How To Explain a Gap in Your Employment History

You remember a time when you weren’t working between Employment from college and landing your first job as you were upgrading your résumé. You chose to go on a trip. How will this period be noted on your resume? Employers, will they comprehend? It’s known as an employment gap, and most professionals experience one. To learn how to explain this typical occurrence in employment history, refer to this tutorial.

Have you ever experienced a seamless transition from one job to another? Alternatively, like the estimated two-thirds of working people according to LinkedIn, have you ever experienced a gap in your career history?

The first thing about employment gaps to understand is how frequent they are. How you should handle these few months (or years) and how a gap will be viewed by a potential employer aren’t always obvious.

According to Brian Donovan, CEO of Timeshatter, “a résumé gap frequently occurs when someone needs to temporarily prioritize something else above employment, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.” “That shows they are self-aware and have good time management abilities.” Professionals coming back from a break are frequently “ready to strike the professional world by storm and will be even more dedicated to the job,” the author continued.

What Is a Gap Employment?

You could be unsure of what constitutes a career gap and whether the two months following graduation or the few weeks before beginning a new job count.

The definition of an employment gap, according to Hana Toffolo, a LinkedIn Top Voice, executive resume writer, and job hunt specialist, is when you aren’t working at all. She generally considers anything more than three months to be an employment gap.

Executive recruiter and resume writer Brittney Swan stated, “We’re searching for those significant gaps, especially in industries like technology.” For instance, if someone is an expert in Tableau but there have been four changes since they last worked with the software, they will need training.

You could be wondering how to address an employment gap or the fact that you are taking a break in your job search if you have realized that you have one.

How To Talk About Your Employment Gap

Swan says that even though you might feel the need to go into great detail about why you have a gap on your resume, keep it as succinct as you can.

I was caught up in COVID-19 reorganization, but I’m more driven than ever to seek my next career move, for instance, if you were laid off in 2018 and are only now entering the job market (after a four-year break).

Toffolo added, “I wouldn’t provide an answer until you asked.” Make sure you are remaining true to yourself if you are asked about a professional gap, whether you took time off due to health concerns or to raise a family.

Toffolo keeps emphasizing how crucial it is to protect your privacy to avoid bias.

Like Swan, she advises that you keep your answers succinct and consistent with what is stated on your résumé, and then shift the topic of conversation to the skills you will offer to a new employee.

Swan also advises noting any educational, volunteer, or career-growth options you pursued to help minimize your employment gap.

Swan advised to “ask yourself what you have been doing during your gap.” Did you enroll in any classes or memberships? Did you seek any more education or volunteer work? These are things that can be mentioned in the interview and the resume.

How To Indicate an Employment Gap on Your Resume

Your resume is what will get you an interview, thus it is crucial that you identify and explain every professional career step on it. Use this document as the framework for your discourse during the interview.

Toffolo added, “As a resume writer, I do like to call out a gap. That way, the reader is not noticing any break when they are looking at the reverse chronology of someone’s career on their resume.

Toffolo elaborates on this procedure by saying that each gap should ideally have a date range and a one-line justification. The key to recognizing or labeling a career gap on a resume is to include a one-line explanation since we don’t want to throw off the reader’s understanding of the CV’s reverse chronology. Yet, we also want to dabble in our explanation of that gap with a sentence that respects our privacy and confidentiality and doesn’t subject us to more bias.

For instance, Toffolo suggests using something as straightforward as “took a temporary, planned, personal absence” if you had a gap caused by travel, a mental health break, or maternity leave/childrearing.