CV advice
The five CV mistakes costing experienced candidates interviews
Talent Media · 3 July 2026 · 4 min read
After reviewing several thousand CVs, the same five problems come up again and again.
Most CVs from experienced people fail for the same reasons.\n\n**1. Duties instead of impact.** "Responsible for the budget" says nothing. "Reduced supplier costs 18% on a £4m budget" says everything.\n\n**2. Front page wasted.** A profile paragraph of adjectives, then the good content on page two. Reverse it.\n\n**3. No scale.** Team size, revenue, headcount, geography. Without those numbers a reader cannot place you.\n\n**4. Twenty years of equal weight.** The last five years deserve most of the page. Summarise the rest in three lines.\n\n**5. Formatting that breaks parsing.** Tables, text boxes and headers stop screening software reading your CV at all.
Related reading
How to Write CV Bullet Points That Win Interviews
A repeatable formula for turning duties into evidence, with before-and-after examples for office, technical, m…
Read nextWhat to put in your CV , and what to leave out
A headhunter's checklist of what belongs in a CV, what quietly costs you interviews, and the formatting rules …
Read nextThe No-Experience CV: A 2026 Guide for Students, Graduates and Career Changers
How to build a credible one-page CV when you have little or no paid experience, using study, part-time work, p…
Read next