Writing a Graphic Design Resume
If you’re aspiring to be a graphic designer, you’re going to need that little thing called a resume if you even want to try and get your foot in the metaphorical professional door. However, not all graphic designer resumes are composed in precisely the same way, and the reason for this is fairly simple: not all designers possess the exact same strengths. So, if you’re just starting out down the HTML-coded, Micron-inked, live-traced path of no return, you should to see to it that your resume highlights and compliments your own personal artistic strengths.
Now, suppose you don’t have much professional or freelance experience yet, or you have none at all. That’s when you need to augment your existing skill list with the keyboard equivalent of steroids…word power. You know those people who would tell you to ‘use your words’ to settle elementary school playground disputes? It may not have worked then, but take that advice now, and use some grown-up words in your resume. At the very least, it will make you seem knowledgeable and well-read; at most, it will really make your skill set sound that much sweeter. A simple example of this would be using a description like “Designed and constructed a multi-windowed Flash website for client’s startup music business” rather than “Made a site for some guy I don’t know who gave me money”. If you can’t come up with fresh, clever words on your own, use an online thesaurus. It will come in mighty handy.
Graphic design resumes are absolutely everywhere on the internet, so if you want to get yourself noticed, you need to have some outstanding things on your resume. That is often a difficult task, but there are certain things that will just dazzle potential clients. If you ever did community service, like shuttling medical lab specimens between hospital floors as a candy striper, or telling stories to folks at a nursing home, put that on your resume. It has absolutely nothing to do with graphic design, but community service shows that you can handle working with people, and that is a great thing for any job or career. If you’ve worked in any sort of environment where you had to deal with other people, it shows you’re a team player and that you are capable of doing assigned tasks. And, of course, if you went to college and got any awards there, list those. Things like “perfect attendance”, while an unrealistic expectation for most college students, is a nice little detail. If you were part of a fraternity or a sorority, add that too. Be careful when choosing what you want to use to “wow” potential clients; it might be impressive to your buddies that you outran a cop that one time, but your client may not agree.
If you’re still a little confused about how exactly to go about constructing your resume, just type into any internet search engine the words “graphic design resume samples” and you’ll find tons of free and not-so-free examples of resume layouts and skill descriptions. Check out other people’s resumes on their own portfolio sites to see just how your competition inflates their own talents.
You’re going to need to create a logo for your resume. This logo will be a design representation of yourself, so it is crucial that you get it right. After all, Why would an employer hire someone who can’t design their own logo?
A few notes for putting together your logo design:
- Keep the design simple, and make sure it looks good in both color and black-and-white.
- Avoid gradients in most cases, they look great on the computer but the often look sloppy in print.
- Use no more than 2 or 3 colors, preferably 2.
- Show a side of yourself, while keeping it professional.
Just remember, a good resume that stands out from the crowd could be just as important as your porfolio when applying for a graphic design job. Your resume is a big part of the first impression you give to potential employers and you rarely get a second chance at a first impression.
Posted in: How to Get Hired for Graphic Design Jobs
