Quickstart Resumes
Most resume books tell you that, as the first step, you should "take a piece of paper and begin listing all your positive attributes" or something to that effect. Why? I thought you wanted to write a resume? If you want someone to produce an exhaustive list of all your positive attributes, go ask your mother—moms are great in the "positive attribute listing" category. This practice in "positive attribute development" futility might be okay for little Johnny who is about to graduate from high school and wants to figure out what he wants to do with his life, but hey—are we not college grads? Why don't we take that quantum leap forward and just start putting together the actual information on disk in resume format where it can be used?
Successful resumes generate information as they are created. Think about it. Do you ever write a term paper from scratch? Not usually (unless you are using a typewriter—any typists still out there?). You use either a template file with all the information and codes already set up (like the standard format for the bibliography section that comes at the end of every term paper), or you reuse the basic information from a previous paper (that is why you handed in your Psych paper with last October's date on it).
The same principle applies to resumes. The very best way to create your resume is online—on the screen, right in front of you, capturing information as you go and updating as necessary over time. No PC of your own? This is a good time to make your pilgrimage to the campus computer lab. Take two blank disks with you—one to use as your working copy and one as your backup for that inevitable point in the future when you accidentally destroy the first disk. Usually when you need it most.
But don't waste your time using one of the commercial resume software packages. Reason? First, they artificially force you into their format, which may or may not be correct and most definitely cannot be fine-tuned to your specific needs. Second, they are not portable—meaning that the output file can only be modified with that package. So the next time you want to update your resume, you either have to locate (or buy) the same package or you are out of luck. You are better off working with a standard word processing package (such as Microsoft Word or WordPerfect) and creating your own.
An excellent way to get a jumpstart on your resume development is with the Quickstart Resume Templates (exclusively available here at CollegeGrad.com), which contains pre-formatted resumes for 30 different majors (from Accounting to Zoology). Quickstart Resume Templates do not require you to learn an entirely new software program, nor does it force you into a rigid format. If you can use a word processor, you can use Quickstart Resume Templates. You simply add your own content to customize your personal resume.
The Quickstart Resume Templates are provided to you FREE for your personal, private use as a visitor to our site. However, please make sure you honor the copyright on these templates.