Yes, I admit it. I’m also a victim of Michael Anderson’s wave of creativity that tossed my old resume down the garbage. He spurred me to rethink how usual resumes are done.
This is his resume in case you haven’t seen it.
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| Infographic Resume |
Here’s what I created when I just got out of college, with a bare diploma in my hands.
You can download it here for a clearer image. Usual details with a lil fancy designing to give it some umpph. My reasons for doing this was simple:
- I wanted to illustrate that I enjoy do art.
- I wanted to get a job that would cultivate my ‘artistic’ skills.
- I’m not plain so why should my resume be so?
I’d like to think that I was pretty creative with my first resume, I still wish I’d thought of Michael’s approach earlier. But I’m quite happy with it, it got me the job I wanted and it was always a conversation breaker when I had an interview, easing my nerves.
But my fascination grew when I saw Michael’s resume. Not needing a resume, I still wanted to create one for three reasons:
- It was a challenge. To prove to myself I could create something similar (atleast almost creatively similar) using Powerpoint.
- To get noticed, set me apart from the rest.
- It’s a fun process anyway.
So I’m calling it my background details, instead of a resume.
8 Steps I took to create an Infographic Resume.
1. I assessed myself.
- What have I accomplished?
- What have I learnt along those success?
- Am I proud of it?
2. So I wrote a list of what’s worth mentioning, and prioritized it. I've personalized it by mentioning what I've learnt from each experience worth mentioning.
3. I divided my list into three sections; (1) Key highlights (2) Describe Experience and (3) Summarize what I did.
4. Then I looked around for inspiration. There are many great examples of infographics resumes out there. See tons of examples here.
6.I choose a color scheme. I knew I wanted to use blue, it depicts professionalism. I chose to pair it with it contrasting hue, orange to add a splash of fun. Here are some examples of palettes.
7.Experimented with some cool online tools that help create colorful charts & diagrams. Check this links out:
8.I played around with the layout till I got the one that I was happy with.
One of the reasons why I love creating pieces like this is because you get to assess yourself. You get to see how much you’ve accomplished along the way. It’s self-recognition. It usually gives me a new confidence to set higher standards and pursue them.
So anyways, I’ll be blogging next about Pros & Cons of Infographic Resume, look out for that!
