Episode 338 - I answer the seven career questions my clients ask most often about visibility, CVs, achievements, career change, age bias, role choice, and career storytelling.

Today I want to talk to you about the career questions my clients ask me most often. And I want to begin with something that I see almost every week. Most experienced professionals don’t have a lack of experience problem. They have a lack of translation problem. They have done the work, they led teams, they managed stakeholders, they have delivered projects, all of that is fine.

When it comes time to explain what they do, what they want next, and why they get stuck.

This is especially true for professionals that work with me, usually in their 40s, 50s, and 60s, because by that stage your career is not simple. You may have worked across sectors, you may have changed functions, you may have had a redundancy, taken time out, for one reason or another. You may be considering changing things like starting consulting or doing board work or starting a portfolio career

And that is often part of the problem because when you can do many things it and you want to do something different, it becomes harder to explain what you want to do next. So in this episode, I want to count down the seven career questions my clients ask me. Most often,

These are broader questions behind a job search, a career transition, or a desire to move into the next stage of your professional life with more clarity. I will start with number seven and work down to number one. Number one is the question that sits underneath almost every coaching conversation that I have. So let’s begin.

Okay, question number seven. How do I become more visible to recruiters and decision makers? Well, this question usually comes from clients who are applying for roles and hearing nothing back. You may relate to that. They are doing what they believe are what they’re supposed to do. They are checking the job boards, they are updating their CV when they apply, and they are applying, and then they are waiting, and then nothing happens or very little happens. This is when they start asking.

How do I get noticed? How do I get on the radar of the in recruiters that are looking for people like me? How do I get people to think of me when they have opportunities coming up? And this is where I often need to explain something really important.

The job market is not only made up of advertised roles, there is also the relationship market, the referral market, the search market, the quiet conversations happening before the role is advertised, the internal discussions that we have when we are thinking about advertising an opportunity and who might be suitable to step up.

The board member who asks, Do we know anyone good? Right? The former colleague who says, I worked with somebody who would be perfect for this. Visibility matters because opportunities often move through trust before they move through process. That does not mean you need to be famous. That does not mean you need to post online every day on LinkedIn. It does not mean you need to become someone that you’re not, but people need to know what you are.

Looking for. They need to understand what you are good at and they need to remember you. Remember you when the right opportunity appears. So for experienced professionals, visibility often begins with reconnecting with former colleagues and managers, recruiters that you’ve just had conversations before who know your market and know your sector.

board contacts, if you have any peers, colleagues, people you have helped in the past, people who understand the level at which you operate. The mistake many professionals make is waiting until they need something before they reconnect.

That can feel really uncomfortable, right? And sometimes it makes the conversation very transactional. A better approach is to stay professionally visible before it’s urgent, before you need it.

I often I do this, you know, if I read something that reminds me of someone, I send them the article, I congratulate someone on a new role, I ask how their sector is going. I share what I’m noticing in the job market before they ask me, you know. Having conversations without immediately asking for a job is so cool and so important because job searching is not only about

When you are available, it’s about being remembered, right? And you cannot be remembered if people do not know what you’re thinking about and what you’re doing, and and where you are. That kind of work that you’re open to, you know, is is something that people need to know about you. So this is really a long-term plan. If you haven’t been doing this yet, that’s

That’s okay, don’t freak out. Just start doing it now. And I hope that you have fun with it because that’s the whole point.

Okay, number six, how do I tailor my CV or profile to specific jobs?

This is one of the most practical questions clients ask me. And they know they should tailor their CV. Everybody knows that. They have heard the advice many times. but they are not sure what tailoring actually means. Does it mean rewriting the whole CV every time? Does it mean changing the summary at the top? Does it mean adding keywords? Does it mean removing old roles?

Matching every sentence to the job ad? And the answer is

That tailoring does not mean pretending that you’re someone else. So let’s start there. It means making the relevant parts of your experience easier to see for that specific role. That is the key. When somebody reads your CV, they’re not trying to admire your entire career and the most interesting things that you have done, even if they are interesting. What they’re trying to do is to answer a very specific question. Is this

person a strong match for this role.

Your job is to help them answer that question very quickly, as quickly as possible. Okay? That means that the top third of your CV matters if you know people are reading with human eyes. I say this because sometimes resumes are read by bots and that is another matter. We’re gonna sort of touch into that, but your headline matters, you know, if the human is reading it. Your summary matters, your key skills matter, your most recent achievements matter.

The language you use needs to reflect the role that you are applying for. If the job is looking for a transformation experience, don’t hide your transformation work on the next page. If the job needs stakeholder engagement, don’t assume the reader will infer it from your job title. It needs to be spelled out. If the job asks for government experience, regulatory experience,

or specific sector knowledge, make sure that that relevant evidence is visible. Okay? The mistake I often see is that experienced professionals include everything and expect the reader to work out what matters.

But the problem is recruiters and hiring managers are super busy and the market is flooded with applications. So they may be reviewing dozens, if frankly, hundreds of applications. And you are not just competing on experience, you’re competing on clarity. Clarity, not just experience, but clarity. So a tailored CV makes that connection between you and the job opportunity more obvious. It says

Here is the part of my background that matters most for this opportunity. Okay, so that’s what you’re trying to do when you’re tailoring your resume. You do not need to rewrite your career. That’s not the point. But you need to rearrange the evidence and make sure that it’s visible.

Okay, question number five. How do I talk about achievements instead of responsibilities?

This is such a common issue. Many professionals write their CVs like job descriptions. In fact, they just get the job descriptions and then copy-paste it. They list what they were responsible for. Responsible for leading teams or managing stakeholders, overseeing budgets, delivering projects, or reporting to a specific executive. And all of that may be true and important, but responsibilities do not always show your impact. They tell the reader.

What sat on your desk. They don’t tell the reader what you changed, what has changed because you were there.

And achievements do matter. An achievement gives the reader evidence. It helps them understand the scale and complexity and the outcome of your work. So, for example, instead of saying that you led a transformation program, you might explain what the program changed in the organization. Did it improve efficiency? Did it reduce costs? Increase revenue, improve customer experience.

Experience, reduced risk, created a new operating model.

All of that is really important and sometimes most times if you can add metrics, the impact is numerical. So you can actually add changes to revenue, changes to cost savings, changes to team size or market share or growth, all of that, either in percentages or

you know, numerical information is so important, but not every achievement has a number, I get it. And that is something that you will sort of have to work out with those different dot points under each of your work experience. Some of the most valuable work senior professionals do is not easy to quantify. I get it.

Because it’s about influence, it’s about simplifying things or negotiating or rebuilding trust, protecting the company’s reputation, improving culture. All of those things are difficult to find the metrics for. But it’s key to move from activity to

Consequence instead of asking what did I do, ask what changed because I did it. So that question can really transform the way you write about your experience. And it also helps in interviews because employers are not only hiring for responsibilities, they’re hiring you for your judgment and your impact and your ability to solve problems.

Okay, question number four. How do I explain a career change or a sector change? This question comes up often with clients who are ready for something different. They may want to move out of higher education or out of corporate or government or consulting. And

go into a portfolio career, go into executive roles or board roles or move from one industry to another. And the problem is rarely that they have no transferable skills. The problem is that they are using the language from the old world where they used to work to speak to the new world where they want to work. So every sector has its own narrative, its own language. Every industry has its own

jargons and assumptions. Every hiring manager has a mental model of what good looks like. So if you are changing sectors, you need to translate your experience. Not dilute it, but translate it. For example, if you have worked in highly regulated environments that may be relevant to financial services or healthcare or energy or education.

professional services. So if you have led complex environments that may be relevant across sectors. If you have worked with boards or unions or as part of an executive team or with customers or donors.

That experience may travel from s one sector to another, but you need to explain it in a language of the new audience and how they understand it. The mistake is assuming that transferable experience is obvious. It is often not obvious. You need to build a bridge for your audience. that bridge might include, you know, common problems.

Common stakeholder issues, common operating environments, leadership challenges.

Commercial issues and this is where career change becomes a communication challenge. You are not asking someone to take a random chance on you. You are helping them see the logic of your move. And that is a very different scenario. A good career change narrative

Answers these three questions. One, why this move? Why does your experience make sense here and why now? When you can answer those questions clearly, your transition becomes easier for other people to understand as well. And when other people can understand it, they are more likely to support it.

Okay, question number three. How do I avoid being seen as outdated, too senior, too old, or too expensive? This is a big one. Big one for my clientele. Many clients don’t always say it directly at first, but they might say, I’m worried, I have too much experience. I don’t want to look overqualified. I don’t want employers to assume that I’m I’m gonna be expensive. I don’t want to sound old fashioned. I don’t want

to look like I’m trying to recreate the role that I had ten years ago.

There’s a lot sitting underneath this question. because age bias is real and they may have experienced it. Overqualification concerns are also real. Salary assumptions, yes, very real. And some employers do make unfair judgments about experienced professionals. And there’s also work we can do in how we present that experience. Because sometimes the issue is not the age itself, it’s

Relevance. If your CV reads like a historical archive, it may make you look backward looking. If your language is outdated, even your fonts, even your type of email address, even if you don’t have a LinkedIn URL included in your resume, it may create a concern.

If your profile focuses on status and titles and authority, it may not show that you are adaptable. And if you list every role you have ever had in equal detail, your message can become too heavy. So the goal is not to hide your experience, but the goal is to frame it well. Experience should be positioned as judgment, pattern recognition, commercial maturity.

stakeholder understanding and leadership. your ability to influence and manage risks should be ⁓

clarified and stated. And that is the advantage of being experienced. But you also need to show that you are current. That means using current language, using recent achievements, understanding market trends, demonstrating that you are adaptable, being clear about the value that you bring, and sometimes being careful about how much detail you include from the early part of your career. You don’t need to prove everything. You need to make

The strongest case for the next role that requires you to step up to that next level. And this may require a lot of editing from you, and that’s when I think coaching really helps because editing is hard to do. And for many experienced professionals, editing is hard because everything feels important. And the reader does not need your full career inventory, even if it is important. They need evidence that.

That helps them say yes to you.

Okay, question number two. What roles should I apply for? ⁓ I get that question so often. This question is really more complex than it sounds because many experienced professionals can do many things, as we’ve said before already.

you may relate to this. You could apply for all types of different roles, right? And you can you feel like you can do so many things like consulting or move sectors or a step sideways or step up or take a contract role or even go into board roles.

So there’s just so much. There’s that they could keep chasing all of these different variables and and opportunities. And the problem is probably at that stage not a lack of options, but the problem is choosing which option makes sense to you now. And this is where job search can be really exhausting. Really exhausting if you get into that rabbit hole of considering all

possibilities. If you are applying for too many different kinds of roles, your message becomes diluted, you get really confused, your CV becomes harder to tailor, your network becomes confused, and even the recruiters don’t know where to place you. And you start measuring yourself against roles that may not even be aligned with what you want. So when a client asks me what role should I apply next, I don’t start with job titles.

I start with fit. You know, the kind of energy that the work needs to give you at this stage of your career. The kinds of problems that you want to solve and that you feel like you do well. The level of responsibility you actually want to do now, you know, having experienced ⁓ different levels, what feels right?

the sectors that make sense for your experience and the environments you want to avoid. That’s often really important at that stage when you’ve had so many different environments and and different experiences.

salary range. Is it realistic? Right? Geography, flexibility, things that you’re no longer willing to tolerate. What would make the next row more sustainable long term for your career? So these things matter, these questions matter because many experienced professionals are not only looking for another job, they’re looking for a better next chapter.

A role that uses their experience without consuming their lives, a role that gives them influence without unnecessary politics, a role that gives them challenge without constant crisis. So before you ask what job should I apply for, ask what do I want this next role to do for my life and for my career? That question leads to better decisions.

Okay, so here is question number one. This is definitely the most popular and the most constant in my coaching practice.

How do I make my career story clear? This is definitely the number one question. Even when clients don’t use those exact words, this is usually what they’re asking. So different ways that they may say this is I don’t know how to explain what I do. My career has been a bit unusual. I’ve done so many different things. I’m not sure what my value proposition is. I don’t know how to position myself.

I’m not sure how to talk about my next move. I don’t want to sound like I’m all over the place.

And underneath all of that is the same issue. The career story is not clear enough yet. Not even for you, let alone for other people. Now, when I say career story, I don’t mean a dramatic personal narrative. I don’t mean turning your career into a motivational speech. I mean a clear, crisp and clear explanation of what your professional identity is. Who are you? What are you what are you known for? What kinds of

problems you solve what environments do you understand and what evidence supports that and what are your what are you looking for that is a career story and for experienced professionals this story needs to be edited carefully because the longer you’re you’ve had a career the more tempting it is to include everything but everything is not strategy everything is a storage unit right so your CV your linked

profile the way that you answer tell me about yourself in in interviews your networking conversations your pitch they should not feel like a storage unit they should feel like a a guided tour okay so that’s probably better you’re helping the listener understand what matters and this may mean choosing

A through line. It may you know, you may choose a through line that weaves everything back together, you know? Maybe it’s transformation, maybe it’s governance, maybe it’s commercial growth. When I look back in my career, the the golden thread that links everything is business development. You know, most of my roles I was hired because I had the ability to engage and bring people together to grow the business through either

philanthropy

or donations or grants or

partnerships with between industry and research so yeah bringing in the money so that’s it you know that was my my through line but finding that is is a really important part of telling a good career story for you it could be something else it could be building teams it could be leading through ambiguity it may be fixing something that’s broken a lot of my clients are are great at fixing things

Maybe it’s helping organizations scale or make better decisions. Structuring chaos. Once you know the through line, everything becomes clearer to you and easier to talk about. Your CV becomes easier to write, your LinkedIn profile becomes more coherent, and your interviews become sharper as well. Your network conversations become less awkward.

In fact it’s really through the network that sometimes you find out what you’re known for and what that through line is. It’s having conversations is better when you’re not ready, if you can talk to people that you trust and ask them what what am I known for? What would you call me, you know, to to ask for help. So all of this is trying to make your job search become more

Focused because you are no longer trying to explain everything, you are explaining the right things, and that’s what creates confidence for you and confidence in others. And it’s not fake confidence, it’s not ⁓ polished confidence, it’s real confidence. It’s the kind kind of confidence that comes from being able to say, This is who I am, this is what I do well, this is where I add value, and this is what I’m looking for next.

That is what people respond well to.

So look, those are the seven broader career questions my clients ask me most often. Of course, there’s so many other questions. Every client is unique. And you know, I think that this is just a great summary for you to reflect upon and hopefully relate to as well.

And underneath all seven questions is one bigger issue. How do I translate my experience into a clear next career move? That is the real work you have to do because experience alone does not speak for itself. You need to frame it well, you need to edit it, you need to connect it to the market, what the market needs now, what’s in demand. You need to help people understand why your background matters.

And here’s what I want you to do after listening to this episode. Take a blank page and write down three things. What do I want to be known for? What problems do I solve best?

And what kind of role, organization, or type of work would make sense for me to do next? Don’t overthink it, just write down quickly, start there, because clarity is not something you magically find, it’s something that you incrementally build. And if you need help building that clarity, this is the work that I do with clients through pirate coaching, through developing their career strategies, developing their

LinkedIn presence, you know, I I do LinkedIn audits, I have one-on-one consultations, I have private coaching retainers, and you can find all of that information on my website. It’s Renata Bernarde.com That’s R-E-N-A-T-A-B-E-R-N-A-R-D-E dot com.

Thank you once again for listening to the Job Hunting podcast. Sometimes I find it so hard to believe that thousands of you are listening because I’m all by myself here alone recording this episode and it warms my heart, especially when I get feedback of a specific episode really resonating with you. So if you have feedback like that, please get in touch. You know, I’m assuming you’re subscribed to my newsletter already. If you’re not, why not? The newsletter is awesome.

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