A junior CV often has to show potential: software, academic work and early experience. After ten years, employers need to understand what you can own. If the first half of your senior CV is still a grid of program logos, the most valuable part of your career may be invisible.
AIA’s interviews with architecture hiring managers emphasise clear contributions and growth across roles. That is the organising principle for a senior CV: what became more complex, and what decisions moved into your hands?
Replace a project list with a responsibility story
For each role, choose two or three projects that demonstrate different responsibilities. A bullet should name the situation, your ownership and the outcome you can verify. For example: “Coordinated the architectural and structural teams through a revised school entrance scheme; maintained the issue register and obtained sign-off before the tender set.” Use that only if it is true. Avoid “worked on numerous projects” and “responsible for all aspects” unless the actual scope follows.
Ask yourself what would happen if you left tomorrow. Which client conversations, coordination decisions or quality checks would need a new owner? Those are strong clues for the CV.
Put the role you want near the top
A CV targeted at design leadership should foreground concept direction, critique, team development and client rationale. One for technical leadership should foreground coordination, documentation, standards and delivery. Do not make the reader infer a career goal from chronology alone.
If you are changing sector, lead with transferable problems: occupied-site phasing, complex stakeholders, repeated consultant interfaces, constrained budgets. Avoid claiming direct sector experience you do not have.
Make the document readable by people and systems
Use ordinary text headings, dates, employer names and job titles. Keep a version whose text can be copied cleanly from the PDF; multi-column layouts can break reading order in some application systems. Test it by copying the text into a plain document. If the order becomes nonsense, create a simpler upload version.
This does not require an ugly CV. It requires information architecture: a reader should find your level, sector, responsibilities and contact details immediately. A visually refined version can still be straightforward.
Keep skills, but give them a job
“Revit: advanced” tells less than “Led model coordination for three consultant packages.” List tools that matter to the target role and attach them to work. Include registration and relevant credentials with jurisdiction and status; do not imply a licence you do not hold.
Then compare the CV with your portfolio. The CV says what you owned; the portfolio shows the evidence. If one claims leadership and the other shows only isolated renderings, the story does not connect.
Rewrite one project bullet before rewriting the whole CV
Take a bullet such as “Worked on a 20,000-square-metre mixed-use project using Revit.” It tells a reader the project was large and a program was used, but almost nothing about your seniority. Replace it with the decision you owned and the context: “Coordinated architectural, structural and services responses for the tender package; resolved the main plant-room interface with the technical lead.” Use only facts you can substantiate. If you supervised three people, mention the team; if you did not, do not imply it.
Now give every major project the same four checks: scope, your authority, the cross-team problem and the result or current status. A result may be an issued package, an agreed design change or a reduced list of unresolved issues; it need not be a heroic percentage. Keep confidential financial figures out unless you have permission and a legitimate reason to share them.
For applicant tracking systems, use a clear text layer, conventional headings and an accessible PDF or requested format. Test by copying the text from your file into a plain editor. If project dates, roles and names arrive in the wrong order, the reader or system may also struggle. A visual CV can still be elegant; legibility is a design requirement.
A senior CV is a map of decisions and trust. It should make an interviewer curious about how you led.
Make one senior accomplishment auditable
Take a bullet such as “managed multiple large projects” and ask what a former colleague could verify. Which phase, team and constraint did you own? What decision moved because of your work? Replace the broad sentence with a bounded example: you coordinated a consultant interface, led a review or reorganised an issue process. State the project type and your part without claiming the firm’s entire result as yours.
Numbers can help when they are real and relevant: team size, number of packages reviewed or a budget you actually managed. Do not add a project value simply because the building was expensive if you had no role in cost control. For confidential work, use non-sensitive scope descriptions and ask permission before showing drawings. An honest senior CV can be specific without revealing the client.
Run two reading tests. Give the first page to a peer for ten seconds and ask what level of role they think you want. Then copy the PDF text into a plain editor and check the reading order. If either test fails, change the heading, chronology or layout before adding more content. A senior CV should make your judgement legible to both the hurried human reviewer and the application system.
Browse current architecture jobs on Jobs.archi and read our architecture interview guide for a related next step.
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