Special Looking Resumes: Pain or Panacea?

Conventional wisdom in these digital days is that your resume should be written in a standard fashion so that employers can easily add it to their automated applicant tracking systems and then pull it up through a keyword search. But what if you’re not a conventional candidate or otherwise want to stand out from the crowd? Some job seekers who fall into those groups are creating resumes with aesthetic features that highlight their creativity, attention to detail, or otherwise are designed to draw the attention of the employer.
Examples of what job seekers are using are:

• Shiny brochures;
• Marketing pamphlets with complete sentences divided into paragraphs;
• Including corporate logos alongside the description of current and past employment experiences;
• Pull-out quotes — shortbits of text displayed in large type which can be used to highlight top skills; and
• Resumes designed to look like news releases — especially effective for public relations folks.

David Perry, co-author of Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters and an executive recruiter, recently worked with a candidate who sent an employer-client a marketing pamphlet resume that even included the pre-printed words “patrick, i wasn’t looking for a new challenge, but you know what perry’s like.” Patrick, who was Perry’s contact at the employer, ended up hiring the candidate.
Source: Wall Street Journal, August 21, 2007