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How To Explain Gaps In Your Resume

In a lot of different scenarios, there is the likelihood of there being gaps in your resume. Periods of time when you have not held down actual employment which may just look strange in your resume. Employment gaps in resumes may indicate that a person was somehow unemployable for that period ò€“ either because of difficult times in the job market, layoffs, personal inabilities or illness of any kind. None of these may reflect very kindly on you. However consider the fact that you can explain away these gaps truthfully in a number of cases:


Prioritizing job descriptions in your resume

The most difficult and time consuming section of any resume is the listing of your work experience, no matter the level you have reached in your professional career. If you have just graduated college and don"t have any full-time professional experience, you are concerned if your part time job and summer internship are enough to get your foot in the door. If you are a seasoned professional with extensive work experience, you are worried how to fit all of your hard work on only one page. If you are changing careers, you are unsure which skills best showcase your qualifications. Listing work responsibilities on our resumes doesn"t get easier as our career progresses. The key is to consider your career objective and prioritize your work in accordance to your goals.


How to Find the Career that Suits You

 

Childhood Dreams

The trouble is that we live in a very competitive environment and our education system is such that we were required, as children, to make choices that affected our ultimate career paths.  Does a child really know what he wants to do ultimately? Does a child know what career will suit him?  A child may see himself as an airline pilot one day and a policeman or fireman the next.  Yet, at the tender age of 11 or 12 years old, they are required to choose between one category or another and this could ultimately affect what they do in later life.

 

Take Action

 

If you are in a job that you find unrewarding or dissatisfying, it is never too late to change and to find something that fills you with enthusiasm, a career that really suits you.  You just have to be prepared to take an active part in your career change.  How? The first step is simply to take stock of where you are now and decide that it is time for a change.

 

Next, you need to decide what it is you really enjoy doing.  More often than not, these preferences are ones that you formed when you were a child.  Let yourself go back to those childhood days and remember what things gave you the most pleasure.  Was it painting a picture, or perhaps teaching a friend how to do something? Maybe you loved swimming, but don"t have time any more because you are so busy making a living? What were your fantasies?  What were your dreams? What career did you think would suit you back then? If you could do anything you want to do, starting immediately, what career would suit you now?

 

Sit quietly and think about what you enjoy doing now.  Are they still the same things that fuelled your dreams of long ago?  Chances are, they are.  Make a list of the things you love and then try and match them with job opportunities.  What could you do that would allow you to use the qualities that you value the most?

 

Time for your Homework

Once you have established what kinds of jobs you might like to do, then do your homework.  Research the job on the Internet, talk to people in that type of career, and find out as much as you can about all the possibilities in that particular field.

 

Your New Career

If you want to be really sure about your suitability for your choice of new career, you can get an assessment done by a professional careers counsellor, who will confirm your suitability by having you do a series of tests designed for the purpose. This type of test takes into account your personality as well as your hobbies and interests and will give you a broad picture of the possibilities for you.

 

The End Result

 

To find a career that really suits you can often make a huge difference to your life in general.  Instead of getting up in the morning with the sinking feeling that you have to face another day in the office, you could wake up with a sense of excitement about what the day will bring.  This, in turn will have a positive affect on your general well-being and on those around you.  If you are satisfied and fulfilled in your work, that spills over and touches many other areas in your life as well.

 

It"s not too late!  Make a decision now to find the perfect career for you, the career that suits you, the career that will bring happiness and fulfilment into your life.  Jump in at the deep end, the water is great and you will be glad you did!






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