How much is too much?

September 8, 2005 11:12 PM

How much creative license should I use when writing my resume?

By that, I don't mean fabricating facts or anything like that. I'm talking about the aesthetic of the resume, design-wise.

I'm a marketing communications major with an emphasis on advertising, due to graduate in December. Several of my advertising professors have recommend to be "as creative as possible" in our resumes as a way to get noticed. I even had a copywriting textbook that showed a real-life example of a resume that looked like a magazine ad, with all of the "meat" of the resume hidden throughout the ad. Caption: "He got the job."

This all seems a little gimmicky to me. I would be afraid that the hiring person might see something like that and toss it, thinking of it as ploy to grab attention.

I read through this previous thread, and this one, and both seemed to warn of "superficial attempts to be memorable."

Given that it is a fairly creative field, I'm wondering if there will be more leeway in that area for advertising/pr/design type jobs. For example, on the job openings section on the website of one of the companies I'm looking at, under qualifications, they list things like: Someone cool. Someone nerdy. Someone who will hang out with us after work and likes pizza. This makes me think that they will be less uptight and more welcoming to the creative route.

Is it too big of a risk? Note: Not planning on doing a full ad, like the example in my textbook, just maybe adding some graphics while maintaining a fairly professional look.

Sorry this is so long :-)

posted by saucy to work & money (10 comments total)

It is only my opinion, but I have been in a position to hire both creative types and regular ol' professionals.

"Creative" resumes should only be done by people who are going to be hired on their artistic skill set. Even then it should be low key and accompanied by an actual portfolio.

So called "eye catching" resumes went right into the vertical file. A resume is just to get the facts out, not dazzle the eye. If you are dying to show how arty you are, send along a CD with your portfolio in PDF format (or jpegs for images).

Some others may say that it is OK to go with a trendy styled resume, but it is so much more likely to get you overlooked that it just isn't worth it. Use portfolios!!!

/end of lecture...
posted by qwip at 11:36 PM on September 8, 2005

I hire copywriters and designers. I want to see artistic skill demonstrated in the portfolio or copy samples -- not in the resume. A well designed resume is OK, but clearly laying out the information so it's easy for me to quickly scan and get a good sense of the applicant's skills is far more important. A very clever resume may get you noticed, but it's also really hard to do well, and almost never works. I wouldn't hold it against you if I could still get the information I wanted, but it wouldn't help you with me.

Spend your time crafting cover letters and resumes that are specifically targeted to each job you're applying for and don't worry about going overboard with a notice me gimmick. If you do want to get noticed and jump out from the clutter, find somebody who knows somebody who works at the company and work an introduction.
posted by willnot at 11:47 PM on September 8, 2005

i would imagine a lot of the "someone who's cool" part comes into play after you get the interview.

the point is, if you make a cheesy resume that you're not happy with, and a company interviews you because of it, do you really want to work for them?

i would say make a resume that, firstly, describes your skillset and experience, write a kickass cover letter, and, *if you can* infuse it with a little bit of your personality.

one would hope that if you have a resume that *you* think is awesome, then the people who would be interested in interviewing you because of it are also awesome. if your resume ends up being "over the top", well, hey, that's who you are, and hopefully you'll find a company that'll fit you. i mean, i think those resume advice books are for people who are just like "well, I guess i'm supposed to get a job now"

the last job I got i had a less than completely professional resume (ie, it had a "personal interests" section), but that's who i am, and those sorts of things are important to me. And the job I got using that resume is my ideal work situation (i mean, i wish i was making more money, but hey, don't most people? And realistically, at this point, I would turn down offers that paid me more without a second thought if I didn't have the sort of environment I do now).
posted by fishfucker at 11:50 PM on September 8, 2005

Also having been in a situation where I was hiring creatives ... the "outstanding" resume usually signfies someone trying to polish a turd.

Your qualifications need to stand on their own in the resume. The coverletter is where you can show that you like pizza, what kind of pizza you like, and why you like consuming it along with a decent brew or two after work.
posted by SpecialK at 12:30 AM on September 9, 2005

A normal resume is safe, a gimmick undertakes the additional responsibility of having to appeal to the aesthetics or sense of a person you really know little about, so it has every chance of failing to impress - and if it fails to impress, you're more screwed than if you'd done nothing. So if you know a fair bit about the person you're sending it to, then you can make an educated estimate of both what will appeal and the risk involved. If you don't know who is going to be looking at it, I'd think the risk outweighs the benefit.

If you're going to go the eye-catching or gimmick way, I'd suggest doing it with something that accompanies the resume, and keep the resume normal. Perhaps the box it is delivered in. Perhaps the cover of a portfolio, or demo reel case.

As to the artistic style of the resume itself, I put some effort into making it look good, while trying to avoid having it look like it took effort. Eg, keeping it simple, not using different fonts and sizes, or colours or graphics, clean and tidy, laid out nicely so it's easy to skim, it Just Works but looks like there is every possibility that I just threw it together effortlessly, not looking like I laboured over it. Minimalist design means you get to focus all your attention on fewer and simpler elements and get them tidier than you would otherwise, while the effect is subtle and inconspicuous, and masquerades as a simple document.
Your philosophy may vary :-)
posted by -harlequin- at 12:35 AM on September 9, 2005

-harlequin-, if I went the route of a neat and tidy minimalist design, would you recommend something similar to this? (Was linked to in an earlier askme)

I guess my main thing is I don't want it to look like I went straight to the career center at school, typed it into a template & and poof, here is my canned resume.

I'm glad most of you disagreed with my weird profs. My opinion was that it probably worked for a few people, when it hadn't been done before, but now it's just hopping on the bandwagon of someone's original idea. And that is cheesy.
posted by saucy at 4:33 AM on September 9, 2005

saucy: Yup :-)
posted by -harlequin- at 5:03 AM on September 9, 2005

A well designed resume is OK, but clearly laying out the information so it's easy for me to quickly scan and get a good sense of the applicant's skills is far more important.

That's the most important thing: design for skimmability. Assume that the person "reading" your resume is working through a pile of 100 resumes, and will spend 30 seconds looking for a few key points to make a first decision. Make their task easy, and you've proved you're a good writer and designer.
posted by fuzz at 5:34 AM on September 9, 2005

My orthogonal perspective on the creative resume:

They can be made to work, but only if you approach it as a full-blown self-promo campaign. You have to commit to it and take it seriously. If your heart's not in it, don't even try.

Also, as established, that approach just won't work for some people. Even if you decide to do it, don't do it unless you've done research on the target and decided they might go for it. (Short version: Know your target market.)

I've known people who got hired or hired people based on that kind of approach. It can often lead to interviews with the CDs just because they're always looking for freelancers these days. And if you're looking for freelance work (which is going to neophytes with increasing frequency), you want to target the CDs, anyway.
posted by lodurr at 6:01 AM on September 9, 2005

I also suspect that the creative approach may work better when it's not so much saying "Look - I'm really creative!", but instead says "I'm dead keen on getting THIS job at THIS place specifically, and I'm going above and beyond to demonstrate that", ie it isnt something you could use when applying to other companies, but is obviously custom-tailored, gone-the-extra-mile when applying at this particular company alone. That makes it a very time intensive approach, since you can't really reuse the effort if it doesn't get you the job.

(In my line of work unfortunately, some custom extra-mile stuff is often required of every applicant that makes it through the "not completely unsuitable" filter. That situation REALLY gets old very quickly if you're applying to multiple places and often don't get the job offer. :-/
posted by -harlequin- at 2:31 PM on September 9, 2005