It is hard to say who has been caught less prepared for the dramatic shift in the institution of employment over the past decade -- employers, or working people.
Working people have been slow to get the memo that lifetime employment is out the window and that employment itself is going extinct as well. We are staying at each position for shorter and shorter periods.
We are learning that we have to be at least as good at getting work as we are at performing our work once we land the job.
Working people and job-seekers are waking up to the reality that any job is just an assignment. Your task is to step into the assignment, gather the valuable things you can get from it (experience, resume fodder, contacts and confidence) and move on.
We can't get too comfortable in any job because the minute we get comfortable, we fall asleep. We forget about the world outside our office or cubicle walls.
Anybody who expects a job to last for years will be disappointed, and will also be ill-equipped to launch a new job search when they need to. Now working people are realizing that they have to drive their own careers. We are all CEOs now. No one is running your career except for you.
Employers have also been slow to notice the changes in the employer-employee relationship brought about by the disintegration of the old corporate ladder.
If any job is just a gig nowadays as it surely is, why should employees kill themselves on the job? It would be illogical to expect them to.
If your job can disappear in a heartbeat one day for no reason, as it can here in the U.S., the only reason employees would have to invest themselves 100% in a job would be their trust in their leaders to play fair with them. Sadly, that trust is exactly what's most often absent in the manager-employee relationship.
Many managers still think it's 1965 and their employees should be fired up and gung-ho about hitting their goals for no reason -- just because they have a job. These managers are deluding themselves. They aren't thinking clearly, because people who don't feel secure in their jobs won't give their best at work -- they can't!
We are animals first, humans second and working people fourth or fifth. We can't help but attend to the signals our bodies send us, including signals that say, "You'd better stay awake and keep our eyes open -- this job might not last all that long, or might not deserve your talents for much longer!"
Managers and people who train managers have been slow to see that fear as an employee motivator is getting weaker every day. That magic wand has lost most of its power.
If your employees aren't excited about your company's mission and its intersection with their own mission -- if they don't feel like a part of the winning team because they aren't treated as valuable collaborators -- then the only tool you'll have left to motivate your employees with is fear.
Fear is what's left when your trust vault is empty. You can threaten people with their jobs, but that won't work very well -- not anymore, when nearly every working person has given up hope that just pleasing their bosses and working hard will keep them employed until retirement.
A spell was cast on us as kids but it is wearing off now. We were taught that an employer is mighty and that employees are lowly, but now we are learning that the better we understand our value to an employer, the more powerful we become.
The more we understand our place in the economic equation between an employer (better thought of as a client) and an employee/consultant, the less we need worry about pleasing anybody.
When we know why employers pay us, we can stop worrying about being the 'pleasingest' job seeker or the most door mat-like employee.
The spell cast on us years ago is slowly wearing off and job-seekers are realizing that they have more power than they thought they did -- but they have only that influence when they know what kind of pain they solve!
The traditional job interview question, "Please explain this gap in your resume!" has lost its power, too -- but only for those job seekers who understand their own path.
There is no reason for anyone to feel embarrassed or apologetic about taking time out of the paid workforce. Over the past eight years, qualified and enthusiastic people couldn't get good jobs no matter how hard they tried. Job-hunting became a challenging, uncompensated full-time job. Anybody who's job-hunted lately knows that job-hunting teaches us more than most full-time jobs do.
There is no reason for employers to ask job-seekers to explain gaps in their resumes, but plenty of employers do.
They are coming from an old-fashioned mindset where any absence from the corporate conveyor belt was considered suspect.
That is a silly idea, but job-seekers still expect to hear the interview question, "Why do you have an employment gap?"
Here are ten possible answers to a question about a break in your work history.
Remember that you have nothing to apologize for!
You are an adult, and you get to work when you want and take time off work when you want, too.
Why do you have a gap in your employment history? What were you doing during that timeframe?
1. During that time I was enjoying my first break from full-time employment in fifteen years.
2. During that period I was helping a family member who needed my support.
3. I was working on personal projects.
4. I was job-hunting and helping out at home during that time.
5. I was studying some topics I'm very interested in.
6. I was helping my friend start a business.
7. I was consulting independently during that time.
8. I was taking a sabbatical.
9. I was refocusing my career in a new direction.
10. I was working on my professional skills and taking on some personal goals as well while I job-hunted.
When you feel good about your career history -- every bit of it, not just the parts of it during which you were employed -- other people will feel your confidence, too.
Own your career story. It's a great story, and no one else can claim it!
