By Patrick Rowan, Partner
Most of us have experienced periods in our careers when we had to take a break from working. You may have been asked to take that break without any warning (i.e. you were let go from your job), or you may have decided to take a break for personal reasons – a leave of absence to get a degree or diploma, maternity/paternity leave, quitting a job that you did not like to re-think your life, making a move across the country, starting a business, dealing with a breakdown in a relationship, taking time to care for an elderly family member, or finally giving that stand-up comedy routine a try full time.
There are countless life events that may cause you to leave your job and to take more than a few months off, perhaps even years.
These events can be difficult to explain to recruiters, hiring managers, and other influencers and decision-makers that you meet throughout the course of your job search, even if it has been a long time since you took that break. Recruiters tend to seek a consistent chronological work history with progressive career moves every three to five years, but that is a rare find.
If you simply leave that “break” period open on your resume, you leave things open to speculation and run the risk of being passed over in a high-level resume screening because there is an unexplained gap (or gaps). People often assume the worst.
Your reasons for taking a break might be complex and sometimes highly personal, and best explained in a face-to-face conversation so they can probe for detail, ask questions, and assess your body language, emotions, or the way you tell the story. For a face-to-face conversation, you need to come to the interview prepared to explain that gap. You should keep your explanation brief and to the point, describing it in the most positive way you can.
If you were terminated and were looking for a job for six months, do not try to hide this fact. Don’t say that you and your boss mutually decided that you would quit, even though you didn’t have another job to go to. Be honest and say that, unfortunately, things didn’t work out, you accepted a severance package, and are seeking an opportunity that is better suited to your skills and interests. Offer to provide supporting references from that employer.
When you have gaps in your employment history, it’s ideal to state the month and year of your arrival and departure from each job on your resume. Easily explained gaps on your resume such as family leave, return to school, or relocation can be added on the resume and won’t attract too much attention – keep it brief with dates and a short sentence about the circumstances.
If the reason is more complicated, it’s best to be transparent and ensure the dates are reflected on your resume accurately so that the recruiter can see it and ask you about it. As you tell your career story, be open that you left your role and took a break for personal reasons. On your resume, you can address these gaps by indicating what you did during that time – volunteered, took a course, consulted, travelled, or worked part-time – rather than just leaving it empty. Don’t lie, but it’s ok to admit that you were seeking full-time employment while you were doing other things. There is no need to go into detail about your personal life or the exact reasons that led you to take the extended break – indicating it was personal circumstances is sufficient. Chances are the person you are meeting with or who is reviewing your resume has experienced the exact same thing in their own career.
Career breaks have always been a part of any work history and everyone’s life. Being honest in your resume and the interview will impress the person you are meeting, and they may even empathize with you from their own personal experience.
Hiding gaps in your experience and avoiding them in an interview – to the point where the interviewer has to stop you in your tracks and ask you about it – will work against you. It may not affect the ultimate hiring decision, but being forthright and open in the conversation, both on paper and in person, will help you develop trust. You will find that recruiters and hiring managers will quickly move past the gap, and focus on what’s important – the skills, experience, and potential that you will bring to the job today.