How Boardsweep Works: From Your CV to an Honest Shortlist

Boardsweep replaces the most tedious part of job hunting — reading hundreds of postings to find the few that fit — with an AI that does the reading for you. This guide walks through exactly what happens, from the moment you upload your CV to the ranked shortlist you get back, and how to set your search up so the results are as sharp as possible.

Step 1 — Upload your CV

Everything starts with your CV. When you upload it, Boardsweep extracts the text and uses it to pre-fill your search: suggested role keywords, your city, the countries you can work in, and your languages. This isn't cosmetic — your CV text is what every job gets scored against later. The richer your CV, the better the screening reasons about your real experience.

Tip: Use a complete, current CV. If it lists your years of experience, tools, certifications, and location, the AI has more to reason with — and your match scores get more accurate.

Step 2 — Set your parameters

Next you tell Boardsweep where and what to look for. A few fields do most of the work:

• Role keywords. The job titles and functions you want. Add several related ones (for example Operations Manager, Chief of Staff, Operations Lead) — more relevant keywords means a wider, better pool. The system searches each one.
• City / cities. Where you want to work. You can add one city or several. Boardsweep anchors the search to your cities, so you get roles that are actually reachable — not the entire country's listings.
• Workplace type. Remote, hybrid, or on-site. If you're remote-only, the search adjusts accordingly.
• Languages. The languages you work in. If a role requires one you don't have, that's treated as a hard requirement during screening.

Tip on keywords: Be specific but not narrow. One keyword gives you a thin pool; five or six well-chosen ones give the screening enough to find the genuine matches without drowning you in noise.

Step 3 — The scan

When you start a search, Boardsweep scans multiple job boards at once — LinkedIn, Indeed, and Google Jobs — plus company career feeds. It pulls the postings matching your keywords and cities, removes duplicates that appear on more than one board, and assembles a single clean pool of roles.

This is the step that finds how many relevant postings exist, and it's always free. From here Boardsweep flows straight into reading them — there's no separate step to trigger and no decision about how many to screen. One scan finds the market and reads it, in a single continuous pass you watch happen live.

Step 4 — The gates

Before the AI reads a posting, Boardsweep applies your hard filters — the gates. If a role fails an absolute requirement (wrong location, a language you don't have, work authorization you don't hold), it's filtered out before the AI ever sees it — no time wasted reading a role you could never take. Only the roles genuinely in play go on to be scored.

Step 5 — AI screening

Now the core of Boardsweep. Each surviving posting is read by our third-party AI provider, one role at a time, against your actual CV. For every job it:

1. Extracts the hard requirements — the must-haves the posting actually states (years of experience, specific tools, certifications, seniority, language). 2. Checks each one against your CV — met or unmet. 3. Scores the match as a percentage, reasoning about your real background rather than keyword overlap.

You watch this happen live. Roles are read in real time; the ones that don't survive fall away, and the strong matches rise into a ranked shortlist as they're found.

Step 6 — Honest scores (the part that matters)

This is where Boardsweep is deliberately different from tools that make everything look like a great match.

If a role has a dealbreaker you don't meet, the score is capped — and the dealbreaker is named first. A posting that needs a certification you don't have, or seniority beyond your CV, won't be dressed up as a 90% fit. It gets capped at a "worth a look at most" level, with the unmet requirement stated plainly so you understand why.

The shortlist uses three honest tiers:

• Strong match (70+) — you meet the core requirements; worth your time.
• Worth a look (55–69) — partial fit, or a small gap worth weighing yourself.
• Reject (below 55) — a real mismatch; named, not hidden.

No inflated matches. The product's job is to save you from the wrong roles, not flatter you toward them.

Step 7 — Your shortlist

You're left with a ranked list of the roles that genuinely fit, each with its score, the reason behind it, and any dealbreaker called out. You read the handful that matter and decide what to do.

Boardsweep will never apply for you. It reads and ranks; you decide and act. That's a permanent promise — it keeps your name and your applications under your control.

A few tips for the best results

• Upload a full CV — more detail means more accurate scoring.
• Use several related keywords — one is too thin; five or six is the sweet spot.
• Set your real gates — honest filters mean the AI spends its time on roles you could actually take.
• Trust the low scores — a capped score with a named dealbreaker just saved you an afternoon.

Boardsweep is free to start — 2 scans a week, each one a full read of the market. Start a scan and see your first honest shortlist.