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To make business and technology leadership visible on an IT resume, organize the document around the role you want, connect technical work to business outcomes, and make career progression easy to follow. CIO’s 2016 makeover of executive Keith Evans shows how restructuring existing experience—not adding unsupported claims—can turn a dense resume into a clearer leadership story.
What the CIO makeover changed
In a feature published November 1, 2016, CIO described how resume expert Laura Smith-Proulx reorganized Keith Evans’s existing material. Evans had held several CIO roles at one company and also had corporate-strategy experience. His original resume contained relevant information, but dense presentation made the story difficult to scan.
Because Evans was seeking another CIO role, Smith-Proulx grouped his CIO and corporate-strategy positions into a more coherent account and brought forward achievements with business relevance. These included cost controls, process streamlining, team productivity, and revenue-generating product development supported by a joint venture for a mobile app. The finished resume was three pages, with more readable type and clearer navigation. CIO’s account of the makeover documents a rewrite, not evidence that a particular format guarantees an interview or job.
The useful lesson is the editorial choice: present the candidate as a business leader who uses technology to deliver results, while retaining the technical strategy and execution that qualify them for the role. As Smith-Proulx put it, “The idea was to convey his capabilities as a business leader, one who just happened to be adept in technology strategy and execution.”
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How do I show both business and technology leadership?
Start with the job you are targeting, then select evidence that makes your fit legible to a reader who may be evaluating business scope as well as technical depth.
1. Define the executive identity in the opening
Use a concise summary to state the kind of leadership role you seek and the value you bring. For a CIO candidate, that might connect technology strategy, organizational leadership, and business execution—but only name strengths you can substantiate later in the resume. The American Chemical Society Career Services guidance recommends supporting summary claims with evidence elsewhere in the document. The University of British Columbia’s IT resume tips also emphasize relevance to the opportunity.
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2. Pair the technical work with its business consequence
Describe what the technology initiative enabled, not just what platform or system you oversaw. When accurate and relevant, connect the work to strategy, revenue, cost control, productivity, risk, service, or organizational impact. Clarify your own role and the scale of responsibility; broad claims such as “transformed the business” are hard to assess without that context.
3. Rewrite duty lists as accomplishment bullets
A useful pattern is action + relevant skill or responsibility + outcome. For example, replace a generic statement about overseeing modernization with a truthful description of what you led, the scope involved, and what changed as a result. Include metrics when they are known and meaningful; never invent savings, revenue, team size, uptime, or productivity figures to make a bullet sound stronger.
Indiana University Indianapolis’s achievement-statement guidance explains the action-and-outcome approach. For federal applications, GSA Technology Transformation Services’ resume guidance specifically recommends describing scope and quantifying accomplishments as applicable.
4. Make a complex path understandable without obscuring it
When several senior roles or promotions form a coherent progression, consider grouping them so the reader can see the arc of leadership. Keep the titles, dates, employers, and context needed to understand what happened. Evans’s resume grouped CIO and corporate-strategy roles to clarify his story; that does not mean every candidate should merge jobs or omit distinctions.
How long should a CIO resume be?
Use the space needed to present relevant experience legibly, and follow any employer-specific directions. Evans’s final resume was three pages because the two-page version used small type and his experience was substantial and relevant. That case is not a universal page-count prescription.
| Choice | When it can make sense | What to watch |
|---|---|---|
| Keep the resume shorter | When older or less relevant material can be trimmed without losing evidence needed for the target role. | Do not compress type or remove context so aggressively that the document becomes difficult to scan. |
| Use additional pages | When relevant senior-level experience needs room to be clear and readable. | Each page should earn its place with useful evidence; follow the employer’s instructions. |
There is no single rule that applies across all contexts. GSA TTS says resumes in its federal hiring process may run several pages when relevant; UBC likewise says more than one page can be appropriate when relevant experience warrants it. Those are process-specific and institutional guidance, not a guarantee that every employer wants the same length.
Which version should I submit online?
Use the format the employer requests. Smith-Proulx’s advice in the 2016 CIO case was to keep a plain-text version for online submission and a formatted version for human review. Treat that as a practical suggestion, not a technical guarantee that one file type will work everywhere.
Application systems and hiring processes differ. GSA TTS says its own process does not use automated screening tools, so do not assume every organization uses an ATS or that a particular layout will pass every system. If the instructions are silent, keep the content consistent across versions and favor a simple, readable structure for the submitted copy.
What to check before sending
- The opening identifies the kind of leadership role you are pursuing.
- Business outcomes appear alongside the technology initiatives that produced them.
- Bullets describe actions and results, with metrics only where accurate.
- Role groupings preserve enough dates and context to make your progression clear.
- Relevant evidence is readable at normal size, and the length follows the content and employer instructions rather than an arbitrary rule.
- Any plain-text and formatted copies tell the same factual story.
Evans said of the revision, “I believe most of the content was already present in my existing resume, but Laura organized the material in a better format for telling my story and holding the attention of readers.” That is the makeover’s central insight: for an experienced IT leader, the strongest resume may come from making the existing evidence easier to understand.
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