Breaks, changes, breaks: by no means every professional career is straightforward. Many employees have different experiences on their résumés which at first glance do not match. That doesn’t have to be a disadvantage. Rather, the effect of such a patchwork résumé also depends on how you design it and how you deal with your unsteady career in your application.
What constitutes a patchwork CV?
Some people already know as a child what they want to do later. You work determinedly towards it, choose the right course of study, do relevant internships, enter the profession successfully and then make a career. However, not all employees have such a dead straight career. Even people who know what they want early on sometimes decide later for another profession. This is not surprising, because there is often a gap between expectations and reality. It is therefore unlikely that as a teenager you will make the right choice for your entire professional life.
In today’s professional world, it is rather often the case that employees do training in another area after completing their studies, that they study in another area after completing their training, or that they dare to move on. Others take a sabbatical, take some other time off from their job, or go abroad for a certain period of time. Switching between freelance and salaried employment is also common. In such cases, the result is a patchwork résumé.
The name is derived from the textile technology of the same name. What is meant is that the résumé was patched together from many small pieces. Such a résumé is not straight but shows changes, breaks, and often interruptions. This is no longer unusual today – and can have many causes.
Why a patchwork résumé is not unusual
The world of work is becoming more and more flexible – and so are employees. Frequent changes, also in different directions, in the curriculum vitae, can therefore be related to the situation in the labor market and fixed-term employment. Those who only get temporary jobs at the beginning of their career sometimes shimmy from fixed term to fixed term and have to record a corresponding number of job changes.
Often, however, patchwork resumes are the result of deliberate changes. Never before have workers had so many options? At the same time, the pressure to make the ideal choice is often high. For many employees, a job is not just a way of earning a living, but a form of self-realization. The expectations regarding the content and framework conditions of a position are correspondingly high. This increases the likelihood that a job or profession will turn out to be unsuitable.
If you have a patchwork resume, you’re not alone with it. Many other employees feel the same way, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Nevertheless, many fear that the mosaic résumé is a disadvantage for applications.
The patchwork curriculum vitae: Not always a disadvantage for applications
In fact, many HR managers are skeptical when they receive a patchwork resume. Many consider an applicant with a pieced-together résumé to be erratic or assume a lack of stamina. Such a candidate can be perceived as not determined. However, there is not always a lack of professional qualifications. Sometimes the patchwork look of an applicant’s vita is enough for an employer to have prejudices against him.
A patchwork resume isn’t necessarily a real disadvantage. It can also be interpreted positively. If your career is like a patchwork quilt, you have held many different positions and got to know different areas, it also shows that you are adaptable and flexible – important soft skills in almost every job. You show yourself to be open to new things and ready to learn.
You have probably learned a lot of different tasks that can benefit you in future jobs. The fact that you are ready for a job or even a career change demonstrates that you know what you want – and what you don’t want. You are ready to face the consequences if an option turns out to be unsustainable. Broad knowledge is a good basis for professional success – and that is exactly what an applicant with a patchwork career often brings with him.
Tips for your application with a patchwork CV
The only problem is: you usually don’t know beforehand what the decision-maker thinks about a patchwork résumé. It may be that he does not find your résumé convincing, but it can also be that he rates your diverse experiences positively. However, you can influence the design of your application to present your career path positively. You can do this by working out the common thread in your career and putting your strengths in the foreground.
Perhaps you will succeed in demonstrating credibly that it was precisely the frequent changes and different insights that now qualify you in a certain way. Maybe they led you to develop important soft skills. Or they gave you the wide-ranging know-how that is required for the vacancy. You must work out your individual interpretation.
Justify suitability and motivation in the cover letter
Your cover letter must be convincing so that you generally have a good chance of a vacancy. The same applies to all other applicants: Make the application letter lively and exciting. Pay particular attention to a successful start that encourages your contact person to continue reading. In addition, you should definitely tailor the text to the respective employer. Don’t forget to explain what attracts you to working with us.
You should be able to credibly justify your interest in the vacancy in the cover letter. In the best-case scenario, you can show how your previous experience qualifies you for the job. If you can justify your suitability with your different stations, that’s good – but you shouldn’t force it. Stay honest and authentic.
Often the question arises whether it makes sense to address frequent changes and breaks in one’s own career in the cover letter. Basically, you should focus on the positive things and explain to the potential employer why you are a suitable candidate. A brief explanation of certain changes in your career is only conceivable if it seems very important to you and you have the feeling that you can use it to refute possible prejudices of the employer. Keep it short, however, so that you don’t lose important space for your actual concern.
On the other hand, with an explanation, you are drawing the recruiter’s attention to your unsteady résumé. Therefore it is usually better not to go into this in the cover letter.
Design your CV: Find the red thread
Your résumé should also be tailored to the company in question. Be sure to think about the common thread that should run through your vita. You can omit jobs that do not fit in and that is presumably irrelevant for the potential employer. This is only problematic if it results in larger gaps in your résumé.
Decide on a case-by-case basis which experience should be mentioned and which should not. Aborted training or an abandoned course of study can be disadvantageous. If you have finished your apprenticeship or studies after a short period of time, there will probably not be a noticeable gap if you remove this experience from your résumé.
Some patchwork résumés, despite the changes, indicate greater determination than others. If your own résumé consists of many different experiences that might not look good in a classic chronological or antichronological résumé, a functional résumé can be an alternative. This variant of the résumé focuses on certain key topics, under which you can summarize the associated experiences.
Functional résumés have the advantage that they relieve the HR manager of work. You put together what speaks for you – and the HR manager sees it at a glance. In the case of very changeable careers, a regular curriculum vitae harbors the risk that your qualifications will go under or that the frequent changes have such a negative effect on the HR manager that he is already skeptical and you, therefore, have worse chances.
The disadvantage of a functional resume, however, is that it is not common. You do not know how this variant is received by the decision-maker. In addition, the frequent changes in your career are likely to be noticed anyway. Whether a functional résumé makes sense, therefore, depends on your initial situation.
Justify a patchwork career in the job interview
Many applicants perceive an inconsistent résumé to be a flaw. Even if the HR manager sees it that way, it is of no use to you if it makes you appear less self-confident. Realize that you aren’t the only applicant whose career hasn’t gone in a straight line. That doesn’t mean you can’t have another successful career if you want to. In addition, frequent changes don’t necessarily tell you how suitable you are for a particular position.
If you have frequent breaks and changes in your vita, you will likely be addressed in the interview. Prepare an explanation in advance, in which you neither fall into a defensive position nor excuse your patchwork résumé. When making your explanation, do not look too long into the past by going into long and broad descriptions of the reasons for the changes. Better to look into the future and move on to a possible new job. Explain what qualifies you for it. Because in the end, that’s what decides whether you get the job or not.