How to reframe 15+ years of experience without hiding it

You don't need to lie about your years. You need to make them feel like an asset to a hiring manager who is, fairly or not, worried about three things: salary expectations, energy, and "can she still actually ship the work". Here's how to answer all three without rewriting your past.

Cut the dates above year 10 12

Keep the last 10 12 years with full detail: company, role, dates, 3 5 bullets. Older roles collapse into a single line at the bottom of the CV:

"Earlier career: Brand Manager at Unilever; Account Director at Ogilvy; Marketing Executive at Innocent. Details on request."

You haven't hidden anything. You've stopped leading with 2008.

Lead with the last 3 years, hard

Most hiring managers scan the first role on your CV, decide, and stop. Make it count. 4 5 bullets, each one a measurable outcome, each one starting with a verb of action:

• "Rebuilt the lifecycle programme; lifted 90-day retention from 38% to 51% in two quarters."
• "Launched the brand refresh across 12 channels; aided awareness up 14 points in the target segment."
• "Shipped 27 paid campaigns in 18 months; cut blended CAC from £84 to £52."

If your last role doesn't have numbers attached, spend an afternoon getting them. Ask the analyst, dig through old decks, estimate honestly. A range ("roughly 30 40% lift") is fine. Vague is not.

Energy reads in the verbs

The hiring manager is silently asking "is she still in the work, or has she moved into chairing meetings?" The verbs answer for you.

• Reads as in-the-work: built, shipped, launched, rebuilt, prototyped, wrote, designed, ran, fixed, A/B tested, hired, mentored.
• Reads as in-a-chair: oversaw, was responsible for, had ownership of, championed, drove alignment around, partnered with stakeholders to.

You can have one or two of the chair verbs they signal seniority but the first verb on each bullet should be doing-work, not directing-work.

Pre-empt the salary question

If your last title was Director and the role is Senior Manager, the recruiter will assume your number is 30% above the band. Beat them to it in the cover note: "On comp I'm calibrating to the level of the role, not my last title; happy to discuss specifics on a call." That single sentence keeps you in the pile.

The LinkedIn move that matters most

Your headline is the second thing recruiters see after your name. "Marketing Director" tells them one thing. "Senior brand & content marketer · DTC, fintech, B2B SaaS · building craft-led teams" tells them what you actually do and what you want next. Rewrite it every time your search changes.