The Interfolio Blog

Earlier this week, our User Experience Designer, Rachel Lehman, showed you Interfolio’s fast and easy Portfolio creation that can take just five minutes. Now, I will show you how to create a more in-depth presentation of yourself in 30 minutes.

Step 1: Add Title and Background Information

You've learned how to add a photo and your portfolio overview, and now you are ready to add more detail. Start by entering your current professional title beneath your name.  Your title should reflect your most current position – whether it is Professor, student, or non-academic employee.

Along the bottom of your profile, you will see the “Edit Background” section.  Take time to fill out the three sections: education, experience, and expertise.  The latter should be considered your focus and specialty; a filmmaker might enter “Digital Video” in this field, a Ph.D. candidate their dissertation topic, and so on.

Step 2:  Make a Page Rich with Content

Your Interfolio Portfolio lets you create “pages”, which showcase your unique accomplishments and highlight your achievements.  We showed you how to get started already, now let's dig deeper.

Make your page rich and vibrant!  And remember to “show” don’t just “tell" -- this is how you will stand out from the crowd.  To begin, gather examples of your accomplishments.  Then use the Add Content toolbar:

to bring a page to life by adding anything from a single document and a few words of text, to several documents, images, videos and links.  In just a few minutes, you can present your teaching portfolio, published research, summer abroad--or any other things you've accomplished in life-- as a richly told story. 

If you have classroom experience, we recommend that you create a page devoted to your teaching. Start with with a list of courses taught, then add sample syllabi, student evaluations, a statement of teaching philosophy, and a video or photographs of yourself working with your students.  Here's a great example of such a teaching page, complete with rich media.

Can't finish all at once?  Don't worry, your work is automatically saved as you go.  Retrieve any unpublished work by going to Pages under the Portfolio tab.

Step 3: Review and Add More Pages

Once you have created a page of rich content, you should review if your Portfolio has showcased the best elements of your background, subject knowledge, and accomplishments. Ask a trusted colleague for feedback - does your Portfolio succeed in presenting the most interesting aspects of your professional identity? If something appears to be missing, then simply add an additional page.

Here's a fantastic example of a well-balanced Portfolio, complete with great individual pages that highlight a candidate’s experiences.

Be more than a resume.

With the creation of your Portfolio, you have made great strides towards establishing your professional online identity. A web-based portfolio is a key step to achieving career success today! Your experiences are more then just a textual resume, and through your Interfolio Portfolio you'll stand apart in a competitive market.