How to Write a CV in 2026: The Guide for People, Companies and Artificial Intelligence

For a CV to work, it needs three yeses.
The first from the system that reads the document, extracts information and looks for a match with the open position.
The second from the recruiter, who must quickly understand whether the career path makes sense for the role.
The third, finally, from the company, which tries to picture that person within a team, a project and a real responsibility.

Three different readers, who carry out (as you might suspect) three different readings. Structure. Clarity. Evidence.

The problem is that many CVs speak well to only one of the three. Indeed, some are packed with keywords but seem written only for machines. Others are well designed but make it hard to understand what the person has actually done. Others still recount the entire career path without setting any priority, leaving the reader to find what matters.

An effective CV does not behave like this. It manages to communicate with all three ideal readers, retaining the same identity even as the level of reading changes.

According to the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025, by 2030 39% of the skills workers use today will become obsolete. This is one reason why a CV today must make visible what the person can do, where they have demonstrated it and what contribution they can bring to the role they are applying for.

In this guide we will look at how to build each section of the CV, which information to select, how to write up experience, how to present skills and how to make the document readable for ATS, recruiters and hiring managers.

Bliss’s new column on CVs, applications and interviews starts here: because before being chosen, you have to make yourself understood. Let’s work on it together.

A CV Does Not Have to Tell Everything

Absurd as it may sound, it is true: no CV is meant to tell the story of an entire life. Yet one of the most common mistakes starts here, in the moment before writing begins. A blank document is opened and the whole career path is reconstructed directly inside the CV.

Every experience seems important. Every course seems useful. Every project would deserve space. But the result, however complete for the person who wrote it, is unclear to the person who receives it.

So let us start from the premise that a CV is not an archive of your career: it is a selection built for a specific position.
That is why, before the CV, you need a broader document containing all the available information:

• professional experience;
• projects;
• responsibilities;
• results;
• tools used;
• education;
• certifications;
• languages;
• publications;
• volunteering;
• awards;
• skills developed outside traditional roles as well.

From this archive, the most relevant information will be drawn each time.

Europass follows a similar logic: keep your entire body of experience and skills in your personal profile, then create CVs tailored to each application. The path stays the same, but the part brought to the fore changes.

The CV Must Answer One Question

Before choosing the template, the font or the number of pages, you need to complete a sentence: “After reading this CV, a person should understand that I can contribute as…”

How this unfinished sentence ends will set the direction of the document.

Structuring the CV for the Three Readers

An effective downloadable template should follow a simple hierarchy:

This order supports all three readings.

The system recognises sections, headings, dates and skills. The recruiter immediately finds the information needed to get their bearings. The hiring manager can examine the substance of each role in depth and assess how transferable it is.

The design may change depending on the sector, but the logic should always remain the same.

Name and Contact Details: Little Space, No Ambiguity

The first part must contain what is genuinely needed:

• First name and surname;
• City or region;
• Phone number;
• Professional email address;
• LinkedIn;
• Portfolio, personal website or GitHub, where relevant.

A full home address adds no value. The same applies to date of birth, marital status and other personal information, which should be included only when requested or if necessary in the context of the application.

The file name is also part of the presentation. “final CV new 4.pdf” is a name that signals disorder. “Name_Surname_Role.pdf” makes the document recognisable even after it has been downloaded and saved in a folder with other CVs.

Simple details, but ones that are noticed immediately.

The Professional Title Must Guide the Reading

Writing “Curriculum Vitae” as a heading offers no information.

Whoever receives the file already knows what they are opening.

That space should state the professional territory.

“Marketing Specialist” is correct, but broad.

“Content Strategist – Social Media, SEO and Editorial Plans” narrows the field and makes skills that are already usable visible.

“Junior Graphic Designer – Brand Identity and Digital Content” conveys both the seniority and the creative area.

The title must be credible. It can describe the current role or the direction in which the person is building a transition, provided the rest of the document can support it. Someone who wants to move from customer service to human resources, for example, should not claim an HR role they have never held, but should highlight where the two experiences meet: Customer Relations Specialist transitioning to Talent Acquisition.

This way the direction is clear and the path remains honest.

The Opening Profile Must Show Why It Is Worth Reading On

The personal profile is not a cover letter in miniature. It should not contain a list of qualities such as precision, dynamism, creativity, reliability and teamwork.

These terms are hard to verify and could belong to any candidate. A good profile, rather, answers four questions:

1. Who are you professionally?
2. How much experience do you have?
3. In which area are you strongest?
4. What kind of contribution have you already made?

So a more useful wording would be:

Content specialist with three years’ experience managing editorial plans for hospitality and luxury brands. I coordinate copywriting, content production and publishing, working with creative teams and clients. Over the past twelve months I have managed six multichannel editorial calendars and taken part in the SEO review of the related websites.

This version contains information that can be checked against the roles that follow. The profile anticipates what the CV will demonstrate. It does not invent.

Experience Must Show What Happened

The job title and company name provide the context.

The description must show the work.

“Corporate social media management” indicates an area, but does not reveal which channels were managed, with what degree of autonomy, for how many brands or through which activities.

A more precise version might be:

Managed Instagram and LinkedIn editorial calendars for four brands, from coordinating design production to copywriting and publishing. Monthly performance monitoring and preparation of client reports.

The difference comes from the information.
Each role should be written through four elements:

1. The scope

How many clients, projects, people, sites or markets were involved?

2. The action

What did you manage, create, coordinate, analyse or improve?

3. The method

What tools, processes or skills did you use?

4. The evidence

What result, change or level of responsibility shows the value of the activity?

It may concern time, quality, volume, growth, error reduction, project expansion, client satisfaction or the ability to meet a complex requirement.
When the figure is not available, it is better to describe the scope precisely than to invent a percentage.

Activities, Responsibilities and Results Are Not the Same Thing

This distinction makes many CVs immediately clearer.

An activity indicates what was done.
A responsibility shows what the person was accountable for.
Results show the impact of their work. The three can coexist.

The problem arises when the entire experience consists solely of tasks. In that case the recruiter understands what the person did, but not how autonomous they were or what value they produced.

A senior CV should contain above all responsibilities, decisions and results. A junior CV can highlight activities, tools used, context and speed of learning.

This is how a role stops being a mere title and becomes an experience that can be understood.

Skills Must Appear First in the Experience

The “Skills” section is useful for making tools and knowledge immediately visible.

According to LinkedIn’s report on the future of recruiting, 93% of talent acquisition professionals consider accurately assessing skills essential to improving the quality of hires. Companies that make greater use of skills-based searches are also more likely to make quality hires.

This makes the section important, but it also increases the need for precision.

“Leadership” remains a self-assessment.

Coordinated five people during the production of a campaign, assigning tasks and monitoring deliverables

is, by contrast, a credible skill, since the CV makes it possible to trace the situation in which it was used.

How to Speak to the First Reader: ATS and AI Systems

Applicant Tracking Systems are not a single piece of software with universal rules, as each platform uses different technologies and procedures.

The common principle is that the document must be capable of being captured, read and turned into structured information.

Greenhouse, one of the most widely used ATS, accepts DOC, DOCX, PDF, RTF and TXT files and offers full parsing for CVs in Italian as well. Its documentation notes, however, that images, complex tables, information placed in headers and footers, columns, WordArt and documents uploaded as images can lead to incomplete or incorrect readings.

To reduce the risk: (i) use standard section headings, such as Professional Experience, Education and Skills; (ii) always keep the same format for dates, companies and roles; (iii) place your name and contact details in the main body of the document; (iv) check that the text in the PDF can be selected; (v) avoid relying solely on icons or graphics for essential information; (vi) keep the file small; and (vii) review any auto-filled data after uploading. Keywords are only useful when they genuinely describe your experience.

Repeatedly inserting terms taken from the job advert without linking them to projects or responsibilities only produces artificiality.

How to Speak to the Second Reader: The Recruiter

The recruiter needs to get their bearings quickly. That is why the first half of the first page is decisive and should contain: the role; the profile; the most recent or most relevant experience; the core skills.

The visual hierarchy must help the eye find companies, roles, dates and results at once. An effective description does not require long paragraphs.

And be careful: remember that a CV loses credibility when it tries to eliminate every discontinuity. A real career path often contains choices, changes and attempts, and the document’s task is to give them order.

How to Speak to the Third Reader: The Company

The hiring manager reads the CV through the lens of the problem they need to solve. For this reason, experience should make transferability evident.
A candidate from a different sector can be of interest when the CV shows similar problems tackled in other contexts.

The question the company asks itself is:

Has this person already dealt with something similar enough to what they will face here?

The CV must be able to provide an answer.

One Page or Two?

One page may be enough for recent graduates and professionals with a few selected experiences. Two pages allow more experienced profiles to document responsibilities, projects and results without squeezing everything into tiny type.

Length depends on the density of the information.
Every element should pass a test:

Does it help one of the three readers understand the application better?

If the answer is no, it can stay in the archive, because an introductory certification obtained many years ago may no longer be relevant.

And remember: condensing does not mean impoverishing your career path. It simply means choosing what should be remembered.

AI Can Improve Your CV, but It Cannot Invent It

Artificial intelligence can be useful for comparing the CV with a job advert, spotting skills that are not visible enough, and correcting repetitions and errors. However, it cannot invent skills. It never should.

Its limitation emerges when information is missing, because when an AI receives few facts, it tends to complete the text with likely-sounding stock phrases.

The CV thus becomes, however technically correct, identical to everyone else’s.

It is the same risk examined in the Bliss editorial “Everyone Writes on LinkedIn”: when the tool takes the place of experience and point of view, writing loses specificity.

AI should step in after the facts have been gathered.
A useful prompt might be:

Analyse this experience against the job advert. Do not add information. Tell me which responsibilities, skills and results are relevant but still unclear. Ask me the necessary questions before rewriting the text.

The final rule, however, remains simple: nothing should appear on the CV that the person is not ready to explain with an example during the interview.

New Connections (FAQ)

How do you write an effective CV in 2026?

Start from a complete archive of your career and select the information relevant to the position. The title and profile must state a direction; the experience must show responsibility, method and results; the skills must be backed by evidence. Finally, the document must be checked from the perspective of the ATS, the recruiter and the company.

What is the best structure for a CV?

Name and contact details, professional title, profile, experience in reverse chronological order, skills, education and relevant additional sections. The structure can be adapted to the sector, provided the essential information remains immediately recognisable.

Can artificial intelligence be used to write a CV?

Yes, to analyse the job advert, organise information, identify weak points and improve the wording. Experience, results and responsibilities must come from the person. Every generated sentence must be checked and defensible in an interview.

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