When you are creating your resume, you don’t need to put every random job you’ve ever had. What companies do is they look at your jobs on the resume, and at most call the employer and ask them if you worked for them and how you did at the job.
There is no way for a non government employee to know if you worked other jobs. Keep off any jobs that you worked at for less than 2 years and use every skill you learned as a skill for your resume.
Nothing hurts your resume more than having 3 or 4 jobs in a span of 2 years because it shows you are unreliable.
You get benefits for that (in some places), and why would you not list that on the resume ahead of time to explain the gap?
Omitting Information is the largest red flag you can provide.
Because resumes are for listing relevant work experience not a timeline of your life events.
Being a caregiver is relevant work experience, quite sad that some people think caring for others isn’t relevant for a large portion of work…
Talk about not trying to sell yourself wow. If shows a whole bunch of characteristics that are known for employability. Wild you wouldn’t want to show that you don’t mind putting others first, can work in a stressful environment, caring, works well with others, etc. m
There’s also money involved, transit, you can always find something relevant in caregiving to any potential career.
Or do you think caregiving is just sitting around all day doing nothing?
Caring for a family member would have no relevance to just as many, if not more, positions than it holds relevance to.
Like any tech related position beyond (at quite a stretch) helpdesk, not relevant.
There’s something to be said for character reference in your resume, but most places are more concerned about more tangible skills.
Like another commenter suggested, maybe under an “other experience” section, but not in the same area as relevant work experience unless you’re trying to pad things.
Caring for a family member (caregiving isn’t actually just limited to family members FYi) includes but not limited; dealing with financing, scheduling, transit, meal planning and prep, etc. you’re the persons care taker, you do everything they would normally be doing. There’s every day tasks that are relevant to every job that’s out there. There’s a reason why people can’t hold jobs while being a caretaker after all… or does this mean absolutely nothing to people?
Tell me you think being a caretaker means sitting around doing nothing all day….
Please get off your high horse and stop making assumptions. I’ve literally laid four eldery family members in the ground over the past 3 years. For some reason I’m always asked to be a pallbearer and I’m never going to say no.
All of them required care. While my wife and I weren’t full time caregivers (living 8 hours away will do that), we’ve done more than enough time in the trenches. Nearly all our time off from work from 2018-2022 went into help and care for elderly relatives. Everything beyond our own days off sick or for Dr’s appointments. Weeks at a time of giving round the clock care. It only stopped once stable care had been sorted out and we decided to start IVF (with the blessing of those family members still able to communicate so) to try and have a kid.
I’ve also been minorly involved in a few hirings. Not directly making the decision, but part of the “meet your potential co-workers” interview. Talked extensively with my boss about the approach, and read up quite a bit about the process. My feedback was part of the decision.
Your points are valid, to a point. Caregivers do tend to underestimate the work involved, and the skills required. It can be, and quite often is, some of the hardest work out there to navigate all the shit involved while watching a loved one slowly die. It changes you.
Edit: and yes, I know caregivjng is not always related to loved ones, elderly, end of life, pallative, etc.
But I would still caution against listing it as direct job experience. Again, I would suggest listing it under an “Other Experience” section with any other skills from volunteering or personal life if they are particularly significant.
Resumes are all about making a good first impression, and there are tons of people out there who would see “Full time caregiver” and mentally file it the same as if someone listed “Stay at home parent”. I mean they would view it as an excuse and a cop out. It’s not necessarily fair, but I’m trying to be realistic here.
Yes, this exactly. Anyone who hasn’t had direct exposure to the mechanics of elder care isn’t going to get it. That’s not a smart gamble to make on a first impression when job hunting unless you absolutely have to go all in on that gamble.
Being a caregiver is relevant work experience if the job you’re applying to is for caregiving, or at least something semi-related like the medical field.
But if you’re applying for programming or sales positions it’s entirely irrelevant.
Dealing with finances, scheduling, planning and transit aren’t relevant to a sales position? That’s an interesting take.
Do you not realize what being a caregiver involves?
You aren’t thinking like a hiring manager.
I wouldn’t list it because it’s in a section that is titled “Work Experience” not my life journal. I even personally call mine “Relevant Experience” and note to please reach out if you’d like to see more, out of respect for their time. My full experience would take up like five pages of resume with everything else. Besides, to me the point of the resume is to get to that phone call, and after that I figure I can talk to anything they’d like to know.
Man I wish I lived in a place that had benefits like that.
Being a caregiver is its own work experience, you should list it. How is it any different than the paid jobs that do the same thing?
It also shows your willing to put your own stuff aside and help.
I guess if you’re just using this as a lie, you wouldn’t realize all the actual benefits something like this could do for your resume.
Sure but being a caregiver doesn’t help explain why you’d be good for a software engineering role, or whatever.
Actually, caring for others, is quite a relevant work trait for even software engineering. Don’t want a bunch of people who can’t handle communicating with others or can’t get someone to do something.
It’s all I how you spin it, and clearly you aren’t using this for anything but a lie if you think it’s not valid work experience.
We get it, you were a caregiver. Good job.
Tell that to the AI that processes 1000 resumes a day filtering ones that seem more “at risk” or “less professional” than others
Sheesh, I must have missed the memo where caretaking a family member required making it your entire personality. Hope you and your family member are doing ok.
As a team lead who is in the process of hiring for three separate positions, I would treat any applicant who insisted on the transferability of their clearly unrelated skills as a “not a good fit” candidate. I get the importance of soft skills, and I value those, but to maintain that a caretaker can seamlessly fit into basically any job role with just a little imagination is disingenuous and a little embarrassing. I’m looking for concrete skills, not spin. By all means, put your best foot forward, just don’t wear clown shoes while you do it.
I work in the medical field, and everything you are saying is complete nonsense. If you’re applying for medical school or nursing school or something, talking about that experience can be part of a personal statement or entrance essay, but it has no place on a CV or resume. To a certain extent, taking care of loved ones should be a basic requirement for being human, not a special experience or qualification for any kind of job.