Converting to an Electronic résumé

To create a résumé which will look consistently good when e-mailed, scanned, or viewed within a simple text editor, you must use the simplest formatting possible. This may mean sacrificing the features of your favorite word processor, such as tables, paragraph borders, and custom fonts.

If you plan to post your résumé to the Internet, it is a good idea to keep two versions of it. Use the online version for e-mails and Internet postings. Save your word processed résumé for interviews and for sending to employers who have already shown an interest.

Follow these steps to create a résumé that will look good no matter where you send it. These directions will work for most word processing programs:

1. Open your résumé in your word processor.
2. Save the résumé as TEXT ONLY. (This feature is usually available by choosing Save As from the File menu)
3. Close the résumé and reopen the new text-only version in Notepad or a similar plain text editor.
4. Edit your résumé so that it looks good to you. See the Format a résumé for more suggestions.
5. Save the document.
6. To send your résumé in an e-mail or post it to the Internet, "select all" of the text in your résumé, "copy" it, and "paste" it into the e-mail or web page.

Note: The maximum size allowed for your résumé is 50,000 characters. This translates into approximately 10 pages.