Is Your Resume Over-Bold?

One of the more common tactical mistakes I see on resume is over-bolding - using too much bold.

Over-bolding creates many problems for your reader and even more problems for a candidate trying to get their point across to their 4 audiences (http://recareered.blogspot.com/2010/05/your-resumes-4-audiences-bes...).

Last week, this was a topic with one of my clients. His resume had a serious case of over-bolding. Every 3rd or 4th line used bold font. Some entire lines were bolded. An entire paragraph was in bold. If the candidate knew how to make flashing fonts in multicolored lights, that candidate would have gladly used it ... all over their resume.

This is a drastic and extreme example of over-bolding. Many resumes that aren’t as gratuitous with the bold are still way over-bold.

Before we get started - I use bold for section titles. Blog platforms allow readers fewer formatting options as MS Word. Bold is a good way to keep readers on track in the outline writing format I use. I’m discussing the use of bold in resumes, a document written for a specific purpose, and read in a specific way.

Problems With Over Bolding

Bolding is useful to draw the reader’s eye to items that the candidate wants to highlight. What happens when too much is bolded?

* Everything looks the same ...
* It’s tiring to the reader: Imagine Gilbert Gottfried reading a resume to you ...
* Reader focus ...
* Shows a lack of ability to prioritize ...
* Difficult to skim ...

( Continued ... )

Learn how to make more effective use of bolding ...

Article: http://recareered.blogspot.com/2010/07/is-your-resume-over-bold.html
Source: http://recareered.blogspot.com