11 Examples of Creative CVs for Engineers

As any recruiter will tell the days of old-school 'vanilla' bullet-pointed CVs are long gone. Engineers, like any person seeking employment, need to make sure they stand out from the crowd.

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Of course, your actual abilities, skills, educations, and experience are important but if no-one reads your CV how are they ever going to know about you.

You need to think of yourself like a company trying to sell a new product to customers - how will you grab their attention to at least consider your product (you)?

For this reason, you shouldn't shy away from being avant-garde with your CV, add graphics, colored text, borders whatever to make your CV shine like a beacon.

Basically think of your CV more as a promotional poster than a catalog of your professional life.

Bearing that in mind the following 11 is a collection of some of the more extreme examples to get your creative juices flowing.

Of course, make sure the actual content of the CV is up to scratch too and you don't need to be as extreme as some of these.

This list is far from exhaustive and is in no particular order.  

1. Why not copy Elon Musk's format?

Elon Musk seems to have been pretty successful as an engineer. Obviously, he prefers to build or run companies rather than work as an employee but his example of a good one page CV is food for thought.

The CV was not actually made by Elon but a company called Novresume who are on a mission to tell you the best CVs are always one-paged.

2. Why not send a LEGO-figure CV?

Although many agree the best CVs are short and to the point, no one ever said they can't be accompanied with a LEGO figure. This chap actually took the time and effort to develop a LEGO figure of himself with short accompanying CV and packaging to mimic LEGO limited edition figures.

Very impressive indeed. You'll be happy to hear his gambit paid off.

3. If Elon Musk's doesn't work you, how about Jeff Bezos?

Novoresume is nothing if dedicated to their mission to show us all that one-page CVs are the way forward. Not content with Elon Musk they decided to create another example for Jeff Bezos.

Since Jeff has done alright for himself this example shows that CVs only need to include pertinent information for employers to review. They don't want to hear your life story after all.

4. Why not get creative with the design?

This example CV from a chap called Soumitri Saxena is both innovative and very creative. Although he clearly has some graphic design skills this CV is succinct, to the point and more importantly, fun.

Obviously, if you were to go down this route you'll need to be selective with your work experience to make this one work for you. But it does look more like a work of art than a CV.

5. Why not include some of your failures?

Failures are as, if not more, important to your personal and professional development. Whilst you might, for good reason, be tempted to only include success stories on your CV employers are more than aware that honesty and lack of fear of failure are solid foundations for any individual, or business, to grow and succeed.

This professor decided to make a resume of failure to teach his students the importance of not being scared to fail. After all, this is how children learn to walk, talk and become an adult.

Many professionals will willingly admit their mistakes when asked and will often attest to valuable lessons such experiences provide. So why not include a few on your CV?

6. This chap landed a Google job with his Google search theme CV

It's always good advice to tailor your CV to the intended employer. This not only shows you have an interest in the company but that you also want the position enough to make the effort.

But this is taking it to the extreme. This guy wanted to impress Google so much he tailored the format of his CV to mimic Google search results page.

Hats off this was an inspired idea and it actually paid off. You don't need to go to this kind of extreme but it should serve as inspiration for you.

7. If Google's not your thing you could always Facebook-ize your CV

If Google's not your thing you could always tailor your CV to look like a facebook profile. Of course, this might not be appropriate for some positions but its certainly an interesting direction to take.

Her application was unsuccessful, due to a hiring freeze at the time, but the Director of the company she applied to widely shared her CV "brilliant" in an attempt to get another position somewhere else. We can't help but agree.

8. This one literally stands out from the crowd

Although CVs should be succinct and contain little, if any, frivolous information not relevant to the company or position that doesn't mean it has to presented in a dull an linear manner.

This chap, although clearly Graphic Designer, should be an inspiration for us all. Any HR manager can't help but take the time to review the document rather than chuck it in the bin.

Do yourself a favor and increase your chances of at least being read about.

9. This CV is packed with nice visuals

This chap's CV landed him a job with Sinarmas (a large conglomerate company in Indonesia). The applicant was a Mining Engineering student but he made himself stand out from the crowd with the format of his CV.

Although it extends over two pages it uses of icons and other visuals really make reading a pleasure. Obviously, if you use this template change the name for the love all things good.

10. Get your ducks in a row

According to some recruiters having a chronological CV is one of their favorite formats. This format also puts more emphasis on your acquired skills and experience in a nice easy to follow and logical manner.

Most common types tend to be in reverse chronological with your most recent experience at the top. This is a great example, it is really a great example of a professional CV template.

It's clean, sick and looks very professional and organized. Again some food for thought - it's your CV after all.

11. Learn to sell yourself

Like many of the CVs on this list, this final one really makes the candidate stand out. The job of the CV is to make a potential employer actually give you 5 minutes to sell yourself rather than them moving on to the next candidate without thinking twice.

This sales brochure-esque CV really does make the applicant stand out from the crowd. Of course, if their skills, education, and experience aren't up to the employers' standards it's all for naught.

Who knows, they might at least invite them for an interview?