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Hey Ambitious Professionals! It's Linda
Raynier of lindaraynier.com guiding you
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to a career and life you'll truly enjoy.
And in today's video, I'm going to teach
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you two key strategies on how to handle
explaining gaps of unemployment on your
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resume.
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There are many reasons why some of us
may have gaps on our resume you might
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have taken time off to be a stay-at-home
mom or dad you might have taken time off
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to study to travel or you may just have
a gap simply because you've been looking
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for a job that whole time but you still
haven't been successful the way to
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handle your gaps is dependent on when
they occurred and I'm going to give you
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specific guidance and give you two key
strategies depending on the situation
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there are two situations on when you
have gaps in your resume situation
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number one you have gaps in the past but
you're currently employed so let's say
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that you are currently working right now
and you've been in your role for at
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least a year or longer and you're ready
to find a new position but at the same
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time you have gaps in your past before
you took on this role that means that
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there isn't much need for you to truly
explain those previous gaps because the
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emphasis for the employer when they read
your resume is to look at your most
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recent position so your strategy is
going to be to emphasize in detail the
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duties tasks and responsibilities that
you've been performing in this most
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recent position and the achievements
that you've been able to accomplish
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because that is actually what the
employer is going to be paying attention
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to employers tend to focus on the most
recent roles that you've held and if you
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can explain your most current position
in a really detailed and compelling
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attractive way then the previous gaps
might may not actually be minded as much
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now that's not to say that they're not
going to ask you about those previous
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gaps in the interview but you want to
leave it to the interview to be able to
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explain and not try to explain it on
your resume the reason for this is
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because I've personally seen resumes
where people have explained in detail
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why they left every single position and
what they were doing in between and
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truthfully that just clutters up the
resume you want to leave that for the
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interview you want to have your story
outlined in the interview and explain it
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then situation number two you have a
current gap right now as we speak and
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it's actually been longer than
year so then if that's your situation
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the big question to ask yourself here is
have you been doing any work have you
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been helping anybody out organizations
people as a consultant helping with
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ad-hoc projects with tasks that you can
say are relevant to the role that you
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want to apply to if yes then it's
important to include it I've heard of so
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many people and so many people have told
me that yes I've been on this
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unemployment break for a while I haven't
been able to find a job but at the same
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time I've been doing some consulting on
the side and they don't include that on
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their resume whatever you have included
because it's important to show that
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you've done something rather than
nothing or if you've been doing some
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higher education getting an extra
diploma or doing your MBA you definitely
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want to include that as well if that's
where you've been spending your time
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studying and just a one-liner is enough
to explain that or if you've been
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volunteering and you've been performing
some work-related tasks in your
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volunteer work then include that as well
again it's better to put something
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rather than nothing
now if you've truly been up to nothing
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this whole time for this past year and a
bit
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for whatever reason then I would say
simply go to the most recent position
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that you have held and emphasize that as
much as possible and when I say
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emphasize I mean include five to eight
solid bullet points of tasks
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responsibilities and key duties that
you've been performing in your most
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recent roles and lining them up to the
position that you want to apply to you
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as much as possible and don't forget to
also include your achievements it's not
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worth it to really put something that's
personal on your resume I mean in my
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opinion to say been searching for the
last year and a half and haven't been
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successful I mean it doesn't really look
good
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I'd rather that you would just focus on
your most recent opportunities the ones
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that you've recently held and focus in
and hone in on the key tasks and
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responsibilities there and from there
you're gonna have to really work on your
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job search networking strategy to make
sure that the employers or the
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recruiters or the
my majors that you get in touch with
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fully understand your situation and are
willing and ready to read your resume
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review your resume and hopefully get you
in for an interview so there you have it
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my two key strategies on how to deal
with unemployment gaps on your resume
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now of course this is only scratching
the surface when it comes to developing
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a truly attractive compelling impressive
resume to send out to employers if you
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want more tips then feel free to
download my free copy of my ten ultimate
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resume hacks that will land you more
interviews and job offers which is
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located in the description box below or
otherwise if you are truly ready to
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revamp your resume take it to the next
level and truly go through a deep dive
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and understand how to develop a strong
Top Notch Resume from beginning to
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finish then feel free to check out my
course Top Notch Resume it's an online
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self-study course where just within a
few hours you'll be able to be taken
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step-by-step through the whole process
of rewriting a brand new top-notch
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resume that you can send out to
employers you can click on the link down
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in the description box for more details
now if you are someone who has been
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searching for a position for a while now
and you're realizing that you don't know
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how to sell yourself or you're
struggling in landing those interviews
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and you're ready to get one-on-one
personalized guidance then feel free to
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reach out to me head on over to lindaraynier.com/standoutgethired feel
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free to read the page fill out the
application form and if I think that we
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are a potential match then I will reach
out to you and we will discuss
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accordingly if you'd like this video
then please give it a thumbs up
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subscribe to share it with your friends
thank you so much for watching and I
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will see you in the next video.
