Honestly, expecting DaVinci's 500-year-old invention to best represent the gamut of job-seekers is...probably a little unfair. The issue is that despite their shortcomings CVs still form the backbone of almost all job-hunting efforts.
Consider for a moment that resumés can't capture:
- How you communicate through the spoken word & body language
- The delight of a PT client who has achieved their fitness goals, or
- The intellectual process of creating artwork from inception to delivery, or
- The way your warmth fills the room when you perform one of your songs
That sounds OK, right? After all, it's just a written document...
Well, not according to Wikipedia:
...resumés are documents used by a person to best present their background, skills, and accomplishments.
The question is: how can resumés truly 'best represent' someone's skills if they cannot accurately capture the points above? The answer is, they can't.
As someone who wants a fighting chance of landing the job or gig in a sea of competition, you need to figure out a way to bridge the gap. So you upload videos or sound recordings covering aspects of yourself that traditional resumés ignore.
Then you beg potential employers to go to YouTube, or Vimeo, or SoundCloud, hoping to exhibit your capabilities that extend beyond the typed word. But many won't because they still have a stack of applications to get through before 5 pm and it becomes yet another thing thrown onto their burning pile of work.
You are now engaged in fighting for someone's limited attention span and probably losing.
Ok...so, what other options are there?