Should the resume be colourful?

Asked by: Guest - 19 Apr 16

I saw a friend's resume and it was colourful but I think that adding the colour to the resume made it unnecessarily jazzy and crying out for attention. I'm just writing my resume. Should I make it colourful?

Our expert said - 25 Apr 16

It is always advisable to avoid including colours to your CV. The conventional ‘Black and white’ transcript appears more professional than any other format. Many a times the colours get changed from system-to-system and that might give a totally shabby appearance while taking the print-out at the employer’s end.

A resume should sound more like a marketing document. It is better to keep away the colours, backgrounds, over-formatting of fonts and texts from your resume. Adding colours to your resume looks gimmicky to many employers, especially when the same is used by the junior level job seekers.

Resume should be simple and elegant in appearance. Employers might get a perception that the candidate is seeking attention with the resume format and may not give value to your content which is of utmost value. Let the words in your resume speak your talent aloud. Focus on the content rather than the appearance through colours.