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This format allows employers ease of transporting, storing, and retrieving data from your résumé. Unlike a “scannable” résumé, which is a paper copy of a résumé for the employer to scan and enter into a system, the electronic résumé can be directly entered without scanning and risking losing information. With electronic résumés you can apply by e-mail, apply over the web via electronic forms, or apply as a web page. Many businesses, offices, and other jobs ask directly for résumés to be submitted electronically. Pay careful attention to their requirements. Remember that what type of résumé you submit should reflect the employers’ wishes. If you are not sure, ASK! You don’t want to risk having your résumé thrown out before you get a chance. Some employers will also ask you to provide a paper copy of your résumé along with the electronic version. When you are finished preparing your electronic résumé e-mail it to yourself or a friend to double check that it appears correctly.

Types of electronic résumés:

A plain text résumé is useful when you aren’t sure what programs the employer uses to open attachments, or if their programs support attachments. A plain text résumé will be created in a text editor like Microsoft Notepad or Macintosh Simple Text. All programs are able to READ plain text documents. This version can be submitted in the body of an e-mail or cut and pasted into on-line forms.

Tips for Plain Text Résumés

1. Do not use pictures, special fonts, or stylistic formatting.
2. Employ careful spacing (for e-mail margins-count 65 characters across the screen and then hit Enter).
3. Use the space bar to indent lines.
4. Use capital letters for heading sections (no underlining).
5. Surround bold sections with asterisks (* *).
6. Use a hyphen (-), asterisk (*), or plus sign (+) for creating lists.
7. Use hyphens (-----) to create a line.
8. Save the file as (.txt).

A Rich text résumé is a fully formatted version of a résumé that you would typically use to print out and give to an employer. The difference again, is that it is saved as a file so that it is easily transportable to the employer. The Rich text resume is typically created in a word processor and saved as (.rtf). The problem with Rich text resumes is that many e-mail editors do not support Rich text and cause a “jumbled” appearance or make the text unreadable. The other problem is if you send the Rich text résumé as an attachment the employers e-mail system may not support e-mail attachments or know which program to use to open the resume.

PDF or Portable Document Format allows electronic documents to be shared between different operating systems while maintaining the integrity of the original document. Whether you created your resume in Word 2003, Word 2007, Works, WordPerfect or other word processing software, when you convert your resume to PDF it will look exactly the way you intended for it to look. The document cannot be accidentally altered. The employer will need Adobe Acrobat Reader in order read the PDF, but many newer computers will have this software installed standard.

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