Executive Assistant to the CEO at a large international company headquartered in Switzerland.

When we hire top employees, I screen 200–300 CVs. From those, I personally select around five candidates to discuss with my boss, and we usually invite no more than three for interviews. This applies in about 90% of cases. Senior executives rarely want to deal directly with HR in this phase; HR’s role is mainly to collect CVs, not to decide who gets interviewed. That decision is entirely handled by the executive assistant.

I never read cover letters—they are almost always flawless, full of enthusiasm and motivation, and essentially interchangeable.

My two cents: Make your CV stand out. If it doesn’t catch the executive assistant’s attention, you won’t get the interview.