I mean here in this example from OP - if he improves his CV visuals and then finds a job - that means he had the technical qualities to get the job in the first place, only the CV impression was causing the rejections. Which means the hiring managers are following a flawed metric, relying on shallow and easily manipulated visual factor. Every time I try to dig into this, the answer is along the lines "You need to impress the hiring manager in 10 seconds" which is a very different game than the technical skill and I don't see how would that impression translate into long term work performance. It's just gatekeeping. Nobody is quoting any statistical research, not even the hiring managers themselves, so I suspect there isn't much to back this practice. I hope someone can prove me wrong.