Being on the job hunt required me to re-evaluate my CV, or “Curriculum Vitae.” I had a very simple one that I’ve been using the past few years, but I was inspired to create a whole new one from scratch by this very awesome article, How To Create A Great Web Design CV and Résumé? from Smashing Magazine. It would also give me a chance to learn GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program). Here’s a look into my design process and how my current resume came to be.

First Version

My first iteration of my evolving resume. I just started learning to use GIMP, previously using Microsoft Word to create resumes. The upside is that I can get more creative with my layouts and use more fonts as long as I convert the final file to a PDF. The downside… I feel like it can get way too crowded and busy for HR heads to look at.

I thought it definitely LOOKED way cooler than my previous resumes, which were restricted to less fancy fonts and ::shudder:: “tabled” formats.

I also REALLY liked my last minute inspiration for a “</resume>” tag at the bottom of the page. I had a lot of white space to fill. I initially was thinking of a graphic of some sort that represents me, but I decided that an kind of image would be distracting and just went with a simple text, that being a closing HTML tag noting the “end” of my resume.

Second Version

The second version. I changed the font for the blocked text mostly because I thought it was a bit too small and wouldn’t read well when printed. It would be this version that I started having friends look at to give me their critiques.

Third Version

Started to really flesh out the resume from here. It’s not aligned properly because I went for another layout as you’ll see in the next version.

After some critiques from some friends, I followed a format that worked for them on their resumes. That is, their job history divided up under Experience Headings. I thought this was pretty cool since an HR head sees a LOT of resumes and usually have to skim through them in less than 30 seconds. My job history before was listed chronologically, but it was cluttered and a hiring rep wouldn’t be able to cypher the best details of myself from it.

By using the Experience Headings, I can state 3 of my best attributes that describe me as well as highlight for the hiring rep what they really want to know from a resume.

I had to add 2 more positions to my experience history so I can have a third heading. I had to pretty much pull out my freelance work and school experience, which I think helps since that’s where most of my programming and developing skills came from.

I decided to take out the bullets and go with blocked texts, mostly because it became a pain to align texts with the bullets and also to save some space.

The References section was also taken out because, really, if an employer needs one, they’ll just ask for it despite it being said on my resume or not.

Fourth Version

The current version of my resume that I’m using.

I tweaked the layout a bit. Instead of dividing it into two columns like before, I went for a more row-like format with sub-columns. That way I could fit in more, such as the Objective.

A lot of the experience summaries got rewritten and cut to give just the gist of it all rather than cluttering the whole thing up.

I took out the gray header background to make the resume more printer friendly. While I like a contrasting background, I think it’s more practical to make the resume easier to print and read for more technical head hunters.

Fifth Version

I decided to make a more simple and straightforward version using Word with less fancy fonts and layouts.

It spilled over into a second page, kind of breaking the “One-Page-Only Resume” rule. I think that can be forgiven in some exceptions.

I made this mostly because I figured that some hiring managers read resumes on their blackberries or some portable device. Also, by creating it in Word and then converting it into PDF, I’m able to preserve the actual “text” in the file; meaning that the PDF can actually be “searched” through (Ctrl-F) for keywords.

Before, on GIMP, I saved it as a Postscript (.ps) file and then converted it to a PDF. Unfortunately, you couldn’t really distinguish the “text” with search mechanisms.

And that’s what I got. I’m always looking at my resume to see what it is I could be missing or how I can always improve it. Got any suggestions?

Tags: Resume