Resume Design: Templates and 8 Essential Design Tips

There are three standard resume formats: chronological resume, combination resume and functional resume. They each organize your information differently so it’s important to choose a resume design that properly complements each format. For example, if you’re using a functional resume, you should consider a design that gives you the space to display different skills sections.

Some jobs, like bank teller and operations manager, will appreciate a more traditional look while jobs in creative industries, such as social media or interior design, are more open to creative resume templates.

You might be tempted to get creative in your headings but it’s best to stick to the standard titles for headings, like “skills”, “work history” and “professional summary” or “resume objective”. Using standard headings will help your resume with applicant tracking systems (ATS), the software companies use to filter out irrelevant job applications and resumes. ATS automatically reviews and filters all job applications and resumes, enabling hiring managers to focus on the most relevant resumes and candidates, so having easily identifiable headings will help your resume pass ATS.

You’ll have the option to choose between serif and sans-serif fonts. A serif font is one that has small, decorative strokes at the end of each letter, like Times New Roman and Georgia, whereas sans serif fonts, like Arial, Helvetica and Calibri, don’t have decorative strokes.

When choosing fonts for your resume, opt for something professional, easy to read, and fits the overall style of your layout. Set the font size to 10 to 12 pt. so that it is easy to read for hiring managers. Finally, always be consistent with the font you use throughout your resume.

Use white space correctly in your resume to keep it readable. Make sure there’s appropriate spacing between sections, use proper margins (at least 1 inch on all sides) across the document, and use short phrases and utilize bullet points rather than long chunks of text. This will allow your overall layout to “breathe.”

Your contact information should be at the top of your resume in the header. You can make your contact section visually appealing by using colors, but you should make sure that the colors you choose aren’t over-the-top. You can also implement reverse type by making your contact section a dark color and the text a light color. Graphic designers often implement reverse type to improve the design of a printed page.

Finally, you can include icons in your contact section, such as a telephone icon next to your telephone number, or an email icon, for example. Depending on if it’s applicable and acceptable in your industry, you can even include your social media links with corresponding icons for each social media platform, such as a LinkedIn logo icon.

While the standard length for a resume is one page, job seekers with a longer career might require two pages to appropriately accommodate all of their professional history. Make sure to use a resume design that looks good and is seamless across two pages.