The economy is bad. No one’s job is really 100% safe, so it’s time we all bucked up and got our recession bags packed (just in case!). Your portfolio is already gorgeous, but have you created a drool-worthy résumé?
This flimsy one-page document is more important than many people think: the résumé is the first portfolio piece that potential employers see, and if they’re not impressed, chances are they won’t look at the rest of your portfolio. “But I’m not a print designer!” you moan. It doesn’t matter, and I don’t want to hear your excuses! You need to conquer this, because if you’re a great Web designer, you don’t want your first impression to be mediocre.
The Steve Stevenson Challenge
Everyone likes a competition. How about one in which ten good Web designers have to design the same résumé in only a few hours? Meet Steven Stevenson.
Steven Stevenson, a fictional Web designer, doesn’t have a résumé. The competition: each designer must translate his work experience, education and interests into their own unique style. Watch and learn, people. At the end is a summary of good tips for Web designer résumés. (If you’re interested in taking the challenge yourself, check out misterstevenson.com for all the rules these designers followed, Steven Stevenson’s raw data and the chance to add your own entry.)
And in no particular order, here are the contestants’ entries!
Contest Entries
Sam Brown made a real effort to distinguish between the three main components of Steve Stevenson’s life and adds a touch of personality with some handwritten text and highlighting. He shows he isn’t afraid to mix media but manages to do so in an elegant, fun way.
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Ali Felski’s design is beautiful and simple, but manages to convey Steve Stevenson’s strong design skills. Her usage of colour is muted, but appropriate, and she’s left out a lot of extra information that could clutter up this one page document. Ali is also aware of the boundaries of the medium. She says, “A résumé should be designed well, but just like the Web, it has constraints, and even as designers, we should respect them.”
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Chris Spooner opts for a purely typographic, clean design that showcases his ability to display information without the need for adornment. Clean design is a skill that Steve Stevenson may possibly need should he be looking for a corporate Web design job, in which case he’d need to present something simple and professional.
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Niamh Redmond makes Steve Stevenson’s résumé stand out by choosing a landscape-style document with well-divided content and good branding. Niamh says about her design: “My aim was to design something in which each element served a function. Every shape and line, the colors and their use, the font variations and text sizes were chosen to communicate something to the reader.”
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Eva-Lotta Lamm chose to keep her résumé simple and typographic: “The only illustrative element is Steve’s little logo (playing with the nice alliteration of his first and last name). It is repeated as a small blue dot to separate different section sin the résumé.” The result is a beautiful, yet simple piece, which is easy to follow.
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Sarah Parmenter goes with a solid yellow background and a very prominent photo of Steven Stevenson (who is quite cute!). She breaks up the copy and puts emphasis on his freelance work.
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Wez Maynard has simplified the information and given it lots of room to breath. His design could easily be used as a Web design. He’s also given a lot of space and prominence to branding and has effectively separated the freelance work from the work experience.
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Luc Pestille has added some great imagery without making it unprintable. He’s allowed spaces for a photo and company logos, and he brings in arty spray-painting. While most likely inappropriate for a corporate work environment, it is playfully suited to a funkier job opportunity.
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Ollie Kav chose to use Steve Stevenson’s love of Japanese culture to organize his résumé. These personal touches give the CV a huge dose of personality, which would give employers something interesting to speak with him about in the interview. “I’ve based the design on the signage in the Tokyo subway stations, which has bright bold colors,” Ollie says. This boldness makes for a resume that shows Steve Stevenson’s confidence and passion.
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Albert Lo has broken an important rule by making his résumé virtually unprintable. But he has also organized the information very differently: chronologically, with awards, skills and work all intertwined, just as they would be in real life. Albert says his inspiration came from listening to house and trance; his colors and illustration really communicate the type of designer he is.
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You can download all of these entries in a handy ZIP file (5 Mb). Thanks to all designers for their participation!
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