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Create ResumeCareer progression on your CV should show one thing clearly: you were trusted with more responsibility over time because your work created value. That may mean promotions, bigger clients, larger budgets, team leadership, wider remit, specialist expertise, or moving from support work into decision making. In the UK job market, recruiters and hiring managers do not just look for job titles. They look for evidence that your career has moved forward in a way that makes sense for the role you are applying for. The mistake I see constantly is candidates listing every task they have ever touched, but not showing the actual growth. Your CV should make progression obvious within seconds, without forcing the reader to decode your career history like a mildly irritating puzzle.
Career progression is not just having a more senior job title. That helps, of course, but titles can be misleading. I have seen “Manager” titles with no people management, “Senior” titles given after six months, and “Head of” titles in tiny companies where the person was essentially the entire department. Hiring managers know this too.
On a CV, career progression usually means you can show one or more of the following:
You moved into more senior roles
You gained wider responsibility
You managed people, projects, budgets, clients, regions, systems, or stakeholders
You became more commercially trusted
You moved closer to strategy, decision making, or leadership
You handled more complex problems
Recruiters do not have unlimited time to interpret vague CVs. A busy recruiter may scan your CV quickly before deciding whether to read properly, shortlist, reject, or park it for later. Career progression gives them a shortcut. It tells them whether your career has momentum.
This does not mean everyone needs a perfect ladder shaped career. Real careers are often messy. People take sideways moves, career breaks, contract roles, redundancies, internal transfers, relocations, and role changes that do not fit neatly into a LinkedIn success quote.
But even if your path is not linear, your CV still needs to explain the logic.
Recruiters care about progression because it helps answer several hiring questions:
Has this person grown in responsibility?
Have previous employers trusted them?
Are they ready for the level they are applying for?
Have they stayed too operational for a role that now requires strategy?
Are they changing direction intentionally or drifting?
You delivered stronger outcomes over time
You were promoted, retained, selected, or given more ownership
The key phrase here is over time. A strong CV does not just say what you did. It shows how your scope changed.
When I screen a CV, I am not only asking, “Can this person do the job?” I am also asking, “Has this person shown the kind of growth that makes their next move believable?” That is where career progression becomes powerful. It helps the reader understand why your current target role is the logical next step rather than a random leap.
Is there evidence of impact, or just a list of duties?
Does the career story make sense?
This is where many candidates underestimate the reader. Hiring managers are not just checking whether you have “experience”. They are assessing risk. A CV with clear progression reduces that risk because it shows patterns of trust, growth, delivery, and readiness.
The harsh but useful truth is this: if you do not explain your progression clearly, recruiters may not give you the benefit of the doubt. They may simply move on to the candidate whose CV is easier to understand.
The best way to show career progression is to combine role structure, dates, scope, achievements, and context. Do not rely on job titles alone. Use your CV layout to make the progression visible, then use your bullet points to prove it.
A strong career progression section usually does four things well:
Shows your roles in reverse chronological order
Makes promotions or internal moves easy to spot
Explains how your responsibility increased
Proves your growth through outcomes, not just tasks
Here is the recruiter logic behind this. If I see three roles at the same company, I want to know whether you genuinely progressed or whether the company just changed titles. If I see five years in one role, I want to know whether you grew during that time or stayed at the same level. If I see a career change, I want to know what skills transferred and why the move makes sense.
Your CV should remove those doubts before they become objections.
Promotions at the same company are usually a positive signal, especially in the UK job market where internal progression can suggest consistency, trust, and strong performance. But the formatting matters. If you show promotions badly, you can accidentally make your CV look repetitive or confusing.
There are three clean ways to show promotions.
This works best when you stayed at the same employer and moved through related roles.
Good Example
ABC Financial Services, Manchester
Senior Operations Manager
March 2023 to Present
Operations Manager
June 2020 to March 2023
Operations Coordinator
January 2018 to June 2020
Promoted twice within five years, moving from operational coordination into team leadership and multi site process ownership
Lead a team of 14 across customer operations, workload planning, escalation handling, and service quality
Reduced average case resolution time by 28 percent by redesigning workflow allocation and improving handover processes
Managed operational reporting for senior leadership, highlighting service risks, capacity gaps, and performance trends
This format works because the progression is immediately visible. The reader can see the journey without reading three separate employer entries.
Use separate entries if your roles were genuinely different, especially if you moved from one function to another.
For example, if you moved from Sales Executive to Product Manager within the same company, those roles deserve separate space. They are not just promotions. They represent a functional shift.
Good Example
Product Manager, ABC Software, London
April 2023 to Present
Own product roadmap planning for a SaaS platform used by enterprise clients across the UK and Europe
Work with engineering, customer success, sales, and senior leadership to prioritise product improvements based on client feedback and commercial impact
Senior Sales Executive, ABC Software, London
May 2020 to April 2023
Managed a portfolio of mid market and enterprise prospects, consistently exceeding quarterly revenue targets
Promoted into product following repeated involvement in client feedback analysis, competitor insight, and product positioning
This format helps because it explains the career move instead of leaving the hiring manager to wonder why your background suddenly changed direction.
This works when earlier roles are less relevant or you need to save space.
Good Example
Senior Marketing Manager, XYZ Retail Group, Birmingham
January 2021 to Present
Promoted from Marketing Executive to Marketing Manager, then Senior Marketing Manager, following growth in campaign ownership and commercial delivery
Manage integrated marketing campaigns across email, paid social, retail partnerships, and customer retention
Increased repeat customer revenue by 22 percent through segmented lifecycle campaigns and improved promotional planning
This approach is useful when your current role is the strongest selling point and you do not want the CV to become a museum of every previous job title.
Not everyone gets promoted, and that does not automatically mean your career has stalled. Employers can be painfully inconsistent with promotions. Some companies hand out title changes like sweets. Others expect people to run half the business before approving a salary review. Very normal. Very annoying.
If you have grown without a formal promotion, show progression through scope.
Scope means the size, complexity, responsibility, or influence of your work.
You can show growth by including:
Larger clients or accounts
Bigger budgets
More complex projects
Senior stakeholder exposure
Team mentoring or informal leadership
Process ownership
Cross functional collaboration
Increased autonomy
Higher value commercial impact
More strategic involvement
Weak Example
This tells me very little. It sounds static.
Good Example
Now I can see growth. The title may be the same, but the responsibility clearly changed.
Another example:
Weak Example
Good Example
The difference is not fancy wording. The difference is evidence.
Your bullet points should not read like a job description copied from an internal HR system. Job descriptions describe what a role exists to do. CV bullet points should describe what you actually delivered and how your contribution developed.
A strong progression bullet usually includes:
What changed
What you took ownership of
Who or what was affected
The level of complexity
The measurable or visible outcome
You can use these patterns:
Promoted from X to Y after delivering Z
Progressed from supporting X to owning Y
Took on responsibility for X following Y
Selected to lead X due to performance in Y
Expanded role from X to include Y
Trusted to manage X after improving Y
Moved from operational delivery into strategic planning for X
Good Example
Good Example
Good Example
These lines work because they do not just say, “I did more.” They show what “more” actually meant.
That is what recruiters need. We are not mind readers, despite what some hiring processes seem to assume.
Your CV profile should not be a vague summary full of phrases like “motivated professional”, “excellent communicator”, or “hard working team player”. Those words have been overused to death. They do not help a recruiter understand your level.
Your profile should position your progression clearly, especially if your career growth is important to your target role.
Weak Example
I am a motivated and ambitious professional with strong communication skills and experience working in fast paced environments.
This says almost nothing. It could belong to half the UK workforce.
Good Example
Operations professional with progressive experience across customer service, workflow improvement, and team leadership. Promoted into management after improving case handling performance and now responsible for a 14 person team, service reporting, and escalation quality across a high volume UK operation.
This profile gives me level, direction, function, evidence, and context.
A useful CV profile for career progression should answer:
What type of professional are you?
What have you progressed through?
What level are you operating at now?
What responsibilities show readiness for the next role?
What kind of role are you targeting?
Do not try to cram your entire career into the profile. Use it to frame the reader’s understanding before they reach the career history.
Multiple roles at one company can be a strength, but only if the structure is clear. The mistake I often see is candidates repeating similar bullet points under each role. That makes the CV longer, but not stronger.
If you had multiple roles at one employer, avoid making each section look identical. Instead, show what changed.
For each role, ask:
What was my level of responsibility at this stage?
What was new compared with the previous role?
What was the biggest outcome or contribution?
What did this role prepare me for next?
Which details matter for the job I now want?
Here is a clean structure:
Company name and location
Current or most senior role
Dates
Previous role
Dates
This prevents repetition. It also helps the recruiter see growth rather than just employment history.
Weak Example
Marketing Executive
Managed campaigns
Created reports
Worked with agencies
Marketing Manager
Managed campaigns
Created reports
Worked with agencies
This is a problem because the promotion is visible, but the progression is not.
Good Example
Marketing Manager
Own annual campaign planning across email, paid social, events, and partner marketing, managing a £420,000 budget
Improved campaign attribution reporting, helping senior leadership identify the highest converting channels for UK customer acquisition
Marketing Executive
Supported campaign delivery across email, content, and events, coordinating agency briefs and performance reporting
Promoted after taking ownership of campaign reporting and improving lead tracking accuracy
Now the reader can see the difference between support and ownership. That is what matters.
Career changes need careful positioning because the reader may not immediately understand your direction. If your CV shows progression in one field and then a move into another, you need to connect the dots.
The aim is not to apologise for changing careers. The aim is to show what carried over.
For example, if you moved from retail management into HR, the relevant progression might include:
People management
Employee relations exposure
Training and onboarding
Scheduling and workforce planning
Conflict resolution
Performance conversations
Stakeholder communication
If you moved from teaching into project coordination, the progression might include:
Planning
Delivery against deadlines
Managing multiple stakeholders
Communication
Documentation
Problem solving under pressure
The mistake is writing two separate career stories. Your CV should show one coherent progression.
Weak Example
I changed career because I wanted a new challenge.
That may be true, but it does not help the hiring manager assess you.
Good Example
Moved from retail team leadership into HR coordination after developing strong experience in onboarding, absence management, rota planning, and employee issue handling across a 35 person store team.
This gives the move a logic. It shows progression through transferable responsibility, not just personal preference.
In the UK job market, career changers often get screened out when the CV makes the employer work too hard. You do not need to explain every emotional reason for the change. You need to show the practical connection between where you have been and where you are going.
A flat career history does not always mean a weak career. Sometimes candidates stay in one role for years but build deep specialist expertise. Sometimes they work in companies with limited promotion routes. Sometimes their job title never changes even though their responsibilities quietly triple. Classic workplace logic.
If your career looks flat on paper, you need to show development in other ways.
You can highlight:
Increased complexity
Specialist knowledge
Process improvements
Project ownership
Training responsibilities
Recognition or performance results
Broader stakeholder involvement
Systems expertise
Commercial impact
Consistency in high pressure environments
Good Example
This shows depth.
Good Example
This shows influence.
Good Example
This shows trust and problem solving.
If you cannot show vertical progression, show depth progression. Hiring managers value people who become trusted experts. Not every strong candidate has managed a team or held a shiny title.
Career progression should make your CV clearer, not busier. These are the mistakes that weaken it.
If your title changed from Assistant Coordinator to Coordinator to Senior Coordinator within 18 months, you do not always need three full sections. Use judgement. Too much detail can make your CV look cluttered and distract from your strongest experience.
A simple line may be enough:
A promotion is good, but it still needs proof. “Senior Manager” means different things in different organisations. Show the size of your remit.
Better details include:
Team size
Budget ownership
Client value
Project scale
Region covered
Systems used
Stakeholder level
Operational complexity
This is one of the fastest ways to make progression look artificial. If the same bullet point appears under three different job titles, the reader starts wondering whether the roles were actually different.
Each role should show a different level of contribution.
Recruiters scan before they read. If your promotion is buried in a long paragraph, it may be missed. Put it near the top of the relevant role or make it visible through the structure.
Please do not turn “occasionally covered for my manager” into “led department operations”. Hiring managers will test this at interview. Inflated CVs create awkward interviews because the candidate then has to defend a version of their career that is slightly fictional. Nobody needs that stress.
Be strategic, not theatrical.
When I read career progression on a CV, I am looking for patterns. One promotion is useful. A pattern of increasing responsibility is stronger.
I notice things like:
Whether promotions happened quickly or steadily
Whether each move makes sense
Whether the candidate gained real responsibility or just a new title
Whether achievements became more complex over time
Whether the candidate can explain the value they created
Whether the CV is targeted to the next role
Whether there are gaps between senior title and actual evidence
For example, if someone applies for a senior HR business partner role, I expect to see progression into advisory work, stakeholder management, employee relations complexity, organisational change, and influence with managers. If the CV only lists HR administration tasks, the senior title will not carry the application.
If someone applies for a project manager role, I expect to see progression from coordination into ownership, delivery accountability, risk management, stakeholder control, budgets, timelines, or governance. If the CV says “supported projects” for eight years with no ownership, I will question readiness.
This is the part many candidates miss. Progression is not just about your past. It is evidence for your next move.
Use this framework when reviewing each role on your CV.
Ask yourself: what level was I operating at?
This may include assistant, coordinator, executive, specialist, manager, senior manager, lead, head of department, consultant, advisor, or director level. But do not stop at the title. Clarify the actual level through responsibilities.
Ask yourself: what was I responsible for?
Scope might include people, clients, accounts, budgets, processes, projects, systems, regions, products, cases, campaigns, or stakeholders.
Ask yourself: what changed compared with my previous role?
This is where progression becomes visible. Did you move from support to ownership? From delivery to strategy? From individual contributor to team lead? From local work to national responsibility?
Ask yourself: what improved because of my work?
Impact can be measured through revenue, savings, efficiency, quality, compliance, customer satisfaction, retention, delivery speed, accuracy, risk reduction, or stakeholder confidence.
Ask yourself: why does this progression matter for the job I want now?
Your CV should not show random growth. It should show relevant growth.
For example, if you are applying for a management role, emphasise leadership, decision making, team development, stakeholder management, and operational ownership. If you are applying for a specialist role, emphasise technical depth, complex problem solving, systems knowledge, and subject matter expertise.
These are not full CV templates. They are examples of how to phrase progression clearly inside your CV.
Good Example
Why this works: It shows the promotion and the reason behind it.
Good Example
Why this works: It shows growth even without a new title.
Good Example
Why this works: It connects performance with increased responsibility.
Good Example
Why this works: It explains the move through relevant transferable experience.
Good Example
Why this works: It shows deepening expertise, not just a title change.
Career progression should be tailored to the job you want, not just the job you have done. This is where many CVs become too passive. They list history instead of building an argument.
Emphasise:
Team size
Coaching responsibility
Hiring involvement
Performance management
Planning and decision making
Escalation handling
Budget or resource ownership
Senior stakeholder communication
A hiring manager wants to know whether you can lead people, not just whether you have been the best individual contributor.
Emphasise:
Technical depth
Complex cases or projects
Systems or tools
Subject matter expertise
Problem solving
Quality improvements
Risk reduction
Advisory responsibility
Not all progression needs to move into management. Specialist progression can be very strong if it shows increasing complexity and trust.
Emphasise:
Revenue growth
Account size
Client seniority
Pipeline ownership
Negotiation
Retention
Market expansion
Forecasting
Commercial hiring managers care about outcomes. “Built relationships” is not enough. Built relationships that did what?
Emphasise:
Process improvement
Team efficiency
Service levels
Cost control
Quality
Compliance
Capacity planning
Cross functional delivery
Operations progression is often about moving from doing the process to improving the process.
Emphasise:
Increased independence
Projects completed
Responsibility beyond your original role
Internships, placements, part time work, or volunteering
Academic projects if relevant
Initiative and learning curve
Early career progression does not need to look dramatic. It needs to show that you are becoming more capable, reliable, and commercially aware.
An applicant tracking system will not admire your career story. It will parse text, dates, titles, employers, and keywords. Then a human being will judge the meaning. Your CV needs to work for both.
To keep your career progression clear for ATS and recruiters:
Use standard role titles where possible
Include employer name, location, job title, and dates clearly
Avoid complicated tables, text boxes, icons, or unusual formatting
Use consistent date formatting
Include relevant keywords naturally from the job advert
Keep promotions readable in plain text
Do not rely on visual design alone to show hierarchy
A simple structure often beats a clever design. This is especially true for UK CVs submitted through online portals, recruitment agencies, and employer systems.
The goal is not to make your CV look impressive at first glance and unreadable at second glance. The goal is to make the right evidence easy to find.
Before sending your CV, read it like a sceptical hiring manager. Not a cruel one. Just a busy one with limited time and a vacancy to fill.
Ask yourself:
Is my progression visible within the first few seconds?
Can the reader see how my responsibility increased?
Have I explained promotions clearly?
If I was not promoted, have I still shown growth?
Do my achievements become stronger over time?
Does my current level match the role I am targeting?
Have I removed repetition between roles?
Have I shown why my next move makes sense?
Would someone outside my company understand my job titles?
Have I avoided exaggeration?
The best CVs do not make recruiters work hard to understand the candidate’s value. They guide the reader. They show the career story clearly, prove the growth with evidence, and make the next step feel logical.
That is what career progression should do on your CV. Not decorate it. Not inflate it. Not turn it into a motivational poster. Just show, clearly and convincingly, that your career has moved forward and that you are ready for what comes next.
Written by Simar Malhi, a recruiter and headhunter with international recruitment experience. I write about CVs, job applications, hiring decisions, and the reality behind recruitment processes. My goal is to help candidates understand more honestly how employers, recruiters, and hiring managers actually select candidates.
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