Writing a Great Resume: Make it Easy on the Eyes!A big part of writing a great resume involves looking beyond the actual words we type on the page. After you’ve taken all of the other steps to write a winning resume, and before you do your fine-tuning and proofreading, consider these important tips about your resume style and formatting. Writing a Great Resume: Universal Principles of Effective Communication Style and formatting features what I call “universal principles of effective communication” which include space (the proper use of black print and white space on the page), consistency, page and section formatting and your appropriate professional use of font type and size. These style elements may seem insignificant compared to the content or written information you provide on your resume, but they actually play a large part in writing a great resume and winning your dream job. Employers notice these “look and feel” factors very quickly – within a few seconds, and definitely before they read a single word. They’ll often have a lasting impact on their opinion of you and your application. They can’t help noticing them, because how we format or style our resume is even more influential than the words we write in it. Writing a Great Resume: Keep it Spacious, Clean and Simple As a general rule, it’s best to keep your cover letter simple and traditional in its layout. Most often, anything “creative” or out of the ordinary rubs employers the wrong way, and generally just doesn’t look that great despite our best efforts and intentions. Your best bet is to keep it simple – but not too simple. As my spouse Josie says, a resume must be “neat, easy to read and consistent.” • The pages should be centred vertically and have a look of fullness without being cramped – just like your cover letter. • Preferably keep your resume to either one full page or two full pages. One and a half pages is also okay, but what’s worst is “one and a bit pages” which makes your resume look empty and incomplete. It shouldn't be under one full page or more than two pages. • Leave one space between each paragraph. Do not right-justify the paragraphs, and keep the paragraphs even on (or “flush” to) the left-hand margin with no indentation. • You can make it easy on the employer by following a consistent format with respect to both subtitles and bold, underline, italics, years and bullet points. For instance, if you bold one of your job titles then you need to bold all of the other ones in the exact same way. This “clean look” is very welcoming, easy to follow and easy to quickly scan for further consideration because there’s nothing hidden, nothing fancy and nothing distracting or hard to understand for the employer. Writing a Great Resume: Beware Over-Statements - Use “Special Effects” Sparingly Beware both over-statements and under-statements as you’re writing a great resume, and make minimal use of bold, italics, underline and caps – these are all designed to be used sparingly. Using any of them too much defeats their purpose and makes a resume look intense, complicated and ugly. • Selected use of bold helps guide the employer’s eye to key parts points on the resume – in 30 seconds or less! I use bold on my name, section sub-titles and for “References Available Upon Request.” I also use it for job titles within my experience section and program titles such as “Diploma in Fine Arts” within my education section – that’s all. • I only use underline only when creating subsections, and italic to describe the names of employer organizations in the experience section and schools in the education section. • I capitalize job titles, city, state/province, country and organization names only. I don’t capitalize job titles within bullet points in the experience section. • I don’t use “ALL CAPS” anywhere. it’s interpreted on the internet as YELLING or at the very least as an unnecessary over-statement. Writing a Great Resume: Consistent and Easy-to-Read Font Type and Size It’s important to be consistent in all matters of your layout and design, both within your resume and also among your resume, cover letter, reference list and thank you letter. For instance, it's important to use the same font type throughout your whole resume as well as these other job search documents. It’s also best to use the same font size for the main text (excluding section sub-titles) throughout your resume - usually 11 or 12 point). Your name can be larger (16-20 pt.) and subtitles can be 12-14 point in font size (1-3 pts larger than your main text) to make them stand out a little more. I often review rough drafts of resumes with several font types and sizes within the main text. This inconsistency is a big issue with employers, who see it as carelessness and may not bother to consider your resume further. • A font size of 11 is often ideal. 12 is also good whereas anything larger than 12 often looks “elementary” and font smaller than size 11 is hard to read, again increasing the likelihood that the employer won’t read your resume. • Text that is too much smaller than other text sends the message, “Please don’t notice this! It’s worthless or at most inadequate!” • Conversely, text that is too much larger than other text sends the opposite but equally poor message, Look at this! Look how important I am! It’s overstated or exaggerated and destroys credibility with the employer. • Times new roman is my favourite font - an excellent type for most resumes and occupational fields. It’s clean, not too complicated to read, and warm in contrast to other font types like arial that are often too cold and harsh looking when used in hard copy. Garamond is also very nice. Writing a Great Resume: Letterhead and Header Tips • Use the same letterhead at the top of your resume as you do for your cover letter, but make your name slightly larger. • Within the letterhead, provide your full address including street address, city and state/province as well as one phone number and one email address. • Here your name is like your signature, and shouldn’t be too big or small (as I mentioned earlier, generally 16-20 pt. Is best depending on the font type). • Your name should stand out - but not too much. For instance, it shouldn’t be in “all caps” because this is similar in effect to using a font size that is too big. • I also suggest that you use a different header for the 2nd page. If not, people may get the pages of your resume mixed up or think that the second page is your one-page resume. • It’s common to put your name along with your phone number and “page 2/2” at the top of the 2nd page. You could also repeat the job title that you included in your objective/headline. For example, “Eric Weir, Employment Counsellor, page 2/2.” Writing a Great Resume: Maximizing the Impact of Your Experience and Education Sections • Your employment history is crucial. So please make sure to start your experience section on your first page, regardless of whether you’re writing a chronological, functional or combination resume. For your experience and summary sections and anywhere else you use narrative-style bullet points, find the balance between making them too short and too long. This means preferably not less than one full line and not more than two lines per bullet point. • A line that's too short seems to lack importance, while one that’s too long may test the employer’s patience and be hard to "swallow in one bite." I make my summary and experience sections look neat and tidy, like a neat rectangular box of words. Otherwise, I end up with a messy-looking combination of short and long lines intermixed, with the short lines making the whole resume look choppy and disorganized. • Don’t lengthen margins or use smaller font to make longer phrases fit – instead, edit them down by removing unnecessary words and asking yourself what’s most relevant to the employer according to what they’re stated in the job description. Or you can try combining two short points into one longer phrase. • Don't use strange or unusual bullet points - keep them square of round, and a regular size that matches well with your font type and size. • Be consistent in your bullet point punctuation: Either use a period or no period at the end of each bullet point. As mentioned briefly above, I recommend using a simple listing format for both your job and education listings. • For your experience section, list your jobs by bolding your job title and listing it on the left margin, then list the years on the right side. On the following line, list the organization or employer name in full on the left side, italicized, followed by the city and state/province/country in regular font. • For your education section, list your education or training programs completed or in process by bolding the official wording of your achievement (e.g. “Bachelor or Arts Degree”) on the left margin, then list the years or year completed on the right side. On the following line, list the school name in full on the left side, italicized, followed by the city and state/province/country in regular font. Writing a Great Resume: “The End” End your resume by stating “References Available Upon Request” either as a line or starting with the subtitle, “References.” This means "The End" :-) and also indicates your ability and willingness to give references later, usually at the end of the interview.
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