The Blog
By Michael Muir
Notes from the desk.
Recruiter insight on CVs, career positioning, and how hiring decisions are actually made. From twenty years reading CVs for real mandates.
Browse by Pillar
Six pillars
From the Other Side of the Table
What recruiters actually see.
Explore the pillar
The New Playbook
How to do the job search differently.
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Market Reality
The data behind the landscape.
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The Search Is Broken
The myths that cost candidates jobs.
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The Interview Room
What happens after the CV lands.
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The Long View
The career beyond the next role.
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All Notes
9 pieces
How Recruiters Actually Read Your CV
What happens on the first pass, and why most CVs fail before they are read.
The three places a recruiter's eyes go, in order
What Positioning Actually Means (And Why Your CV Probably Gets It Wrong)
Most CVs answer the wrong question. They describe where you have been instead of making the case for where you should go next.
Most CVs answer where you have been. Recruiters need to know what you are for.
Why Your LinkedIn Profile Is Undermining Your CV
LinkedIn is not a social network for your job search. It is a credibility surface. And most profiles undermine the CV they are supposed to support.
A recruiter reads your CV and your LinkedIn side by side. Most profiles don't match.
The Difference Between a CV Rewrite and a CV Assessment
A rewrite gives you a better document. An assessment gives you the understanding to write every CV you will ever need.
Very different things, often sold as the same service
Nobody reads your CV in six seconds
The 6-second CV scan comes from a 2012 white paper by a CV-rewriting service, n=30, no peer review. Independent research with better methodology finds recruiters typically spend 17-30 seconds on the initial scan, and several minutes for well-matched senior candidates. Here is where the number came from, what the evidence actually shows, and why the myth persists.
Recruiters who actually spend less than 10 seconds on a CV
The ATS rejection myth: what software actually does to your CV
The claim that 75% of CVs are auto-rejected by software is almost certainly false. Here is what applicant tracking systems actually do, what the best research shows, and why at senior levels it barely matters.
Recruiters whose ATS does not auto-reject anything. The myth, busted.
From the Other Side of the Desk
The writing is free. The personal version is the report.
Notes from the desk apply the thinking broadly. The CV Intelligence Report applies it specifically, to your CV, with a full rewrite and two production-ready documents.