Sometimes You Get What You Pay For

Posted by David B. Wright

June 16, 2008

OK, I admit it. I can be a bit on the frugal side sometimes. In fact, I’ve gotten pretty good at finding great deals. But sometimes you get what you pay for, too. I check the site FreeAfterRebate.info (which often has some fantastic deals, by the way!) and found a listing they had for free resume templates.

So I clicked through, and it took me to another site where, frankly, I was more than a little disappointed. Of the “10 most popular resume templates” there wasn’t a single one I would recommend using. The closest one would be the “Professional Resume” but even that one would have to be modified significantly to pass muster.

The biggest beef I have with those free resumes is that they use too much fancy formatting and colors that distract from the content of the resume. Some of them would be OK if they just removed either the unnecessary colors or the lines or tables.

Why would anyone use purple, green, orange, hot pink, or red on a resume? It’s like wearing a clown suit to an interview - you might grab their attention but it’s not likely you’ll get the job offer.

I was listening to Earl Nightinggale’s excellent program “Lead The Field” recently, and one of the things he was talking about was about looking the part. He stated “who you are speaks so loudly that I can’t hear what you’re saying” - in other words, the person’s appearance, dress, etc. so overwhelmed the other person’s perception that the true message was lost. The same thing can happen with your resume.

Face it, people make snap judgments all the time, and this is especially true when it comes to sorting through resumes. Your resume might get an 8-20 second scan before being either discarded or kept for closer review later. So do you want the recruiter to actually read through your resume, where your accomplishments and qualifications have a chance to speak for you, or do you want your resume to be thrown away before the recruiter even reads it?

So my advice is to stick with a black & white resume, with little formatting (bullets, bold text, and underlining are all fine). Get rid of the text boxes, tables, borders, lines, and so on. For more you can buy my book, in either the paperback version or the e-book version, and/or get a free special report on the top 7 resume mistakes.

To your success,

David B. Wright
Author, Get A Job! Your Guide to Making Successful Career Moves
www.thegetajobbook.com

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