Frequent change of employer

[anonymous-user]

[redacted]

[Puggit]

On Thursday I leave my longest period of employment ever - 3.5 years. I work in a fast moving field though, and it's not uncommon to change jobs every 2 years or so.

[Soovy]

It's a tough break this.

Employers generally assume that people who are made redundant are the weakest in an organisation and therefore the ones who get canned given the chance.

Not right or fair, but a problem for you given your circumstances.


For example in the current market, lawyers who have been made redundant by their previous firm are being automatically excluded from the recruitment to new firms on the basis that they were the runts and got cut first because they were no good.

[stuthemong]

I guess the other thing is that those who move around more are more likely to be after more money. Those who hang tight for 5 years on a 1% payrise/year are a lot cheaper to a firm. Acquiring a replacement will probably cost circa 5K/person for the averaged salary position, be that recruitment agency fees or just time spent interviewing etc...

[Munkeyfeet]

Long term tenure is only bad if you haven't progressed, taken on new roles or been promoted as it shows you have no drive or desire to progress. You are in essence a plodder.

Short term tenure is fine if it shows you have completed a challenge and want to move on - you arent a steady state person etc. However any change will take 2 years min so 2 roles in 5 years is about right.

Did you list the fact you were made redundant on your CV or was it shown as just short tenure without the chance to state your case? 3 jobs in 2 years would worry most employers if they dont know it was redundancy although 3 times in a row does question your decision making - although I appreciate it could be just bad luck.

Different hiring managers have different perceptions of tenure but short tenure is never good - they will think "if i spend my budget etc training him and getting him up to speed and then he leaves 18 months later its a waste of money & time and I am back to square one!"

Or - "if he was any good they would have kept him etc"

Not saying they are the right thoughts but you can understand why they would comtemplate it.

Some people MAY show some of that time as a career break or travelling! Not saying you should but it may stop the assumption you cant hold down a job!

Good luck

Edited by Munkeyfeet on Friday 7th May 14:27

[Simon Brooks]

Have worked in recruitment/hr for more then 20 years, personally I would say that most employers skim read applications and look for patterns of employment history, numerous jobs in a short period of time can create a perception that the applicant may be flighty and therefor not worth investing any money/time/training into. However if you have been made redundent I would suggest adding the number of redundancies made to identify it was not just you and they where made as part of a company restructure and not a one off to get shot of an underperforming member of staff

[skeeterm5]

In my experience this is cyclic, for some time the issue is "moving too often shows lack of loyalty etc" and then it swings to "staying too long shows lack of ambition etc".

The best thing to do is show your own career choices in the best light, why did you choose to do what you did and let the facts support you not the current fad driven broadly by recruitment agencies.

S