Ditch the CV. Get a website.

Are you wasting too much time and effort on your CV? 

That time and effort would be better spent on creating a personal website.

In the pre-internet era most senior executives looking for a new job adopted the scattergun approach: get your CV up to scratch, apply to any job that looked remotely relevant, send the CV out to anybody and everybody, and then follow up to get face-to-face interviews wherever possible.

This doesn’t usually work, especially when you’re a senior executive in your 50s. Regardless of how much time and effort you spend perfecting and polishing the final version, no-one is going to remember your CV. What matters is your story. Is it clear? Is it memorable? Is it backed up by your track record in the job?

CVs have tended to become longer and too difficult to digest. In an attempt to cover all eventualities, a lot of executive CVs that we see mention dozens of specialist areas of expertise and hence lack clarity and simplicity. Decision makers want facts and dates, not long lists of skills. When were you there? What was your mission? What did you achieve? The rest is noise. 

Another mistake is to copy and paste the CV into LinkedIn. A skilled researcher will quickly cut through the buzzwords on your LinkedIn profile to identify potential candidates with the right experience and track record. The CV comes later and is really just a way of confirming what you did and when. It’s not going to get you the job.

The main thing you need to think about is your brand. Do you have one? What does it say about you? The right opportunity is far more likely to come from a structured networking strategy combined with a clear and effective personal brand. This is where the personal website can make a big difference.

A personal website should do a few simple things: it should articulate clearly what type of organisations you serve, what you do, and give examples of where you’ve done that. The process of creating your personal website, simplifying and clarifying your message, will help to shape your story. This will then become the cornerstone of your networking strategy. It’s the story and the message that are memorable, not the CV.

The real danger is that over-reliance on the CV ignores the massive changes that have taken place in senior executive hiring. The CV obsession could ultimately prove costly, not just in terms of the time and effort, but also in lost income from a long and protracted job search.  

Don’t waste too much time on the CV. Get a personal website and start building your brand. That’s what’s going to get you your next job - and the one after that.  

Talk to Harlschon to find out how we can help.