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Hey, you. Do you have a career gap on your CV? Can I talk to you?

We in the E&P department are champions of soft skills. People learn from every stage in their lives, and we’re committed to helping our student job-seekers communicate their skills to employers. Oftentimes, that means addressing career breaks.

Sometimes, you have to focus on something other than paid work. Sometimes you have to find yourself, or redefine yourself. Sometimes you try something and it doesn’t work. Sometimes, you don’t have a choice. And we believe it’s all worthy of at least some degree of reverence.

Don’t worry – if you don’t want to share, you don’t have to! No one can force you if you prefer to keep it private.

But just in case…

We’re compiling a document that will outline the responsibilities and skills that can result from career breaks. In order to make this as authentic as possible, we want to talk to people who have experience with a variety of reasons for not being in paid work. We want to know what you did, what you were not good at to begin with but improved on over time, what you did to enrich your life, and the skills you developed during this time. We want input from you if you have taken a break from paid work for any of the following reasons:

· Caring: for an elderly family member, partner, very sick child or child with complex needs

· Unsuccessful project/startup

· Volunteering

· Full time amateur athlete

· Unable to work due to illness, injury or disability

· Coping with homelessness

· Spending time in prison or in a rehabilitation facility

We know that a lot of these are difficult subjects and not everyone would like to share their experiences on a CV. BUT, we want to be prepared in case I meet a jobseeker who does want to share this information. Not everyone will have the same experience, for example, in prison, or caring for a very sick child. These would be used as a framework and a kickstart to bring out their own unique skill set and making every month of their working-age life shine.

Please email m-j.appaqaq@nelsoncollege.ac.uk if you would like to contribute to this project. Everything will be in the strictest of confidence and we won’t note any identifying information.