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50 Shades Of Resume #28: The Blurbs

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Resume 28

Resumes are both ways to describe ourselves but also advertise ourselves. Briana Higgins ran with this idea to create a resume that “blurbs” her personality and traits while mixing them with her background and job description, with some infographics to boot. It’s a bullet-fast bang-bang of information with specific details when you drill down.

Needless to say it’s also a non-standard resume, though works a lot of standard elements into it. Let’s analyze what we can learn:

  • Mixing the personality traits (“Dependable”, “Versatile”) in with the regular resume background like education is an interesting choice.
  • There’s use of text running in various directions that’s a real change of pace from other resume – and also saves some space.
  • She uses different fonts, colors, and sizes to make the resume more interesting.
  • The use of icons in the left side is a clever idea that drives how what the sections are about before you read them.
  • The skill section is really unique – using the labels as major categories with a “ring” of specific skills around them. That’s a take that saves space and is visually interesting.
  • The resume then goes from the “Skill blurbs” to a linear measure of experience, which actually is a mix of skill and job history display. That’s a fast way to communicate knowledge and experience that’s efficient and easy to understand visually.
  • When you look it all over, the resume says a lot, but each part is different.

Now a few critiques:

  • I like the interleaving of personal traits in with the resume, but sometimes that can be overdone. it might be good to mix the “trait bars” with background elements relevant to said personality traits.
  • I think the “blurb” text may be too large – you could free up more space.
  • References are probably not needed, nor is the quote from a previous manager. Though the quote is clever, it’s usually not needed – it could be replaced with a personal or philosophical quote. However, it does fit the overall “show my personality” trait.
  • I’d have liked to see more job history Since she has a lot of skills, I’d want to see something showing what she’s done.

What I like with this resume is each part is different, so it doesn’t get dull, and there’s some ways to portray backgrounds that are clear, but also different. It also has a friendly, funky look that’s non pretentious.

Steve’s Summary: Hand me this and it definitely tells me we’ve got a person with skill, and I get some fast-and-easy summaries of what she’s capable of on top of the talent that went into the resume. It’s also enjoyably non-standard. I would want some job history though.

[“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

The Kindle Fire Ads Kinda Burn

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Sigh.

OK, we’re not surprised that the new Kindle Fires will have ads.  There’s some confusion, but at this time it appears the ads are going to be banging around the retinas of new Kindle Fire users like it or not.  So I’m going to write with the assumption this is the plan.

I’m not happy with it.

Oh, it makes sense.  As I noted earlier I think Amazon is experimenting a bit with what they’re trying to do, so this has the stench of “it seemed like a good idea at the time” wafting off of it.  Though who thought it was a good idea needs to really re-assess their personal dictionary.

I see a number of problems – and problems that are going to affect us progeeks in technology and media.

First, this will quickly eclipse the new announcements.  It’s not a good marketing move.

Technology-wise it’s a bit worrysome because I have to wonder what backchannels, system mods, and other tech had to be grafted into and onto the system.  I also wonder how easy it’d be to hack and abuse . . . you can guess people are lining up to figure it out.  Could backfire on Amazon.

It also brings up questions of ad-supported mobile apps.  If Amazon is going to leverage advertising on the Kindles, then it brings in the question of what ad policies other software may have to follow.  The “ownership” of the platform by Amazon has been clearly stated – what restrictions will they next place.

I’m concerned this may lead to others trying it – which I consider kind of hare-brained.  But hey Amazon is doing it, and one thing I’ve learned in the valley is that “if a successful company does something rock stupid, people will assume it’ll work for them.

I also am concerned that, if Amazon pushes this, they’ll try more and more invasive approaches.  Will they have associated ads with books, turning them into another broadcast stream?  I dunno.

I’m waiting to see reaction to this by people who brew and burn their own systems.  They just got a new reason to do what they do.

Still I think this is the experiment stage, and one I expect to quickly be turned into “here’s an option to turn it off.”

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.fantopro.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.