Resume Writing :: Fast Tips for Electronic Submittal of Your Resume
Submitting resumes electronically can ensure that your resume is reviewed promptly and also demonstrates your facility in utilizing computer technology. However, increasing numbers of employers are automatically deleting all incoming e-mail with attachments as a security measure to protect their computer systems from the danger of viruses. Therefore, if you have been asked to submit your resume electronically, confirm whether or not you may send it as an attachment. If you may not submit is as an attachment, following are some useful tips on setting up an ASCII (plain text) formatted resume:
- Set margins so that the area you are typing within is no more than 6.5 inches (for a standard 8" x 11" page setup that would mean 1" margins on both the left and right).
- Use a 12 point fixed pitch font style such as courier (fixed pitch means that all the characters, including spaces, use the exact same amount of space on the page).
- To fancy up your resume, use asterisks (*), o's (O), plus signs (+), etc. in place of bullets which can convert to question marks or other odd characters on the receiver's end.
- You can opt to create a website for your resume and just add a link in the e-mail to your website
Some tips:
- If you choose to create a website with the intention of placing your resume there for potential employers access, be sure that you do not add any personal information on your website that you would not necessarily want the employer to use in the evaluation process (ie. Gruesome graphics, etc.)
- Creating a website allows you to imbed links to former employers websites or to the sites of organizations you have been involved with and can be a very impressive way to communicate more information than would be possible given the restrictions of a single page resume format.
