Font and contrast
Legibility is key. Avoid overly artistic fonts and opt for more straightforward ones – Open Sans, Arial, Garamond or Times New Roman are the preferred candidates. Make sure that the selected font works with all Czech letters (Czech fonts) – if it doesn’t, the Czech letters will appear in a different font, leading to an odd and unprofessional look. Use one font only, or one for the headings and different one for the text. It is also important to choose a correctly contrasting background colour – the text should be easily legible (you can check the contrast here).

Sizes, spacing and alignment
A font size of 10 to 12 is ideal for regular text. The font size of headings can be larger. A good trick is to stick to multiples of one number – e.g. 3, which would mean 12 for regular text, 15 for a heading, etc. Using multiples balances fonts of different sizes and achieves visual harmony. We recommend left-aligning text for comfortable reading, that also considers the specific needs of readers, such as dyslexics. Keep the spaces between paragraphs the same size. Always check for accidental double spacing between words. And if you want to be extra precise, make sure that no line ends with a one letter word – it is better to move it to the next line, where it will look much better.

Grammar
After you made your resumé look as neat and pretty as possible, don’t forget that it must be grammatically correct as well. Mistakes make you look sloppy, as if you didn’t even bother checking your resumé, which may be perceived negatively by the recruiter. Keep an eye on subjects and verbs agreement, commas, hyphens, capital letters and other common mistakes (Typographic Cheat Sheet). Not sure about something? Word’s AutoCorrect or Nechybujte.cz can help you out!

Colour
Want to impress? Try colours! Rather than picking them by eye, we recommend using a colour generator, that is widely used even by professional graphic designers. The generator helps you create so called colour palettes – a selection of two or more matching colours, that can be used consistently throughout the body of work. If you included a photo in your resumé, base your palette on its colours. The exact colour from the photo can be determined by paint dropper, available in graphic editors or online. Don’t forget that colours can help you evoke a certain emotion. Pay attention to the symbolism we traditionally associate with them – for example, red can appear aggressive, while green is deemed more peaceful, and blue more confident.

Icons
Icons are a great way to spice up your design and help navigating through the text – for example, you can insert a graduation hat next to your education, or a briefcase next to your work experience – the recruiter will immediately see the location of the information they are looking for. However, use only simple icons, not 3D or cartoon ones. Line icons are tasteful, match the text and don’t overshadow other elements (texts and photos). Most graphic and text editors include a set of icons to insert, but you can also use free databases.

Data visualisations
Various scales (bar or pie charts, stars, etc.) are very popular way to show how proficient you are in a given skill but be very careful when using them. Rating your English four out of five stars can be rather confusing. It is more appropriate to use an internationally recognized and well-defined level (B1, C2, etc.) that will give your recruiter a pretty good idea of your skill. These visualisations can be very pretty, but if you feel that they may create confusion, turn to traditional certificates and experiences with given language. Another example is a timeline – a refreshing method for visually organising presented data.