It’s a common concern of stay-at-home parents and something that keeps some women from leaving the work force to raise children: What to put on a résumé to explain away years of caring for children at home?
Being a stay-at-home parent may not be rocket science, but it does require hard work, a focus on goals, ability to multi-task, and significant leadership capabilities.
Getting that point across on a résumé is the first challenge in a stay-at-home parent’s return to the workforce.
Don’t Ignore or Hide Your Time at Home
Gaps in chronological job experience listings will jump off the page to a prospective employer. Taking time off of a career to care for children full-time is nothing to be ashamed of, nor should it be hidden or glossed over.
That time can be inserted into a résumé as simply as “2003-2008: Full-time homemaker” or “2004–Present: Full-time mom and volunteer.”
Being unemployed to care for a family isn’t taken to mean laziness or lack of ambition. Most employers not only understand a parent’s desire to take time off work to raise a family, but respect it.
Don’t Over-Inflate Your Stay-at-Home Parent Job
Stay-at-home parents who are returning to work may be tempted to over-inflate what they did while raising children full-time. Claiming to have been a “domestic engineer,” or “household coordinator” may backfire and cause a prospective employer to doubt the validity of the entire résumé. Everyone may agree that staying home to care for a family and household is a tough job, but not all the associated duties should be included on a job résumé.
On the other hand, if a stay-at-home parent did extensive volunteer work, headed school projects or showed strong leadership and skills in some way, those accomplishments should be listed on a résumé.
Formatting the Back-to-Work Résumé
Employers prefer résumés that clearly list job experience in reverse chronological order, with the most recent job first. Many stay-at-home parents who are returning to work are reluctant to list "Homemaker" first on the résumé.
To solve this dilemma, JobsandMoms.com Career Center suggests using a combination format that blends chronology with highlighted skills. A combination résumé starts off with a skills summary, followed by a section that highlights skill clusters, and concludes with a chronological section at the bottom of the résumé that includes specifics about education, places of employment, job titles and dates of employment, the career center’s Web site says. “Because combination résumés are accomplishment oriented, they are a great way to showcase your capabilities without drawing attention to the gaps in your work history.”
How to Highlight Volunteer Work
Volunteer work done by stay-at-home parents makes up a significant chunk of the important work being done in schools, churches and communities.
A stay-at-home parent considering returning to work should think about the skills needed for the job she’s seeking, and then make a list of the volunteer projects she’s worked on. Where are the connections? Any projects that she coordinated, supervised, managed or led should be considered leadership examples.
JobsandMoms.com says, “Remember, skills learned while volunteering are equally valuable as skills gained for paid employment – consequently there is no need to distinguish between paid and unpaid work related skills on a résumé.” However, it can’t hurt to include the fact that the work was done as a volunteer, simply to make the résumé as clear as possible.
The stigma of not having a career outside the home is fading fast and employers are seeing more "stay-at-home parent" on résumés. Like most job endeavors, honesty is the best policy.
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