8 Tips for Explaining Employment Gaps on Your Résumé

“As a former recruiter, I like to see explanations for gaps right there on the résumé,” Thomas says. You might include a single line that says something like the dates and “Previous job eliminated due to merger” or “Career break for caregiving responsibilities.”

While it may be tempting to list your work history dates by year instead of month and year to make gaps less obvious, the experts differ on whether that’s wise. While Poepping says it’s fine, Thomas worries that it may backfire, since using the years-only format would make it impossible to assess how long you worked at a company. For example, a listing of “2019 to 2020” could be one month or two years.

4.  Avoid fake gap fillers

List anything you did to add or update your skills or stay engaged in the workforce during an employment gap, but make sure the activities you highlight are relevant for the specific job you’re seeking. “As someone who was a recruiter for 25 years, if I got a résumé and the top job was president of the PTA, I would say, ‘Bless your heart, no. That’s a no,’ ” Poepping says. Instead, put all volunteer experience in a “Community Involvement” or “Volunteer Work” section.

That goes for listing fake “consulting” roles as gap fillers, too, Boggs says, especially if you’re currently unemployed. “Everyone is doing that, and so recruiters and hiring managers are preconditioned to just skip that,” she says. Worse, such listings take away focus from the value of your most recent roles, she says. However, if you are doing relevant consulting work and the skills you used are transferable to the position for which you’re applying, include it on your résumé.

5. Focus on skills

The experts agree that functional résumés — those that summarize skills into groups instead of listing chronological employment — generally aren’t a good idea. (“Recruiters hate functional résumés,” Boggs says.) This type of format makes it harder to determine what skills and accomplishments apply to each role.

However, Thomas recommends analyzing several ads for the type of job you’re seeking and developing a skill-summary section near the top of the résumé, perhaps with a few “career highlights” bullets that most closely align with the job you’re seeking. If you have recently taken classes or obtained certifications, especially for in-demand areas like artificial intelligence or cybersecurity basics, be sure to list them to show that you’re keeping skills current.

Poepping agrees and advises her clients to develop what’s essentially a “CliffsNotes” section at the top of their résumés. “It’s chock-full of all the keywords that relate to your professional experience,” she says. But it can also include skills you obtained earlier in your career, through volunteer work or in other areas.

6. Tell your professional-growth story

Your résumé often serves as a professional introduction and matchmaking document between you and an employer. In addition to highlighting the skills the employer likely needs, work on telling a story of professional growth throughout your career, even if there were detours, Poepping says. One exercise she has her clients do is to look at their various roles and write brief stories about themselves, explaining what they accomplished in the role. Then, look at the jobs to which you are attracted and pick out the skills and achievements from those stories that are relevant and demonstrate professional growth and achievement.

She recalls a client who had been out of the workforce raising children for years and was afraid no one would want to hire her. Poepping asked her, “Who needs moms?” As it turned out, she tailored her résumé to showcase her understanding of mothers and found companies looking for that expertise. The client ended up working for a winery, organizing house parties and fundraisers — primarily for mothers in the community.

“It's like matchmaking,” she says. “What does the employer want? What have I done, and am I articulating that clearly in the résumé, whether there’s a gap or not?”

7. Tap your network

The perennial advice to “keep your network warm” also applies to job seeking with an employment history gap, Thomas says. Having the endorsement of a mutual contact or someone who works at the company can help you get to the interview stage faster, she says. In addition to helping you compete with the flood of résumés job ads may typically generate, you might also find “hidden” jobs.

“I tell people to take opportunities to network and not rely so much on what they see posted, because not all companies can afford to have a big marketing budget where they can blast their positions all over LinkedIn,” she says.

8. Be prepared to talk about it

Rehearse what you’re going to say about your employment history gaps so you’re ready to talk about them in an interview, Boggs says. You don’t need to go into a lengthy discourse. Rather, keep your explanations brief — you exited the workforce to be a caregiver for a few years, or you were part of company-wide layoffs — and turn the conversation to what’s next.

“Avoid the urge to fill the gap unnecessarily; instead, lead with your value and demonstrate how you’ve been staying relevant in the market,” she says. Answer the worst-case scenario questions that may be unspoken: How have you kept up with the fast-changing pace of business? What professional organizations have you stayed involved in? What webinars, podcasts or training have you listened to or participated in to keep current on industry topics?

“Show that you’re ready to just plug back in and that the gap really isn’t an issue,” Boggs says.