Key Takeaway
Your NHS CV will not get you a healthtech job. This article explains exactly how to rewrite it, with advice from a recruiter who has hired across the sector and real examples from BiteLabs alumni.
_This is a BiteLabs article, originally published at bitelabs.io._
## I have reviewed a lot of clinician CVs.
Most of them are excellent documents for getting a job in the NHS. Long lists of audits, publications, teaching commitments, leadership roles, and exam results. Formatted to match the person specification for a specialty training application. Largely useless for getting a job in digital health in general.
That is not necessarily a criticism. It is just the reality that a medical CV is built for a completely different purpose. And if you send it to a healthtech company without changing it, it will likely get deleted in under ten seconds, or just filtered by the ATS.
> "I don't need to spend more than five or ten seconds on a CV to see if somebody's potentially a fit for it. We're trying to delete as many as possible in the beginning." - Jason Spinney, Head of Talent at BiteLabs
That is the reality of what happens on the other side. So here is how to make sure your CV survives that first ten seconds, and gets you an interview.
Why your clinical CV does not work for healthtech
Your clinical CV is built around a framework that healthtech recruiters do not use.
The NHS person specification asks for: publications, audits, teaching, management experience, leadership roles, presentations, prizes. So your CV leads with those things, listed in exhaustive detail.
A healthtech hiring manager is looking for something completely different. They want to know:
* Can this person identify a problem, think clearly about it, and do something about it? * Can they communicate across disciplines - with engineers, designers and commercial teams - without using clinical jargon? * Have they ever worked outside of direct patient care in a way that is relevant to what we do?
Your ten publications in anaesthesia journals do not answer any of those questions. Your MRCS result does not either. But the QI project where you redesigned a ward referral pathway and cut response times by 40%? That does. The side project where you built a prototype app for a clinical workflow problem? Absolutely.
The good news is you almost certainly have the experience. You just need to translate it.
The structure of a healthtech CV
Keep it to two pages maximum. Healthtech companies move fast and hiring managers are busy. A four-page CV signals that you have not thought carefully about what matters.
Here is the structure that works.
### Professional summary — 3 to 4 lines at the top
This is the most important part of your CV and the part most clinicians either skip entirely or fill with generic statements.
Your summary should do three things: state who you are, state what you bring to a healthtech role specifically, and include a concrete, quantifiable proof point.
A weak summary looks like this: "Experienced NHS clinician with a passion for digital health and innovation seeking new opportunities in the healthtech sector."
A strong summary looks like this: "Specialist registrar in clinical radiology with 5 years of experience leading on products that have improved workflow within radiology departments by 30% and reduced the time for trauma reports to be released by over 25%. Currently seeking a clinical product management role at a growth-stage radiology healthtech company."
The difference is specificity. One tells the recruiter nothing. The other tells them exactly what you have done and what you want. One is quantifiable, the other is waffle. One is describing an impactful QI project, the other describes vague passion.
### Work experience — reframed for the context
This is where most clinicians lose the plot. They list their clinical roles with bullet points describing clinical tasks: "Assessed patients in outpatient clinic. Performed procedures. Supervised junior doctors."
None of that is directly relevant to a healthtech role.
Go back through every role you have held and ask: what did I do that involved problem solving, project management, data, technology, communication across teams, or building something? Then write about those things.
> "Having experience and having had the title before are not necessarily the same thing. Clinicians are doing project management every day." - Lauren Curtis, Senior Product Manager at Parachute Health
Quantify wherever you can. "Designed a quality improvement project within my trust that resulted in a regional presentation" is much weaker than "Designed and implemented a new triage pathway that reduced patient waiting time by 35% across a caseload of 400 patients per month." Same experience, completely different impact.
Skills section
Keep this short and honest. List technical skills you actually have - any coding languages, data tools, specific software, project management frameworks you have used. Do not list things you have only a passing familiarity with.
If you have completed any healthtech-relevant training, a fellowship, a digital health course, a product management course, list it here. Google, Microsoft, AWS, Stanford and Harvard all have great online courses to build a basic knowledge base, although none provide hands-on experience, mentorship or networking directly.
### Education
Keep this brief. Your medical degree and any postgraduate qualifications. You do not need to list every module.
### Publications and research: be selective
If you have publications, include the three or four most relevant, otherwise provide a link to your Researchgate profile. If your research involved data analysis, machine learning, AI or digital health in any way, highlight those specifically.
This will feel uncomfortable. I know. But a recruiter at Accurx does not know what the South Korean Journal of Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is, and does not need to.
The biggest mistakes clinicians make on their CV
* Leading with clinical experience as if it speaks for itself. It does not. You need to do the translation work. The recruiter will not read between the lines and figure out that your audit experience is actually project management experience. You have to make that connection explicit. * Using clinical jargon without explaining it. Terms like "ARCP," "MRCS," "FY2," "ST3", “OOPC” or "NTN" mean nothing to a hiring manager who did not train in medicine. Either explain them briefly or remove them. When in doubt, remove them. * A CV that is too long. A medical CV for a specialty training application can run to six or eight pages. That is appropriate for that context. For a healthtech job application, anything over two pages signals poor judgement about what matters. Cut ruthlessly. * Generic personal statements. "Passionate about digital health" appears on roughly half the CVs I see from clinicians applying to healthtech roles. It says nothing. Replace it with something specific: what you have done, what you have built, what problem you want to solve. * Not having a LinkedIn profile that matches. Healthtech hiring managers will look at your LinkedIn, often even before they read your CV. If your LinkedIn still reads like a training portfolio and has no indication of your interest in the industry, it creates doubt. Make sure the two are consistent.
> "A LinkedIn profile is mandatory for networking and visibility to recruiters." - Jason Spinney
Translating specific clinical experiences
Here are the most common clinical experiences and how to reframe them for a healthtech CV.
### Quality improvement projects
This is your strongest asset and the one most clinicians undersell. A QI project is a product development cycle. You identified a problem, defined a solution, tested it, iterated, and measured outcomes. Write it that way.
Instead of: "Led a QI project to improve sepsis screening on the acute medical unit."
Write: "Designed and implemented a clinical decision support tool for sepsis screening across a 40-bed acute medical unit. Reduced time to antibiotic administration by 28% over six months. Presented findings at a trust-wide governance meeting, resulting in a peer-reviewed publication."
### Research and publications
Focus on the process as much as the output. If your research involved data analysis, statistical modelling, machine learning or any form of technology, describe how you did the work. The methodology is often more relevant to a healthtech role than the clinical topic.
### Teaching and education
Reframe as content design and curriculum development. If you have designed teaching materials, delivered structured learning sessions, or created resources that others have used, these are directly relevant skills for companies that produce clinical content, medical education tools or training platforms.
### Leadership and management roles
If you have managed a team, run a department, chaired a committee or led a project, describe the scope and the outcome. "Deputy Rota Coordinator" is less compelling than "Managed scheduling for a 12-person clinical team, reducing unfilled shifts by 20% over six months."
### NHS committees and working groups
If you have sat on a trust digital health committee, an informatics group, a patient safety board, or any group that intersects with technology or systems improvement, include it. These demonstrate that you already understand how change happens inside the NHS, which is exactly what clinical partnerships and medical affairs teams need.
What to add if you are transitioning without direct industry experience
Most clinicians applying to healthtech roles for the first time do not have prior industry experience. That is fine. But you need to show that you have done something to prepare.
### A fellowship or structured programme.
Completing the BiteLabs UK fellowship gives you a real project to put on your CV. It shows you have worked in a product development context, been exposed to industry thinking, and built something outside of clinical practice. This matters significantly to hiring managers who are otherwise looking at a CV that is entirely clinical.
### A side project.
Even a small one. A prototype app, a digital tool, a piece of content, a GitHub repository - anything that shows you have experimented with building something. In the age of ChatGPT, Claude, and Manus, there is absolutely no excuse not to build. A bias toward action is absolutely fundamental.
### Relevant self-directed learning.
Product management courses, digital health certifications, data analysis courses. List them with the provider and the date. They show initiative.
### LinkedIn activity.
This is underrated. If you have been writing about digital health topics, engaging with industry conversations, or building a visible point of view on LinkedIn, mention it. It demonstrates genuine interest in a way that a personal statement cannot. On BiteLabs, we strongly encourage everyone on our programme to be actively posting on Linkedin at least once per week.
A note on cover letters
Most healthtech companies do not require a cover letter. If they do, keep it to three short paragraphs:
* First paragraph: who you are and why you are interested in this specific company and role. Not healthtech in general, this company specifically. Do your research. * Second paragraph: the one experience or project that most directly demonstrates you can do this job. Not a summary of your whole career, one thing, with a specific outcome. * Third paragraph: one forward-looking sentence about what you want to contribute. Then stop.
A good cover letter takes thirty minutes to write properly. Most hiring managers spend less than a minute reading it. Make every sentence count.
Before you send anything
Run through this checklist.
* Does the professional summary mention a specific role and a specific proof point? * Is every clinical bullet point translated into language a non-clinician can understand? * Is there at least one quantified outcome in each major role? * Is the CV two pages or under? * Does your LinkedIn match? * Have you removed or explained all clinical acronyms? * Have you removed irrelevant publications and listed only the most relevant ones? * Is there at least one example of work outside direct patient care?
If you can answer yes to all of these, you have a CV worth sending.
If you want one-to-one help with this, our career coaching service works with clinicians specifically on CV translation, interview preparation and role targeting. It is the fastest way to get your application materials to a standard that works for industry rather than the NHS.
_Dr Azeem Alam BEM is a clinical radiology specialist registrar and former NHS Clinical Entrepreneur. He is a Venture Partner at Creator Fund, advisor to the King's College London MedTech Society, former advisor to the Royal College of Radiologists' AI Committee, advisor to the Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Partners Digital Health Hub, Venture Scout at EWOR and on the Investment Committee at Proximo Ventures._
_BiteLabs runs digital health fellowships in the UK and US. Applications are open now. Explore the UK fellowship or the US fellowship._