Why your CV should contain a single page and how to make it fit, even with lots of experience

When I was seeking my first job, I faced a common problem: I had nothing to put on my CV.

Most people go through the same challenge. We start looking for a job, google how to create a CV, and see that we must include our personal information, studies, and professional experience (in reverse chronological order). However, we have nothing to put there.

So, why would a company hire us?

Same problem, different perspective

Some years later, I faced, without realizing it, the same problem. But this time, I was on the opposite side.

After working at a few companies and completing several projects, the “Professional Experience” section on my CV was heavy. I had lots of things to write about. So, I proudly included them all (in reverse chronological order). Although I tried to be consice, I put everything, and that was too much.

My mistake was not asking the same question: “Why would a company hire me?”

Reasons for keeping it short

I can think of several reasons for keeping your CV short. These are the most relevant:

No one will read it

Some people come home after work and can talk to their partners for one hour about their day.

If 60 minutes of talking are acceptable for 8 hours of work, why wouldn’t 2 pages be for describing an entire life?

Well… Basically, because the hiring manager is not your partner, and they have another 30 “partners” who wrote about their lives and want to be hired, too.

Lack of intention

Although the biggest problem I see on the CVs is not the length but the lack of intention, by keeping it short, you are more likely to fill it with intention.

Try to answer the question: “Why would a company hire me?”. If I dump everything I did on my CV, I’m implicitly answering it this way: “I have no idea. I’m just putting everything and hoping they find the why.” Unfortunately, that’s not a good strategy.

If you force yourself to make it 1 page, you must choose. And when you choose, you will prioritize the more interesting experiences for the reader.

Why you think you need 2 or more pages

I asked myself that when I first stumbled into the one-page rule, and my answer was clear.

I was convinced I needed many pages because I had lots of experience. Some years later, I realized it wasn’t true.

I did have a long work history, but the reasons for writing many pages were some others:

• I was talking about myself but not about how I could contribute to the company
• I had no idea what they wanted, so I dumped everything I did, hoping they could pick something they liked.
• I limited my creativity to the standard, boring format because I feared doing something different and being rejected.

Those were my biggest mistakes when creating my resume. If you identify similar ones, this is how I worked on them.

Make it fit

When I first tried to reduce the length so it fit on a single page, I did it wrong.

Instead of choosing the most relevant experiences and skills, I re-wrote the sentences using fewer words, reduced the font size, and expanded the page margins. That’s not the idea. The single page is an arbitrary metric that actually means: “Choose the most relevant information.”

Even though my first 1-page version was even worse than the “long” one, I eventually found how to fix it:

Understand the resume’s objective

It’s not to talk about yourself—no one cares—but to convince them that you can contribute and add value to them.

Of course, if you were to write down every experience, position, and project you implemented, you could write a book. A boring one, but a whole book.

Instead, shift the focus. Highlight your achievements, talk about your solutions, ideas, the challenges you overcome, etc.

What are their problems?

Even if you want to mention every win, your resume will still be a long, boring, and boastful manuscript.

The only way to choose among all your victories is to know what they seek. If you know they have high turnover, you can emphasize your self-management and ability to adapt to new positions.

Of course, you will have the stories you will always tell. But beyond those, it’s better to select the ones that are interesting to them.

Stand out

Be creative. Design a resume in the format that better represents you and your contribution.

Summarize past experiences that are not relevant to the current application.

Avoid including information just because most people do.

Be concise, be direct, and cut out. You will always have time to provide more information during the interview.

Conclusion

Although the single-page rule is arbitrary, the idea behind it is to be concise and carefully choose the most relevant experiences for the position.

Multiple years of experience don’t mean that everything applies to that role. So, that’s not a valid reason for creating a long CV. Dumping every experience on a few pages and hoping the hiring manager will pick something meaningful from it is not a good strategy (they won’t even read them).

Understanding the CV’s objective, talking in terms of the company’s problems, and showing courage by standing out are 3 key ingredients to success in your job-seeking process.