Returning to work after long break - cv?

[Boo]

But the new ones that crop up are likely far more difficult to overcome...

I have not found this to be the case.

In particular, clients do not care less about dates missing from my CV and on the extremely rare occasions they have expressed an interest in the dates I used a specific skill I have told them during the interview.

Agents sometime pretend to care about dates. Right up to the point that a real prospect somes along...

Boo

[uk contractor]

@ OP
Dot.net & banking forget it the regulations are way tighter now they would want to see financial documents to support the 2014 to present gaps for every single month. That's assuming you could even convince the agents to pass your cv along to the client (most would dump it instantly). Try looking at another sector even then its going to be really tough to sell your CV due to the gaps. As others have said why would you stand out from people who are currently working or only had a short gap on their CV? Its a very tough job market even if your currently working due to intense competition & so few roles around. Unless you have niche in demand skills (dot.net is very common) its going to be a long hard slog regardless of rate you will work for!

[northernladuk]

I have not found this to be the case.

In particular, clients do not care less about dates missing from my CV and on the extremely rare occasions they have expressed an interest in the dates I used a specific skill I have told them during the interview.

Agents sometime pretend to care about dates. Right up to the point that a real prospect somes along...

Boo

But the agent is your first hurdle. You've got to get it past them to get the client to see it. They will care and go with the candidate they feel is least risk it easiest to process. Faced with a conventional CV and one with no dates on it he's got an easy choice.

It's a poor situation and some agents are better than that but not enough yet.

[SueEllen]

Agents sometime pretend to care about dates. Right up to the point that a real prospect somes along...

Boo

The first person who shifts your CV tends to be under 25 and thinks CV should come in one format, so you need to get pass them.

[Bee]

Well you said...



That's going cheap. By not negotiating properly, understand the market and so on you've lost out by being cheap to the agent. The client is now getting a contractor that is only worth half of what they wanted. The client could be wanting a £400 a day contractor, he gets a £200 one... and as a side note.. to be letting an agent take 50% of your rate makes you look like a right chump.. I wouldn't be mentioning that one again if I were you. That's disgraceful. You could argue you are part of the problem letting them get away with that... if it's even true....

Maybe a better example would be a contractor saying they will take £300 when the gig is advertised at £400 but still... it's cheap compared to clients expectations.



LM said this which will be advertised at a miserly rate. They will get the dregs of the what's left but pay for that and expect it. They are paying £200 a day and get a £200 a day contractor

In both cases the contractor only get's £200... One is cheap, one is a low rate. Different things.

You problem it’s not only my English. You have other problems, you don’t have capacity to understand a set of posts and give a correct answer within a context.

I can imagine your communications and leadership skills.

[northernladuk]

You problem it’s not only my English. You have other problems, you don’t have capacity to understand a set of posts and give a correct answer within a context.

I can imagine your communications and leadership skills.

You can only dream of my communication and leadership skills......

[jamesd]

in the same boat

I stopped work in August 2015, now I'm having real problems getting back into work.

I've been working for 15 years, including some work for the defence, government, and overseas sector.

I would appreciate any advice anyone would have in returning to work.

[SueEllen]

I stopped work in August 2015, now I'm having real problems getting back into work.

I've been working for 15 years, including some work for the defence, government, and overseas sector.

I would appreciate any advice anyone would have in returning to work.

Why did you stop working?

As long as you weren't held at Her Majesty's Pleasure there is always something someone can come up with to cover that period.

Also you need to look in everywhere once you have that excuse.

[DieScum]

I stopped work in August 2015, now I'm having real problems getting back into work.

I've been working for 15 years, including some work for the defence, government, and overseas sector.

I would appreciate any advice anyone would have in returning to work.

August 2015 till now isn't a huge gap. Keep your head high and keep going - you'll get something.

I've had one large gap of sixteen months. After which I decided to switch careers so I was going for stuff I didn't have experience in. Personally, I lowered my sites to lowered roles and eventually took a mediocre five month fixed term contract. It paid for all my bills and put something on the CV. After six weeks I negotiated it down to 4 days a week and spent the fifth day focussing on the next role and CV building activity (I arranged to teach an evening class at a local university, arranged speaking gigs on various technical topics at meetups). After the five months I managed to land a proper contract as my next role in the new field.

So for me lowering my sights, getting something on the CV while pedaling feverishly to get the next big one worked.

[gables]

I stopped work in August 2015, now I'm having real problems getting back into work.

I've been working for 15 years, including some work for the defence, government, and overseas sector.

I would appreciate any advice anyone would have in returning to work.

What problems are you experiencing? I did very similar in 2014, I left a full time job in June 2014 to take a break, started looking seriously in December\January and started a contract in February. I took a lower role than my experience\skill would normally command as I was returning to contracting, other than that the gap didn't pose any other problems.