I was on a call last week with a client, a highly experienced Senior Manager in the tech sector. He had a fantastic career spanning over two decades.
The problem? His CV was four pages long.
It detailed every role he’d had since graduating from university, including his first junior position from 2002.
When I suggested we cut everything before 2015, there was a long pause on the other end of the line. “But Tony,” he said, “all of that experience is what made me who I am.”
I understand completely. Every role you’ve ever had, every project you’ve worked on, feels like a crucial chapter in your professional story. You’re proud of that journey, and it feels dishonest or dismissive to simply delete it.
That’s a tough feeling to shake. You’re right to feel that your history has value.
Remember this : Your CV is not your autobiography. It’s a marketing document designed for one purpose: to get you an interview for your next role.
The story you’re telling yourself is that more experience equals more value. But for a busy hiring manager scanning 100 CVs, the story they see is often one of clutter, which hides your most relevant skills.
This is where the ‘10-Year Rule’ comes in. It’s a simple but powerful principle I use with nearly all my mid to senior level clients.
The rule is this: your CV should focus in detail only on the last 10 years of your career.
Anything older than that doesn’t get erased from history. It simply gets handled in a much more strategic way.
So, how do you apply this correctly?
First, go through your work experience and be ruthless. Draw a line under everything that happened more than a decade ago. All the detailed bullet points and lists of responsibilities for those older roles must go.
This leaves you with a clean, focused list of your most recent and senior positions. This is now the core of your CV.
You might be asking, “But what about my early experience? How do I account for it?”
The answer, and the most effective professional approach, lies in your bio. You must weave your full career history into that powerful opening statement at the very top of your CV.
This is the method that gets my clients results.
Instead of listing an old role, you summarise it with a clear, confident statement that establishes your seniority immediately.
For example:
“A Finance Director with over 20 years of progressive experience in the banking and professional services sectors…”
This single sentence does all the heavy lifting. It tells the reader you have deep experience without forcing them to read about your Junior Analyst role from years ago. It claims your seniority right from the start and frames the rest of your CV with authority.
I know it can feel like a drastic edit. But there are very practical reasons why I write CV’s using this approach.
Hiring managers and recruiters are incredibly time-poor. They spend, on average, 6-8 seconds on their first scan of a CV. They are looking for your most recent, relevant experience that matches the job they need to fill.
Your successes from 15 years ago, whilst important to you, are far less relevant to them than what you’ve accomplished in the last five years. The world of work, technology, and business practices moves too quickly.
Focusing on the last decade forces you to showcase your most strategic, high-impact work. You’re no longer applying for junior roles, so the duties you had as a junior are just noise.
This approach also helps you navigate Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS). These systems are looking for a strong match to the keywords in the current job description. A CV that is tightly focused on recent, relevant experience often performs better than one that is diluted with outdated information.
Of course, this is a guideline, not a rigid law.
If you managed a ground-breaking project 12 years ago that is directly relevant to the role you want now, you can absolutely include it. The key is to be intentional.
Similarly, if you’ve been with the same company for your entire 20-year career, you apply the rule by focusing the detail on your most recent roles. Give the most space to your time as a Senior Manager, and summarise your earlier years as a Team Lead or Specialist.
It feels counterintuitive, I know. You’ve worked hard to build that long record of experience.
But letting go of the need to list every single detail is liberating. It allows you to craft a sharper, more compelling, and forward-looking document.
You’re not hiding your past. You’re simply shining a brighter spotlight on your present and future value.
Taking a red pen to two decades of your hard work can feel daunting. It’s often hard to see your own career objectively.
If you’re struggling to decide what to cut and what to keep, let’s talk. Book a free 30-minute consultation with me. Together, we can shape a CV that respects your past but is built to win your future.