2 Your experience and current practice

A CV is a timeline rather than a complete account

A CV tells a reader where you have worked and for how long. It may identify qualifications and appointments. It rarely explains exactly which decisions you make, what complexity you manage or when you seek advice. Those are central questions when someone is trying to understand your present scope.

Begin with the timeline because it is factual and useful. Record the dates, setting, specialty, working pattern and principal responsibilities of relevant posts. Keep overlapping appointments visible. If a date or employment term needs confirmation, identify the record that can establish it. Do not make unsupported conversions between overseas titles and UK grades.

Then move from posts to activities. Choose one activity you undertake regularly and describe it in enough detail for a colleague outside your immediate service to understand. “Ward work” is too broad. “I lead the scheduled review of patients within this rehabilitation service, agree the medical plan with the multidisciplinary team and seek advice through the specified pathway when a problem is outside the service's agreed scope” begins to reveal responsibility.

The wording must fit your actual work. It is not a phrase to copy merely because it sounds senior. If someone else makes the principal decision, describe your contribution accurately. If you make it yourself, do not hide that fact behind passive language.

Describe the setting as well as the activity

The same activity can require different arrangements in different settings. A clinic with immediate specialist support, a community hospital with remote advice and an acute unit with multiple teams are not interchangeable contexts. An assessor needs to understand what resources and constraints surround your decisions.

Describe the patient group, the purpose of the service, the range of presentations within its remit and the support available. Explain what happens when a patient's needs exceed that remit. This provides context for judgement without requiring you to include identifiable patient detail.

Next describe your decisions. Do you assess and formulate the plan, carry out a plan made by someone else, review progress, coordinate a complex discharge or decide when another service is needed? Different activities may involve different combinations. A truthful profile can show senior responsibility in one area and development needs in another.

Finally, describe limits. A profile without boundaries may look impressive but be less credible. Senior practice includes knowing when a decision requires advice, a second opinion or transfer to another service. A clear boundary does not diminish the work within it.

Existing work and intended work

Keep two columns in your early notes: work currently undertaken and work proposed. Confusion between them is common. A doctor describes an ideal future role, and the reader assumes that every activity is already demonstrated. Alternatively, an experienced doctor describes current work so cautiously that it sounds merely aspirational.

A phrase such as “I help run the service” leaves the level of responsibility unclear. A useful profile identifies the scheduled activity led, the decisions made, the team discussion coordinated and the matters referred for advice. It also records absence cover and where these responsibilities appear in the role documents.

List a proposed additional activity separately. Evidence from established work may be relevant, but it does not automatically demonstrate capability in a new setting or responsibility. The current profile supports an assessment of existing work; the proposed activity needs its own discussion of capability and support.

This distinction is useful even when you are not applying immediately. It prevents informal expansion of duties from becoming invisible. When work changes, the profile gives you a basis for discussing the role and the job plan rather than waiting until the change has become assumed.

Experience from another country or service

Relevant experience should be described in its own setting. Explain the nature of the institution, the patient population, your actual duties and the support arrangements. Where a title has no direct UK equivalent, describe the work rather than choose a more prestigious translation.

When moving from another country or service, separate two questions: what prior experience demonstrates, and what must be learned about the present organisation, referral arrangements and clinical environment. Familiarity with a new local system is distinct from underlying clinical capability. Both need attention, without assuming that unfamiliarity invalidates previous experience.

Evidence may include a former job description, appropriately detailed references, activity records or accounts of responsibilities. Consider how a reviewer can understand and, where required, verify them. A document that makes sense only to someone who knows the former institution may need a short factual explanation.

Do not assume that experience loses value simply because it was acquired elsewhere. Equally, do not assume that an activity transfers unchanged to a different population or support structure. The useful question is what carries across and what needs contextual confirmation.

Working patterns and periods away

Record less-than-full-time work accurately, including the working pattern relevant to the activity. It may matter that an opportunity is concentrated on a day you do not work, or that continuity is shared. These are practical arrangements to address. They should not disappear from the profile because you fear they will be judged negatively.

After a career break, distinguish the factual record of prior experience from any current support needed for return. You may need refreshed familiarity with systems, updated knowledge in a defined area or a period of supported practice. The purpose is to establish what is appropriate now, not erase the experience that came before.

Formal experience calculations belong to the applicable rules. Do not infer an eligibility total by adding calendar years without checking how the relevant process treats the circumstances. A clear timeline helps workforce colleagues answer the question accurately.

Choosing corroboration

Ask who can speak about the activity from a relevant basis. A colleague who has worked alongside you may describe your contribution to team decisions. A consultant may have observed clinical work or reviewed cases with you. A manager may confirm the service responsibility and job-plan arrangements. Each account has a different evidential purpose.

Avoid asking one person to certify everything. A generic letter from a senior person who has little direct knowledge may add less than a specific account from someone who has observed the work. The issue is the basis of the statement, not simply the signatory's title.

Where accounts differ, treat the difference as information. Perhaps the profile describes a responsibility that is not consistently understood by the team. Perhaps the observer has seen only one part of your work. Clarification may improve both the evidence and the service arrangement.

From a broad description to an assessable profile

Consider the difference between “I work independently” and a description that states the activity, decisions, limits and support. The first asks the reader to accept a conclusion. The second gives them a basis for judgement.

A useful hypothetical profile might state: “I lead the planned review within the agreed ward scope. I formulate and communicate the medical plan, coordinate the team's outstanding medical questions and identify problems needing specialist advice. Advice is available through the agreed clinical advice arrangement, with the service's escalation pathway used for urgent deterioration. The supporting clinician has reviewed a sample of my reasoning and can comment on it.”

A scope profile that another service could understand

Consider a hypothetical profile for planned inpatient review in a rehabilitation service. The responsibilities include assessing new information, setting medical priorities, agreeing the medical plan and ensuring that outstanding actions have an owner. Nursing and therapy colleagues contribute their own assessments. Their responsibilities remain distinct even when a doctor chairs the discussion.

The profile identifies the review activity, rather than claiming responsibility for every aspect of the service throughout the week. It distinguishes decisions made during the session from advice obtained afterwards. It records how urgent concerns are managed and who covers the activity when the doctor is absent. It also explains which arrangements are established and which need clarification.

Now compare that account with the phrase “independent ward round”. The phrase could describe several different arrangements. One doctor may assess patients and then present every proposed plan for approval. Another may make decisions within a defined scope and discuss selected uncertainty. Another may be working alone because support has failed. These circumstances need different responses, even though someone could use the same phrase for all three.

Ask a colleague to read your profile without supplying verbal explanations. Where do they have to guess? Which decisions cannot be attributed clearly? Revise those points. This is a practical test of the document, not an additional clinical assessment.

Make the employment timeline useful

Use one row for each relevant post or distinct period of work. Record the start and end dates, employer, setting, specialty, grade or local title, working pattern and principal duties. Where posts overlap, show the overlap instead of silently counting the same period twice. Where the working pattern changed, use separate periods so that the record can support a reliable calculation later.

The employment timeline and the scope profile serve different purposes. Employment records establish dates and working patterns. A former supervisor's account can explain the nature of the clinical work. Neither document automatically answers the other's question. Keep relevant supporting records beside the timeline, with translations or verification arranged when the applicable process requires them.

If a record cannot be obtained, identify the missing fact and ask the receiving organisation what alternative evidence it will accept. Avoid guessing dates to make the table complete. A clearly identified uncertainty is easier to resolve than a confident but inaccurate total.

What the service needs to arrange

Allow the doctor and relevant colleagues to compare the profile with actual duties and role documents. If the records are inaccurate, establish who can correct them. If there is disagreement about the work, describe the disagreement specifically. A broad assertion that the role is “just a Specialty Doctor post” does not answer a factual question about responsibility.

Where the profile reveals work beyond agreed arrangements, review the situation promptly through the appropriate clinical and managerial processes. Do not advise the doctor to continue unsupported practice merely to collect more evidence. Safety and accurate role definition come before portfolio building.