When you are recruiting, a CV has to do a lot of the initial heavy lifting. It gives you an overview of somebody's experience, where they have worked, how long they have stayed and, depending on the role, the qualifications or technical training they have picked up along the way.

But how much can it really tell you about whether somebody will be good at the job?

Research published by City & Guilds in September 2026 found that 64% of UK employers say human capabilities including communication, problem solving and time management are becoming harder to find. Perhaps more importantly, 74% now say employability skills are more important than technical expertise for workplace success.

At the same time, 69% believe AI-powered applicant screening tools prioritise technical skills over those human capabilities. For Motor Trade employers, that raises an interesting question. If some of the skills you value most are difficult to demonstrate on a CV, could suitable candidates be getting ruled out before anyone has actually spoken to them?

Key Takeaways

• 64% of UK employers surveyed by City & Guilds say human capabilities including communication, problem solving and time management are becoming harder to find.
• 74% say employability skills are now more important than technical expertise for workplace success.
• 69% believe AI-powered applicant screening tools prioritise technical skills over those human capabilities.
• Relevant transferable experience can make somebody worth considering even when their CV does not exactly match the original job specification.
• Since January 2025, 65% of Perfect Placement's placements have come through proactive recruitment rather than relying solely on candidates applying directly to advertised vacancies.

What Can a CV Actually Tell You About a Motor Trade Candidate?

There are plenty of things a CV is very good at telling you. You can see somebody's employment history, qualifications, IMI accreditations, manufacturer training and the types of roles they have previously held.

For some Motor Trade vacancies, those details are essential. An MOT Tester needs the appropriate authorisation, while certain Vehicle Technician roles may genuinely require a particular level of diagnostic, manufacturer or EV experience. Looking beyond the CV does not mean overlooking those requirements.

Where employers can run into problems is when every part of the original job specification starts being treated as equally essential. There is a big difference between something somebody must already have to do the job safely and effectively, and something that would simply be nice to have.

Some of the Most Important Skills Are Hard to Put on Paper

Communication, problem solving, time management and adaptability are good examples. A candidate can list them in a skills section, but that does not really tell you how those skills translate into their working day.

Think about a Service Advisor. Their CV might show five years of dealership experience, but it will not necessarily tell you how they deal with a frustrated customer when a repair has overrun, how organised they are when several jobs need attention at once, or how well they communicate with the workshop when the pressure is on.

It is similar with a Workshop Controller. Technical understanding is important, but so is being able to manage people, prioritise work, keep Technicians productive and communicate effectively across the business. Even in a highly technical Vehicle Technician role, somebody still needs to manage their workload, work with other people and adapt as vehicles and technology continue to change.

Those are all things that tend to become much easier to understand once somebody has actually spoken to the candidate.

When Is an Imperfect CV Match Still Worth Considering?

Quite often, the difference comes down to whether the missing requirement is genuinely essential or simply part of the employer's ideal wish list.

Someone may have worked for a different manufacturer, come from an independent rather than a franchised dealership, or have four strong years of relevant experience when the original brief asked for five. None of those things necessarily make them unsuitable, particularly if the experience they do have covers what the employer genuinely needs.

A Technician who has spent several years in a busy independent workshop, for example, may have excellent diagnostic ability and experience across a much broader range of vehicles than their job title suggests. Equally, somebody moving between related Motor Trade roles may already be doing parts of the new job without ever having held that exact title.

We recently looked at whether job requirements are putting good Motor Trade candidates off applying. The same principle applies once applications start arriving. If every preferred requirement becomes a reason to reject somebody, the available pool can become very small, very quickly.

Why Skills-Based Hiring Is Becoming More Important

The City & Guilds findings come at a time when there is a wider conversation taking place around skills-based hiring.

The Recruitment & Employment Confederation explored this in September 2026, looking at how employers are increasingly thinking about the skills their businesses need rather than planning solely around fixed job titles and headcount. It also highlighted how this is changing the role recruiters play, with recruitment specialists being brought into conversations about skills availability, candidate motivations, training and future workforce needs much earlier.

That makes sense to us, because by the time a vacancy reaches a recruiter, there is often already a very specific picture of the person an employer wants to find. Sometimes that person is readily available. Other times, once we start speaking to candidates in that area, we find that the exact combination of experience, salary, location and working hours is extremely limited.

That feedback is useful. Rather than continuing to search indefinitely for somebody who may barely exist in the local market, we can go back to the brief and look at which parts genuinely matter and where there might be some flexibility.

What Does Skills-Based Hiring Look Like in the Motor Trade?

Skills-based hiring does not mean qualifications and experience suddenly stop mattering. It is really about being more deliberate about why they matter.

An MOT Tester needs the appropriate authorisation. A Technician carrying out certain high-voltage work may need specific training or experience. Those are genuine requirements. Five years with one particular manufacturer, however, may be a preference if somebody with comparable experience elsewhere could be trained on the product.

The same applies across other areas of the Motor Trade. Somebody who has worked in an independent garage may have skills that transfer well into a dealership. A candidate from another franchise may already understand the systems, pace and customer expectations of a main dealer environment even though the badge above the door has been different.

We explored a similar question in our article on whether hiring for potential could help solve automotive skills shortages. There will always be roles where somebody needs to arrive with a particular level of competence, but there are also situations where widening the brief slightly gives employers access to people they may otherwise never have considered.

Sometimes the Candidate Market Changes the Brief

This is something we see regularly when recruiting. An employer may come to us with a clear idea of the person they want, only for the first few days of a search to show that the market looks slightly different from what they expected.

The salary might be below what experienced candidates in that area are currently looking for. A particular requirement might be restricting the pool more than expected. Suitable candidates may exist but already be working and therefore unlikely to apply to an advert. Sometimes it is the combination of location, working hours, salary and experience that makes the original search particularly narrow.

Having that information early gives the employer options. They might decide the original requirements are all essential and continue the search, but they can do so knowing what the market looks like. Alternatively, there may be parts of the brief they are happy to reconsider.

Salary is one part of that conversation, which is why we created our Automotive Salary Insights using salary data from real Motor Trade vacancies. But our consultants also hear directly from candidates every day about why they are looking, what would tempt them to move and what is putting them off particular opportunities.

That is the kind of information that can help shape a recruitment campaign before weeks are spent searching against a brief that is struggling in the market.

What Can a Specialist Recruiter Find Out That a CV Cannot?

One of the biggest limitations of relying on applications alone is that you only see the people who happen to be actively looking at that moment.

Since January 2025, 65% of Perfect Placement's placements have come through proactive recruitment rather than candidates responding directly to advertised vacancies. In other words, a large proportion of the people we have successfully placed were found because a consultant went looking for them.

That is particularly relevant in the Motor Trade, where experienced candidates are often already working. They may not be checking job boards every evening or uploading an updated CV, but they may still be open to hearing about an opportunity that gives them something their current role does not.

A Conversation Gives You the Context Behind the CV

When we speak to somebody, we can find out why they are considering a move, what salary they realistically need, how far they are prepared to travel and what they want their next job to look like.

We can also dig into experience that might only take up one line on the CV. A Technician may have started mentoring apprentices, become the person colleagues turn to for difficult diagnostic work or taken on additional workshop responsibilities without ever receiving a new job title. A Service Advisor may be regularly covering parts of a Workshop Controller or Service Manager role. Unless somebody asks the questions, that experience can easily be missed.

It also helps us avoid making assumptions. Two candidates with almost identical employment histories can have completely different priorities. One may want progression and manufacturer training, while another is perfectly happy at their current level but wants shorter hours or a better commute. Knowing that before the interview gives both sides a much better idea of whether the opportunity is worth pursuing.

How Can Motor Trade Employers Assess Candidates Beyond the CV?

None of this requires employers to throw out their existing recruitment process or lower their standards. In many cases, it is simply about making sure the first stage of screening reflects what the job genuinely needs.

It is also worth remembering that finding the right person is only the first part of the process. Suitable candidates can still be lost later if interviews take too long to arrange, communication disappears or the process becomes unnecessarily complicated. Our article on why good automotive candidates drop out of recruitment processes looks at that side of the hiring journey in more detail.

Where Does Recruitment Technology Fit?

Recruitment technology is not the problem here. Used well, it can make hiring quicker and easier to manage. Screening tools can help employers deal with large numbers of applications, identify relevant experience and take some of the administration out of the early stages of recruitment.

We use technology ourselves and have continued investing in it as Perfect Placement has grown. The important bit is knowing what you want the technology to do and where human judgement still adds something.

If a role genuinely requires a particular qualification, using technology to identify candidates who hold it makes perfect sense. If you are trying to work out who communicates well, who has strong problem-solving skills or whether somebody's experience could transfer from one automotive environment to another, a keyword search is naturally going to tell you less.

That is what makes the City & Guilds findings particularly interesting. Employers are saying that human and employability skills are becoming more important, while many also believe the technology used to screen applicants is more focused on technical skills.

The answer does not need to be technology or people. It can quite happily be both.

Use technology to make the process more efficient, but leave enough room in that process for somebody to understand the person behind the CV.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why Can Relying Too Heavily on CV Screening Be a Problem for Motor Trade Employers?

A CV is useful for checking experience, qualifications and employment history, but it cannot show everything an employer may need to know about a candidate. Communication, problem solving, adaptability and motivation are difficult to judge on paper, while relevant transferable experience may not be obvious from somebody's previous job titles alone.

Which Skills Are Difficult to Assess From a CV?

Communication, problem solving, time management, teamwork and adaptability can all be difficult to assess from a CV alone. These can be particularly important in Motor Trade roles involving customers, colleagues or responsibility for managing workload, so they are often better explored through conversation and interview examples.

What Is Skills-Based Hiring?

Skills-based hiring looks at the abilities somebody needs to perform a role rather than relying solely on previous job titles, employers or a fixed number of years' experience. In the Motor Trade, this could mean considering whether experience gained with another manufacturer, in an independent garage or in a related automotive role could transfer successfully into the vacancy.

Should Motor Trade Employers Consider Candidates Without Exact Industry Experience?

It depends on the role. Some positions genuinely require specific Motor Trade experience, qualifications or technical knowledge, particularly where safety or authorisation is involved. In other cases, relevant transferable experience and the ability to learn may make somebody worth interviewing even if their CV does not exactly match the original specification.

How Can a Specialist Motor Trade Recruiter Assess Candidates Beyond Their CV?

A specialist recruiter can speak to candidates about what they actually do in their current role, why they are considering a move, their salary expectations, motivations and what they want from their next job. They can also explore relevant experience that may not be obvious from the CV and use their knowledge of the wider candidate market to advise employers on how realistic the original brief is.

About the Author

Ashley Camies

Ashley Camies is Marketing & Automation Manager at Perfect Placement, with 14 years of automotive recruitment experience. Since 2011, Ashley has worked within specialist motor trade recruitment, using recruitment data, candidate behaviour and first-hand market insight to explore the career and hiring challenges facing automotive professionals across the UK.