How To Prepare A Creative Resume (With Definition And Tips)

Updated 3 March 2023

The Indeed Editorial Team comprises a diverse and talented team of writers, researchers and subject matter experts equipped with Indeed's data and insights to deliver useful tips to help guide your career journey.

When you prepare a creative resume, you focus on designing a document that is visually appealing to highlight your accomplishments. This type of resume differs from a conventional resume because it is a highly formatted and specialised document. Submitting a resume that presents your educational and professional credentials in a unique way is likely to impress recruiters within the creative industry. In this article, we describe what a creative resume is and provide you with multiple tips to guide you when you construct your own.

What Is A Creative Resume?

A creative resume is a professional document that follows a creative design and an original format to show an individual's strengths, abilities and career achievements. Professionals working in the fields of web and graphic design, marketing, advertising, public relations, writing, social media, journalism, animation, photography and entertainment typically design such resumes. Designing an imaginative resume helps a professional working in any creative industry to highlight their creative abilities and skills to hiring managers. A resume that is creative may be a graphic design, a short video, a digital portfolio or an interactive website.

How To Make A Creative Resume?

The following tips may help you create a resume that highlights your creative skills:

1. Make the resume look unique

An engaging resume requires a unique template to make it look different from other resumes. You may do this by selecting a variety of colours or adjusting fonts and their sizes. Consider devising your own format instead of using an online template because other job candidates may use the same template. When you design your own template, you display the creativity that is exclusive to your personality.

2. Prepare an engaging layout

When preparing an engaging layout, focus on developing a fresh design. Your design elements may include text boxes, shapes or images. You may, for instance, highlight your skills and work experience by writing these headers in bold. Placing colourful blocks behind resume sections is another way to provide an interesting layout for the document. All these elements help you avoid following the list structure of a traditional resume.

3. Focus on consistency

Regardless of the layout and format you select, it is important to focus on providing consistency to your resume by using similar design components. This lets you show hiring managers that you care about how the information looks in the document. Dates, dashes, tenses and spacing are some elements to check to ensure consistency. For instance, if you are using colours for headers, it is a good idea to have them all the same colour.

4. Use colours

You may select a solid colour for the background of your resume or use a gradient pattern. A gradient background design gives your document a vibrant look. You can then adjust the colours of the text so they are compatible with these colours. Another option is to use the colours in the logo of the company you are applying to. Although this approach means that you design a different layout for each company, it is an excellent way to express your interest in the organisation.

5. Utilise a variety of fonts

Fonts can add creativity to a resume, but it is important to choose ones that are easy to read. One option is to write the resume text in a traditional font that is easy to read and then use a different font when writing your name and headings. This also provides consistency to your resume. A design-forward font for headers allows you to create a visually interesting resume. It is important to note that not all fonts may be free to use or open source.

6. Incorporate graphics

Graphics help you construct a resume that can instantly attract the attention of hiring managers. These graphics or illustrations may be simple, for example, using email and phone icons alongside your contact details. Similarly, you could use a lightbulb icon to illustrate problem-solving or a brain icon to signify logical thinking in your skills section.

Related: How To Write A Resume Headline

7. Insert columns

Columns are a good way to manage space on your resume and streamline the information. Using columns may also help recruiters to scan the information on the document. They allow you to break up the text and arrange it so that it is easy to read. For example, you could use a two-column option to produce a one-page resume, displaying your skills and summary on the left of the document and your work experience and educational credentials on the right.

8. Include infographics

Infographics allow you to display your skills and professional accomplishments on a resume creatively. Consider using this visual element with short sentences or phrases, such as your skills or awards. These infographics may be charts showing your accomplishments or a mind map to highlight your personality traits. They may also be helpful in presenting a timeline resume to show your career progress and other related accomplishments.

9. Add photos

Photos can be an effective way to tell a visual story that illustrates your work. A professional photo of yourself next to your name may enhance your contact information section. Adding photos or designs to your resume may also be a good idea if you are a photographer or a graphic designer. For instance, an architect may include a photo of a building that they have designed.

Tips To Prepare An Impressive Resume

Here are some additional tips you may follow to devise a robust resume and help you make a good first impression:

Focus on quality and keep it brief

You are more likely to impress hiring managers when you include high-quality design elements and content. It is important to proofread the resume to ensure that it is free from error and check the quality of the design elements. Keeping the document brief and simple can also make it easier to read.

Demonstrate your skills

Use your creativity to highlight your strengths and abilities. For instance, if you are a writer, writing an engaging professional summary may be an effective way to demonstrate your career goals and skills. You may also consider listing important information at the beginning of the document, such as your professional goals, skills, awards and key accomplishments.

Insert links

To demonstrate your work experience and professional accomplishments, you can add links to your social media channels, work portfolio or your website (if you have one). This allows hiring managers to access your work and view your professional achievements without having to search for your name and work online. Adding links to your professional networking portals is another way to show your work experience and skills.

Research trends

Before constructing your resume, do some online research to look for examples of resumes that briefly and creatively highlight skills and accomplishments. This exercise can help you focus on a trend that aligns with your industry and personality. The aim is only to get inspiration from other resumes, so make sure that your main focus is on showing content to recruiters rather than distracting them with too many design elements.

Create a digital copy

It is convenient to have a digital version of your resume so that you can quickly email it to hiring managers. You also then have the option to hyperlink your work so that recruiters can click to see your accomplishments and better understand your skill set. Hyperlinks are unnecessary if you choose to use a printable copy that you can offer to recruiters in person.

Ensure it is printable

When printing your resume, ensure that all the colours and other design elements look good on the paper. Make sure that you select the high-quality option for the printout. Consider saving your digital resume as a PDF because this makes it easy to access and share and also maintains the quality of the document.

Make your resume look professional

Your resume lists all your key professional and educational credentials, so it is essential that it looks professional. A professional resume helps you demonstrate your unique style and also your ability to arrange and highlight the important information on a document. Constructing an innovative resume combines text that is easy to scan with creativity so that you can impress hiring managers.