

When it comes to writing your CV and Cover Letter, GenAI can help you refine and articulate your own thoughts and ideas, improving clarity and word structure. 

Authenticity: Keep how your present yourself real and consistent whether that’s across your LinkedIn Profile, CV, Cover Letter or other channels – remember you’re building your personal brand across every touch point! When using GenAI to support you, it’s recommended you avoid:

• Using GenAI to create fictional experiences or skills. Your application should reflect your own experience and abilities.
• Directly copying AI-generated responses into your application – this won’t support a real representation of who you are and responses can often come across as formal and generic, not helping you stand out.

Top Tips

We encourage you to use GenAI as a co-pilot, helping you showcase yourself authentically, fine-tune and clarify your ideas. Falsification or misrepresentation of your skills or experiences may lead to disqualification from our recruitment process.

As you learn more about us during our recruitment process, we want to learn more about you — your unique experiences, skills, and perspectives because what makes us different, makes us remarkable together.

Make sure you do not share your personal information (such as your name, age, or address). This ensures the protection of your personal data and upholds your privacy.

If you require reasonable adjustments during your recruitment process, please ensure that you inform us during the application stage.

"Take the time to tailor your CV to every job application, read through the role profile, and ensure you are showcasing your strengths. Don’t forget to harness the power of social media, LinkedIn is a primary tool for our Talent team so best to keep your LinkedIn profile regularly updated!"

Farrah Keyani
Talent Engagement Manager, Global Functions

Research

• Connect: With us on LinkedIn, Instagram or YouTube to learn more about our business. Hear from our people and get a feel for #LifeAtDiageo. Always stay up to date with the latest news. 
• Explore: Our website and Annual Report to gather information and gain further knowledge about who we are – our business, performance, industry, brands, people, and news. You can also use GenAI to support your research to learn more about our sector and industry trends!
• Experience: Thoroughly review the job description to help you understand more about the role responsibilities. This will help you align your experience, skills and expertise to the role requirements and prepare examples of previous experience you’d like to showcase during your interview. To build your confidence, you can use GenAI to get acquainted with the most common interview structures and questions and help you prepare and frame your answers. Using prompts in GenAI tools often yields more useful results to help you prepare.
• Questions: Prepare questions for the interviewer, showing you’ve done your research, and you have an appetite to learn more. If you use GenAI to help formulate questions, using prompts can be a useful way to refine your ideas and help you formulate suitable questions.
• Practice: Boost your confidence and enhance articulation by answering AI-generated behavioural interview questions. Review your answers compared to the suggested ones and tailor them to reflect your own style.
• Mock Interview: It’s a good idea to practice answering common interview questions out loud to help you build confidence and to answer more articulately. A mock interview is also good practice for this – do it with a friend! You can also search for advice on body language and communication techniques for interviews and practice them in mock sessions.
• Who you'll meet: Find out who the interviewer(s) is/are and read their open LinkedIn profile/s. You can find out more about their career path, experiences and skills. This can be useful during your interview to help you build rapport and perhaps ask questions relevant to their work and achievements. 
• Virtual: For a virtual interview ensure you have good internet connection, and everything is working as it should be. Be in an environment that sets you up for success. Think about your video background and limit any distractions and ensure you are presentable.

Top Tips

• Relax: And just be you. Showing who you are and letting your personality shine through means we get to see your authentic self.
• Inclusion and Diversity: Are at the heart of who we are, and we celebrate varied voices. We want to know your perspective and passions because they make you unique. 
• Enthusiasm: Show us yours along with your passion for the role you’ve applied to - this shows us your interest and commitment. 
• Thoroughness: Consider your experience, expertise, and skills and how they match to the role you’ve applied for and why they would benefit the role. Be clear on why you’ve applied for the role. 
• Listen: Make sure you listen carefully to the question being asked. Take your time to consolidate your thoughts and answer concisely. If you need an interview question repeated or rephrased, don't be afraid to ask!
• Be Prepared: Have examples ready to illustrate your answers. The STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Result) is useful when giving examples of how you've handled something in the past or achieved results through your work. It’s helpful to think through the following questions:
  
  • Situation: what was the situation you had to deal with?
  • Task: what was your task/responsibility in the situation?
  • Action: what action did you take to complete the task?
  • Result: what was the result?
• Questions: This is your chance to ask questions about the opportunity. You typically have time during the last section of your interview to ask the questions you’ve prepared.

Authenticity:

• Remember. Refine your work, don’t replace it: We want to know the real you, so always ensure that your responses reflect your authentic self.

• Misusing GenAI could result in a misrepresentation of your abilities, potentially leading to a role that isn’t suitable for you or causing you to miss an opportunity. By not highlighting your true strengths and experiences, you might not stand out in the most desirable way.

Usage of GenAI during a live or virtual interview won’t be permitted while in a recruitment process with Diageo. Interviews are intended to assess how well you fit the role and Diageo, and we believe it's essential to highlight your complete range of skills.

"Authenticity is key during the interview. We value every unique talent and skill you bring to the table. Our culture thrives on individuals who stay true to their character and leadership style—so don’t be afraid to show who you really are”

Maya Hsiao
Talent Engagement Lead - GC, Korea and Japan