Moving into interim work - best way to frame CV/Linkedin

[Wonderbug81]

I've just been made redundant from a Head of Dept role.

I've got a good buffer and had already dipped my toes into a (totally separate) 'side hustle'. While it earns a bit of money it'll take time to make it really pay enough to make it my main income.

In the meantime, I'm not particularly fussed about getting contract/consultancy work as a Head of again, in face a manager/senior manager level interim role would be better as it's easy and takes up less energy.

But I also don't want to have lower level roles on my CV and Linkedin as it looks like a forced step back.

Could I wrap them up under a 'Consultant' header instead and then just bullet point the company and type of work I do in each role?

I think this narrative plays better but don't know if it's appropriate when they are actually paid contracts with employers?

For your CV, you need to be reasonably accurate about how you describe any future posts you take on following your Head of Dept redundancy. LinkedIn is full of inaccurate claims of seniority and many different weird and wonderful job titles, as long as your CV aligns that's the main thing,

if your CV isn't well aligned with actual role titles, that detail could get picked up as a discrepancy when it comes to references being given. You'll need to decide whether any future roles you take as temporary contracts can loosely be described as Consultancy roles - a Business Analyst role could quite feasibly be consultancy, a manager in retail most certainly wouldn't. It's all about context.

it sounds a bit "cake and eat it" - you don't want the seniority and responsibility, but you do want the seniority to show on your CV. It's a risk you need to consider as to how important it could be in the future.

Thank you. It's less about wanting to keep the seniority, more about future (interim) employers not discounting me for senior roles because I have 1 or 2 managerial level roles on my CV. The roles I'm talking about are office based professional roles as opposed to retail manager etc.

I didn't think 'Consultant' necessarily makes me sound super senior, but I felt it provided a broader wrapper no matter the type of role.

Maybe sticking with roles where I can actually come in as a sole trader 'consultant' would be better than contract roles where the job title is 'manager' or whatever.