now you want to go back to work. Why is it the kiss of death to have taken some time off?
It wasn’t for me. I didn’t take a full year off, but most of one. When the time came I explained the many reasons I had and was offered not one, but two jobs.
I think it depends on what you were doing on your years off.
I was laid off for the 2nd time in a year. I said screw it, and I went back to school. I was a computer programmer for 15 years when I got laid off the second time, and went back to get my degree in Computer Science. It’s all I knew, and it’s what a lot of my coursework was already in. I didn’t want to re-invent the wheel. I just wanted to get the degree that I never got because I married at 20 to a 17 year old pregnant girlfriend, and I had resonsibilities that took the place of school. Over the 2 years, I worked part time building websites, and other mundane technical stuff to make ends meet.
When it came time for me to get a job, I think they liked the fact that at 42, I had gone back to school and received my degree. Well, they didn’t know my age, but it’s not hard to tell with my dark black & gray salt & pepper hair!
So like I said in my first sentance… it depends on what you say you did on your time off. I think, especially in a technical field where it’s easy to forget if you don’t use your skills, that if can’t show that you did anything to keep your skills sharp, then it won’t look too good.
E3
I just started my masters this semester! Woo Hoo!
Can you give more about the particulars of your situation?
I’ve been considering taking some time “off”–back to tending bar or traveling before going back to school, so I’m curious, if you don’t mind sharing.
Stranger
Well, like Enright3, I am a computer software developer. About 5 years about, when the Internet bubble burst, I quit my job (having mercy on the company that was going under anyway). I got into stock day trading and I have done that ever since (1999). I’m sick of stock trading, and I’m not really making a lot of money at it, so I would like to get back into the programming world.
I have taken a couple classes along the way and self-studied several new technologies. I was pretty much a C/C++/Unix/SQL guy with other bits and pieces tossed in there. I have applied for several jobs that are basically a duplicate of my resume and they jump right on me. When I am honest (maybe that’s my shortcoming), and tell them about being “out of the loop” for the last 5 years, they drop me like a hot potato. I have gone back and looked at my listings, I can do what I did back then, no problem at all. But it seems to me they think I have gone through a memory eraser and there’s no way I can ever do what I used to do. Either that, or they just don’t like the idea of taking time off from the industry, thinking I will get tired of it again and bail.
I wouldn’t say it’s the kiss of death or anything, but you will have a 1 yr gap in your resume and employers don’t like that. Enright3 took a year off from working but not from doing something career related. It’s a different story if you take a year off to go bum around Europe or something.
For one, you might be at a competitive disadvantage if you are right out of school. Many companies hiring at that level are looking at campus hires. If you take a year off, now you are an “experienced” hire in the sense that you won’t get hired through the on-campus recruiting system.
If you are taking time off before going back to school it doesn’t matter.
Best thing to do is do what I did after graduating business school. Have a job lined up that doesn’t start for 4 months after you graduate.