easily portable artifacts that people can use to validate claims they
make about themselves.
A career portfolio is not a resume, which simply lists your experi-
ences and accomplishments. Nor is it a cover letter in which you write
about yourself and your qualifications for a particular job. Instead, it
is a collection of actual documents that support and make tangible the
things you want to say about yourself in a cover letter, a resume, or a
face-to-face interview. Letters of commendation, performance evalua-
tions, certificates, papers, and pictures of things created or of activities
led are all examples of items that might be included in a career port-
folio.
The carrying case for a career portfolio typically looks like a
leather briefcase that can be zippered shut. The kind of impression you
wish to make (along with your budget!) will determine the actual look
of the carrying case you use for your portfolio. When you open it, the
carrying case reveals a three-ringed binder.
Placing original documents in your portfolio would be a mistake,
since if you were to lose your portfolio, you’d lose everything. Instead,
use photocopies of originals, a practice which has the added advantage
of enabling you to scale the size of the documents you include in your
portfolio to the size of your binder. Smaller photographs or memo-pad
notes of appreciation can be made bigger, and huge spreadsheets can be
reduced in size to fit comfortably in your carrying case.
An alternative to punching three holes directly in the photocopies
is to slip each photocopy into the sleeve of a clear plastic page protector
with three holes in it.
Whatever system is used for physically storing documents inside
the portfolio’s carrying case, the important point is this: A career port-
folio should contain documents that support the important things you
want known about yourself.
In Chapter 2 we will discuss in greater detail the different kinds
of items you might want to collect and how you can obtain the ones you
don’t presently have. As career coaches, the authors frequently find
that many of our clients at first feel they don’t have any items to use
in their career portfolios. But as you read Chapter 2 you will likely dis-
cover, as our clients inevitably do, that you really dohave many port-
folio-worthy documents. The key point to know right up front is that
career-relevant documents can come from most anywhere, not just
from a person’s work life. You can, in fact, build an entire career port-
folio using only items that come from your school, volunteer, or leisure
activities.WHY SHOULD YOU USE A CAREER PORTFOLIO?
In fields such as art, advertising, architecture, writing, photography, de-
sign, and fashion, students and practitioners have been using portfolios
as the primary vehicle for marketing themselves for years.
Nowadays, the use of portfolios is spreading to other fields as well.
Career-minded people, whether they are students or practitioners, high4 Part I: Building, Using, and Maintaining Your Career Portfolio