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A tattered and torn resume with more holes than swiss cheese

King_Oni

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
My resume is a joke, and not even because of the lack of a list of degrees and accomplisments of sorts.

My careercoach asked me to make a resume so he has an overview what I did in terms of education, what I did as jobs, stuff like that. But I can't help but connect the dots and see a person who is faulty to the extreme. And while my coach might not judge me on that, it's the same exact resume that is part of my identity and thus follows me around my entire life. Honestly; not even 3 PhD's could mitigate this beautiful disaster (regardless on whether obtaining a degree of any type is actually a realistic option for me).

I'm wondering; anyone else have a resume with more holes than swiss cheese? How do you go on about it? I mean, having the answer that dreaded "what went on during those few months in your life? Why is there a gap?" is one thing, but the moment you have them regularly, and you appear more like you're just totally of any radar without education or employment for months up to a year at a time; I can't help but even think that any potential employer wonders if you're hiding potential jailtime or a stay at a psych ward from them.

If anything, my resume does not scream "reliable employee" unlike plenty of people one has to compete with.

So yeah, anyone else and how do you go on about it?
 
My gaps are pretty easy to fudge the lines. All but one or two of my past employers are either out of business or dead. For a while I was in college and started a family, although the latter is a major red flag not to hire me since heaven forbid anybody put family first. But I've only been in the work force for ten years, so it's not so long a list. My main job is also a seasonal job, so it works for and against me by showing that I can be dedicated to a job for several years, but that I'll also likely leave my current job to go back to it. On the plus side, it's a resume no-no to put down jobs over five years old, so if you only have a gap or two, start smudging! Add in a note about the sucky economy if you think your employer won't say it's a cop out. A lot of people claim there was a "great recession" in 2008, although I personally find today's job market a helluva lot tougher than in 2008. I got three call backs in three months in 2008, I barely get so much as a rejection email after six months now.
 
I have similar problems, although I usually manage to rack up some kind of achievement. (When the Mage and the Revolutionary align, change happens to realign espoused theory with theory-in-practice, whether any of us want it or not; I make good things happen even for bad people, who prefer the skeletons remain in the closet and all credit remains with them). Fortunately, people who are delegating work to contractors often don't care about anything other than this:
  1. Can I believe you can do 'it' (as measured by portfolio and ability to explain problems...which works if you are a pack rat and can talk to whiteboards)
  2. Do you care enough to do 'it' for me (see #1, it's about how happy you sound about telling stories)
  3. Are you and your colleagues going to want to kill each other before time's up (generally an issue if a contract lasts over 6 months, and always an issue for 12 months or longer)
  4. Oh, by the way...I have a body to move. (They never ask this, but they listen for abilities that suggest you can be their Dobermann.)
The only reason this works for me is that I'm quite good at the Man in the Iron Mask routine. It's when I start putting people in the Iron Maiden that the fun(!) begins.

Good luck to us both, this season. :mask:
 
I think it would depend on the length of time working/studying between the gaps, and the type of work you have done.
If you have gaps of months in your resume, I'd also question if maybe you are giving too much detail? Maybe generalize a bit more.
 
I no longer list months, only years, for anything that's more than five years in the past. I gather from what you've written above that you would be looking at entry-level positions, so a gap of e.g. two months that occurred six or seven years ago shouldn't really be terribly relevant now. (If it were, the employer would also subject you to further vetting procedures anyway, not just a discussion of your CV.) Also, if you had any jobs that were fixed-term work I would say so on my CV, to explain why it ended - and if it was followed by a couple of months of job seeking, then I would list the months of job seeking as job seeking. In the economy of the last few years, that should surprise no one and accounts for the time.

If there are as many gaps as you imply, can you stretch the truth a bit? If you did any volunteer work, unpaid work for friends or family or any project of your own, you could list those as jobs, if at all possible. As an example, you could even list dog walking - that is a job! - if you have sufficient knowledge of dogs and dog-related regulations that you could do the job if you were offered it and have done something sort of like it in the past, even if it was only your grandmother's or your neighbour's dog that you took to the park once in a while. Short version: I would overstate something (in the form of a job) I have done in the past if I were sufficiently proficient at it to do a lot of it if offered. But the proficiency would indeed need to be real, even if the past job, as such, as something of a fabrication. You would need to make sure though that you only do this where the job can't easily be verified.

However, depending on how much financial pressure you are under to generate an income of your own in the immediate future, it might be more productive to focus more on what you do from now on, and to largely (or to some extent) let the holes in your CV stand. It could ultimately even work in your favour to let it be seen that you 'got your life on track' (regardless of what we might think of that concept privately).

If you have even a little money available for a short time, you could look around for an accredited short course (whether academic or vocational) that interests you. Short courses are less daunting than degrees and require far less time, money, energy and commitment and, depending on the subject matter, can even be completed online. The more rigorous ones can be used on your CV to fully account for the time you spent completing them. In addition, MOOCs are always worth looking at and generally cost you nothing. I'm thinking that demonstrating continued learning and an interest in anything at all will likely be preferable to employers than no demonstrable interests (that could be of professional use) and no demonstrable continued learning, however low-key.

Also, thinking of how things work where I am, is there any chance that you could get some sort of certification based on the work experience you already have? That might help you get a foot in the door in places you otherwise wouldn't. To have gaps in your CV, you must also have worked! Perhaps, if you have worked x amount of years in a particular industry/capacity, you are eligible to sit some sort of exam for official certification from some accrediting body or other? If so, you may still have to prepare, but not necessarily formally through a course but just privately with textbooks. (This is something I did to at least get a certificate out of my dreary current job. I still needed a year of part-time private studying to prepare beforehand, but I was admitted to sit the exam on the basis of work experience alone. The examining body was the Chamber of Commerce and Industry. I don't know if any such option is available where you are.)

One final point, though: it seems working has proved difficult for you in the past. Is it something you can really do now? I am not attempting to discourage you, just to be realistic, for two reasons. One of them comes from the perspective of potential future colleagues, and I speak from experience when I say that it is at least annoying and disruptive, at worst aggravating and demoralising, when someone is either always off sick and/or simply doesn't pull their weight around the office/on the job for whatever reason. It really doesn't matter whether the reason is valid or not by whatever standards. Things get delayed and/or other people get lumped with the work, and even reasons that I may consider valid don't change the fact that I and the colleagues in attendence are overburdened when other people don't fully do the jobs that they were hired to do. That's not a good situation for anyone around, even if it does not lead directly to termination, which can be difficult in some of Europe. The other perspective is that of someone with Asperger's/on the spectrum: supposing you get a job and pull your weight, what toll will it take on you? Can you sustain any kind of marginally worthwhile life while holding down a job, or are you going to get up in the morning, go to work, come home and collapse until the next morning rolls around, when you repeat the cycle, and spend weekends/days off curled up on the sofa wishing for this hell to end, and only begin to look at other options once psychosomatic symptoms start piling up?

I've been through both scenarios and found both pretty awful. My solution, for the time being, is to work part-time. But even that is awful enough that I would look at disability benefits if they weren't nearly impossible to get for someone like me where I am located, if they weren't as meagre and if they didn't open me up to constant harassment from official bodies and attempts to 'rehabilitate' me, all of which would ultimately result in the same amount of stress as part-time work, but for less money and without any significant amount of self-determination. But if working is really difficult for you, taking a serious look at what the benefits situation is where you live might really be worth it as an alternative.

With that being said, I truly do believe that most of us can work but that finding something that is sufficiently aligned with our psychological, mental and neurological makeup can be so exceedingly difficult as to be nearly impossible for many.

Good luck in whatever you do.
 
On my resume, I only list the last seven years of employment. For me I've only had one job in the last seven years, and that's my current one.
 

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