Ask a hiring manager what makes a good CV and you will get a shrug: “I know one when I see it.” That is true, and unhelpful. So we sat down and worked out what we are actually noticing in those first twenty seconds, when a CV goes from the pile to the shortlist or to the bin. There are eleven things. Some are obvious. Several are not, and they are the ones that separate a CV that gets interviews from one that is merely tidy.

1. The three facts are visible without scrolling

What you do, at what level, and where. On a good CV those three facts are in the top third of page one: in the personal statement and in the first line of the current role. On a weak CV the reader has to assemble them from a job history, and most do not bother. If someone can glance at your CV and say “finance manager, eight years, manufacturing, currently at a £40m site”, you have passed the first test.

2. The job title matches the job being advertised

Not necessarily your current title, but the one you are targeting, somewhere in your own words near the top. Recruiters search for it and hiring managers look for it. “Customer Success Evangelist” means nothing to someone hiring an account manager. Translate internal titles into market titles, and say in the personal statement what role you are looking for.

3. Numbers, early and often

A number is the fastest signal that someone has done things rather than been present while things happened. Team size, budget, revenue, percentage improvement, time saved, headcount hired. A hiring manager scanning a page registers numbers before words. Three or four in the first half of page one and the CV reads as credible before anyone has read a full sentence.

4. Outcomes, not duties

“Responsible for managing a team of ten” is a duty. Everyone who held the job had it. “Took over a team of ten that was 22% behind target and finished the year 6% over” is an outcome, and it is yours. The majority of CVs we see are lists of duties copied from job descriptions. The good ones read like a list of things that changed because this person turned up.

5. Recent roles get the space

A CV that gives equal weight to every job, back to 2009, tells the reader the author does not know what matters. The last two roles should take most of page one. Anything older than ten years gets a line or two. A hiring manager wants to know what you can do now, and a CV that is proportioned that way signals judgement.

6. Progression is visible

Promotions, expanded scope, bigger numbers over time. A good CV makes the trajectory obvious: title changes shown separately under the same employer, scope growing from role to role. Where the trajectory is flat, the best CVs show growing responsibility within the title instead. What a hiring manager does not want to have to do is work out whether three similar-sounding roles were a plateau or a climb.

7. It is two pages, single column, one typeface

Format is noticed before content. A two-column design with icons and skill bars takes the eye longer to find the three facts, and it parses badly in applicant tracking systems. A plain, well-spaced document with clear headings is read faster and trusted more. Nobody has ever been hired because their CV had a sidebar.

8. Nothing that makes the reader work

Acronyms specific to one employer. Project codenames. Internal grade bands. Dense eight-line paragraphs. A hiring manager with two hundred CVs will not decode any of it. Good CVs are written for a smart reader who knows the industry but not your company, and every line can be understood on first reading.

9. The gaps are handled, not hidden

A gap is not a problem. A gap that has been disguised with year-only dates, or an overlapping role that does not add up, is. Hiring managers notice the arithmetic. A good CV uses month and year throughout and, where there is a break of more than six months, gives it a line: a career break, a period of study, caring responsibilities. Said plainly, it is forgotten; concealed, it becomes the interview.

10. No adjectives doing the work of evidence

“Dynamic”, “passionate”, “results-driven”, “proven track record”. These phrases are on so many CVs that the eye slides over them. Worse, they signal that the author did not have a fact to put there. Good CVs are almost adjective-free. Where the writer wants to claim a quality, they show the result that demonstrates it and let the reader draw the conclusion.

11. It has clearly been written for this job

Not rewritten, but tailored: the last sentence of the personal statement names the kind of role, the first bullets under the last two jobs speak to what the advert asked for, and the language matches the language the employer uses. A hiring manager can tell within seconds whether a CV was sent to them or sent to everyone, and the ones sent to everyone go to the bottom of the pile.

What a good CV does not need

• A photo (in the UK it is a negative, not a neutral)
• A date of birth, nationality or marital status
• A “Curriculum Vitae” heading
• Hobbies, unless directly relevant
• References, beyond “available on request”
• A skills matrix or star ratings
• Colour beyond a single accent for headings

The 20-second test

Give your CV to someone who does not know your job. Let them look at page one for twenty seconds, then take it away. Ask them: what does this person do, at what level, and what are they looking for? If they can answer all three, the CV passes. If they cannot, the problem is in the top third of page one, and that is where to spend your time.

Frequently asked questions

What is the most important part of a CV?

The top third of the first page: the personal statement and the first few lines of your current role. That is what gets read in the initial scan and it decides whether the rest gets read at all. There is a separate guide to writing the personal statement.

How do I make my CV stand out?

Not with design. With specificity: numbers, outcomes, and a clear statement of what you are and what you want. A plain CV with four strong numbers on page one stands out more than a designed one with none.

Do hiring managers really only spend 20 seconds on a CV?

On the first pass, yes, and often less. The ones that pass that scan get read properly, which takes a few minutes. The twenty seconds decides which group you are in.