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Creating an Electronic Portfolio

What is an Electronic Portfolio?

This document is designed to help you develop an electronic portfolio to share samples of your work with potential employers. An electronic portfolio is a "webpage that highlights your abilities, achievements, and intellect."

  • The portfolio is designed to do one thing—to support you as you market yourself.
  • A well-prepared portfolio provides "evidence" to the reviewer of your accomplishments, skills, and abilities; it documents the scope and quality of your experience and training (Iseman & Sheely, 1995).

How do portfolios differ from resumes?

Portfolios can expand on your resume in that:

  • They allow you to provide concrete examples of your work.
  • They can demonstrate your knowledge of resources available for general and field-specific research by linking to appropriate source materials.
  • They can highlight your technical skills and competency with website design (rather than just mentioning it).

Do I need an Electronic Portfolio?

Essential for:

  • Web Development Jobs
  • Technical Consulting (one strategy)
  • If you want to work for a ".com"

Or if:

You want to demonstrate your technical and design skills as well as your comfort level with web-based technologies...

Pros for Developing a Portfolio

  • Can supplement your resume and cover letter
  • If done correctly, it can demonstrate your intellect, technical skills and visual competence.

  • Portfolios can improve your visibility.

    Though your resume must be one page... There is a lack of limitations with the online website.

Cons for Developing a Portfolio

  • No guarantee that the employer will look at it.
  • Some things are better left unposted.
  • Inside information from your summer job (many employers don't wish for all project information to be shared for proprietary reasons).
  • personal information about your friends, families, and idiosyncracies
  • not all information on student web pages is appropriate (or appreciated by employers)

General Portfolio Resources

Logistics

How can I develop a portfolio at Thayer School?

You can apply for web space through Dartmouth Computing OR

You can open an free account with an Internet service provider that offers "homepage" space and "building assistance" in exchange for allowing "banner" advertising on your site. The following sites are but a few to offer this service:

(Note: Angelfire and Tripod are both operated by Lycos. The ownership of Yahoo! Geocities is self-explanatory...This is not an advertisement for these companies, other ISPs provide space as well. These providers have been included because both offer user-friendly materials to their subscribers.)

Once you've chosen a site host...

Be sure to read the information on

  • Editing and creating new pages
  • Changing permissions so that only you can modify files

If you've never written code before:

  • Surf links for html authoring tools and/or?
  • Utilize web-authoring software.

A few good applications include: Netscape Composer, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Front Page, Macromedia Dreamweaver...

You may also want to consider software such as Keeboo. (Keeboo allows you to compile files, create, and publish "books" of material on the web.)

You may also want to consider purchasing your own domain name:

Content and Design Strategies

Suggested guidelines for content

Less effective:
Extensive collection of things of no professional interest or value.

More effective:
Site that demonstrates abilities and experiences which are directly related to hiring needs or job field of prospective employer, and gives a sense of your competencies.

Before you link, ask yourself—is this appropriate for a professional audience?

  • If in doubt, leave it out.
  • If yes, ask "how can I do this most effectively?"

Ask for help and suggestions:
A few good eyes and ears: Career Services, professors, former employers, others working in the field, members of the Dartmouth Alumni Career Network.

Ask yourself "what do I want the employer to know about me?"

You may want to include:

  • Links to interesting pages i.e. links to clubs and activities you're involved in
  • Pages you've created that demonstrate your skills, interests, or hobbies—i.e. recipe for your perfect pies.
  • Writing samples and a modified resume (see information on copyright and privacy)
  • Resources you recommend for research

Resources for Developing Content and Look of Your Portfolio

The following books are available for checkout through the Thayer School Career Services office:

Sample Portfolios

Choose from Thousands of Portfolios on Coroflot (view "People")          OR

From a Recent Graduate: Portfolio of Thayer alum Brian Ferguson '04 Th '05

(Note: If you are interested in submitting a sample portfolio for this site, contact us)

Protect Yourself, Protect Your Ideas...

  • Avoid giving out your address, your phone number and especially your social security number.

  • Don't share information or ideas you wouldn't want to see somewhere else—you may want to copyright the content of your page. The Library of Congress' U.S. Copyright Office has a great website that provides information about how to protect your intellectual property.

Website Design Strategies

In Fast Company Magazine, noted graphic designer Roger Black shares "Six Rules for Website Design."

You'll want to avoid:

  • Animations that never stop.
  • Color, background and font combinations which make page difficult to read.
  • Counters.
  • Huge graphic files that take forever to download.
  • Things that blink.
  • Vague link names.
  • FRAMES! (Because it makes it hard for you to refer others to a specific page or for you to "find it again."

May we also recommend Fast Company's "5 Fatal Flaws of Website Design"? (Note: The above mentioned articles were written "way before the blog" but we think they are simple and good.)

Submitting Your Site to Search Engines

The following URLs allow you to submit your website to multiple search engines simultaneously free of charge?