If you are looking for a job it’s probably best to throw your resume away. Everyone has one and thanks to resume workshops, websites, and books they all look the same. If your resume is professional it is no doubt typed up with something very close to Times New Roman and it’s in 12 point font. I bet you even use bullet points. Way to stick out.
But if you don’t believe me–maybe you’ll trust the Wall Street Journal. According to a recent article more and more recruiters are finding job candidates on Facebook.
So much for resumes. It’s the age of the ‘cool’ looking social media profile. The resume is dead.
Half of me is grateful. I hated formatting resumes on Word or any other text editor. It took forever. The second you indented one job another one would disappear.
But the other half of me is scared. Resumes are boring–but they have established rules to follow and set guidelines. I know that if my resume has a purple cover page, I’m making a mistake. With social media profiles we’re still in gray territory. Is it OK to tell future employers about the minutia of your day? Do you want them to see pictures from your vacations and your nights out?
Maybe. The trick is figuring out how to do these things with a little class and an ounce of humor. But before we iron out the details there will be a lot of mistakes.
So if you want to stick out and be on the cutting edge–take a deep breath and drag your resume to your recycle bin. After that figure out a way to show the world what you can do without putting people to sleep.
