The Foreign Service Journal, September 2015

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | SEPTEMBER 2015 51 This will give you the opportunity to get back into the work force, put a position on your resume and accrue government service time—which could help you eventually get another job with the U.S. government somewhere else. 5. Get your resume in order. Now that you’ve signed up for an online class or begun your own self-guided learning, you are ready to put Steps 2, 3 and 4 together to revamp your resume. You can add volunteer positions, part-time positions or any consulting work that you may have done under “Professional Experience.” Include any classes or training you took under “Education.” Your resume should be tailored to the type of job you are trying to get. For example, if you are applying to positions in marketing, do not include experience that has no connection with marketing—such as volunteering to cook at an orphan- age—under “Professional Experience.” You can include it under “Volunteer Experience” or “Additional Skills” if you have a section like that. Do not include a trumped-up name for mom or dad like “house manager” or for another major responsibility you had within your own home. If it looks bogus to you, it will look bogus to employers. I am a parent, too, and I know that that job is important, incredibly difficult and challenges you in ways you never thought imaginable (e.g., keeping cool when a 2-year-old is throwing a fit in the middle of the park about not being able to eat candy at 8 a.m., anyone?). But the fact of the matter is that parenting is not something employers want to see on a resume. You should add a “Key Skills” or “Key Qualifications” sec- tion at the very top of your resume where you list the important traits about yourself that you would like future employers to know. Keep this section limited to job qualifications, not your personality traits. The best place to mention the reason there is a hole in your resume is in your cover letter. This way the employer knows that there is a legitimate reason you were not working for a few years. If you are having trouble figuring out how to update your resume effectively, there’s help! Luckily for us Foreign Service spouses, the State Department offers the Global Employment Initiative. Global employment advisers (based regionally) provide job coaching sessions, training workshops and career development services at no cost to family members. They sup- port family members who want to work for the U.S. govern- ment or on the local economy and also those who want to start their own businesses. 6. Begin actively networking. Now that you’ve got your up-to-date resume in hand, it’s time to network. The ideal time to do this is about a year before you want to be back at work. You won’t sound desperate (because you have some time before you have to get a job), and you can begin to put your feelers out. Start this process by talking to people you have not connected with in a while, and put some time into creating a network on LinkedIn—especially if you are in a field where you anticipate working with recruiters. According to Forbes , networking is the number one way to get a job. Networking is even more important for an expa t returning to work. People who know you will be able to vouch for you and your past performance. Ensure that those people know you are returning to the job market and will be looking for work. Sending out hundreds of resumes, especially if you have a gap in your resume, is much less likely to yield an inter- view. Maintaining professional connections while overseas is a challenge but definitely more than worth it when it comes to reentering the workforce. 7. Think about your salary expectations. By this stage, you probably know how much your potential positions pay. Some people have probably told you that you should be ready for a pay cut if you’ve been out of the workforce for a few years or more. For some fields, this is definitely true, but it doesn’t always have to be the case. There are a few options you can consider if taking a pay cut from what you made prior to mov- ing overseas doesn’t sit well with you. Option A: Look at smaller companies that may value your experience of having lived overseas. Working for a big com- pany will probably (not always) mean a pay cut, but working for a smaller company that does not get as many applicants and focuses particularly on a market that you have experience with could be to your advantage. Option B: Consider working for yourself either in the field you worked in before or in something completely different. Depending on your field, you may be able to work as a consul- Try not to disconnect completely from your field or your network while overseas.