Depends on where you want to work. In a large organisation, top-sifting of a first pile of CVs might be done by someone in HR who's looking to match person specifications... they might want a Word document for reasons of their own and if you can knock together something half-decent in Word, it shows you know how to design with whatever tools you have to hand.
By all means, design a CV that looks nice. But if you can't or won't give a potential employer what they want, it means you can't follow a brief.
I've spent a lot of time attempting to integrate my business card, resume/portfolio, and website. It's basically my attempt to brand myself. Design continuity is one of my major goals with any design job. This is why I want the control over what people see. I simply can't achieve that sort of control over my design with Word.
However, I do very much see your point. I've always said that the computer and the software are merely the tools. Photoshop on a Mac and Photoshop on Windows is the equivalent of using two different brands of hammers. You'll accomplish the same thing. It's just one of the hammers may randomly decide to explode on you.
Fortunately, as I mentioned earlier, I was able to convince them to accept my PDF - which is a combination of my resumé and a teaser portfolio. 12-14 pages.
And I'm even happier to say that I have a job interview at this company on Thursday.
tgildred - Thank you. But I give the credit to indexhibit for my website. I just uploaded a background and a logo. They took care of the template.
Topher15 - Thanks for the heads up about the background graphic. It is very similar to how my actual resume appears, but my printed piece is cleaner and the background image is lighter. I'll tinker with it on the website. (It looks fine on MY specially calibrated monitor
). And to everyone who haas chimed in so far, I appreciate the words of wisdom and the advice. Thank you.
Finally, I feel that I should mention that as much work (and money) as I've put into branding myself — the 12page resume/portfolios I've had printed, the business cards, the website — I still don't have a job. And this is after 7 job interviews since November. So maybe there's something to be said for the super simple Word resumé after all.
But my way is so much more fun.