Avatar photoSteven Savage

SF, Vision, And Beyond

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Space Station

Some time ago I mentioned the role of SF in having a vision, how our culture’s attitude made “visionary” SF harder, and the virtue of incrementalization. Serdar further examined how we might examine progress inappropriate.

But something kept kicking around in my head. There is some good SF out there, challenging SF, outrageous SF out there.  But I didn’t see anything that was really inspiring to me, that felt like it’d build the future.  Certainly little of it inspires me (especially as you’ve heard talking to me about my editing experience).

Then I realized that if we’re looking to SF to provide visions and growth and direction, to inspire us to more, it doesn’t matter if the SF is good (in some ways), challenging, or outrageous.

The thing is we need SF that really inspires us to do more. That means it has to have two traits.

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50 Shades Of Resume #38: The Personal Timeline

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Resume 38

Maria Rybak’s resume is a timeline – something we’ve seen before, but she approaches it in an almost stark approach that’s minimal except for text, while still incorporating good visual touches and standard resume elements.  It’s an approach that’s both creative and measured, which is a difficult balancing act.

It’s also a resume that presents a lot the more you look at it.  So let’s see just what we can learn from it.

  • The angled look is different, very artistic, and adds a bit of visual richness – which I think it needs otherwise its measured sense may get a bit too dull.
  • She uses a distinct, limited color palate throughout the resume.  That unifies it visually and keeps the feeling of “precision” at the same time.
  • The resume is actually divided – by her name.  The top is the timeline, the bottom is skills and related information.  That’s a clever division, and we’ve seen similar things done before.  In this case it makes sure the parts of the resume stay distinct.
  • The timeline itself is nicely done, not overdone, but rather precise.  It also acts as a visual separator for the bottom of the resume and her picture and information at the top.  It reflects her chosen palette.
  • In addition, you’ll notice the resume is education on the bottom and practice on the top.  That’s a great, effective division – this really shows job history and education at the same time, and tells you a lot.
  • The photo, as always, is a nice personal touch – and here I think it’s needed to keep this from being to impersonal.
  • The resume works to communicate.  It’s another resume that is really trying to tell you about the person.

A few things I’d change:

  • Some of the font size seems a bit too small.  A few less words an a bit larger fonts would help – though I wouldn’t diminish too much of the white space – in this case the white space works.
  • The level of detail on some timeline elements is a bit larger.  A little tightening may make it flow better.

I think in this resume we actually see a change from the norm that doesn’t overdo itself, and meets very specific goals.

Steve’s Summary: This is the kind of “experimental” resume I like to get – does the job while doing it differently.  Also it tells me she’s quite talented.

[“50 Shades of Resume” is an analysis of various interesting resumes to celebrate the launch of the second edition of my book “Fan To Pro” and to give our readers inspiration for their own unique creations.]

– Steven Savage

Mental Health In The US Is More Mental Than Health

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USA Today is going to do a multipart series on the lack of mental health care in the US.  I’d recommend reading this and following it.

My background is actually in Psychology, all the way back to my college years.  Thus issues like this are ones I was and am concerned about, and it’s been frankly obvious but not talked about that the mental health care in the US is pretty bad – basically it’s prison, emergency wards, and the streets.  And the morgue.

It’s wrong on many levels.  It’s frustrating as it’s been bad for awhile.  It’s painful that in our age of snarky gotcha politics no one is going to actually do something unless a lot of us push for it.  That’s a hint, by the way.

So I’m hoping this gets some damn attention.  As a guy who gladly votes to raise his taxes, I’d like to get some better social services, please.

Because something like this means the system, such as it is, is going to break spectacularly.  More.

– Steven Savage