Why does my resume get out of wack when I copy & paste it to an website application & how do I fix this?

Question

How Can I copy & paste my resume so that it stays the way I set it up?

Answer 1

You should not use Microsoft Word to make this type of resume.

Unfortunately, a printed resume and an online resume are two different things. If you're copying your resume into a website, that website throws away the formatting information that you included in the print version. What you need to make is a "text-only resume".

To do this, you will want to use Notepad instead of Word because it will ensure that you don't accidentally introduce formatting or special characters that the website can't recognize.

Use all-caps and other symbols to indicate headings and organize the information using character returns instead of tabs and/or spaces.

It's important to make a version specifically for online applications because of the reason that companies ask for resumes online in the first place. The reason is that a computer does the first look over your resume---not a person.

A computer needs the information to be organized in a way that it can be used so make sure that you take the 10 minutes to make an online resume or else you could take yourself out of the running just by not formatting your resume correctly.

Answer 2

I believe it's the formatting in your version that isn't read correctly by the website's. What I do is keep a non-formatted copy of my resume handy to paste into these forms. Basically, you just want all your information flush left like a list in Word. No bold characters, no italics, no special symbols or bullet points.

I've found you can do some minimal formatting by using capital letters where you would bold, or hyphens where you would use bullet points. And of course spacing your lines so they group things the way you want.

Save it in Word or whatever, try pasting it into one of those web forms and see how it looks. Often you can make adjustments on the forms themselves. If you do, and you like the way it turned out, copy and paste the updated version back into Word and save that as your unformatted template.

Hope that helps. If you get a job around Chicago, hire me!

Answer 3

You might be using a form that the receiver's computer doesn't recognize.

I would try retyping your resume using Microsoft word (they have resume templates you can use), and saving it as a word document. Then, when you want to email it to an employer, all you have to do is bring up the email function from your Word task bar, and type in the employers email address.

This also has the added bonus of being able to send the resume in the body of the email. With so many prospective employers being leary of opening attachments (and thereby infecting their systems with possible viruses), this is seen as a definite plus by many of them.

Answer 4

It's because it is being taken from a formatting program (such as Word) to the website app that does not read or allow formatting in the same way (such as bullets are misplaced, paragraph spaces delete). It's usually ok, the companies that ask for your resume to be posted to their site know that the resume is not going to come across as perfectly formatted. It won't have an effect on their opinion of you.