Does Job Hopping Hurt Your Career?
There are some red flags for employers when looking at resumes. First the obvious; seeing someone was fired or finding someone lied about their job history. Then there is calling a reference and hearing negative things about the potential employee. However, there’s one thing potential hires may not realize is hurting their chances beyond the aforementioned. That critical item is hopping around from job to job.
How Does Job Hopping Hurt Your Employment Chances?
Job hopping doesn’t immediately mean you’ll be disregarded. It will ring some alarm bells for some hiring managers. Kevin O’Leary, a judge on CNBC’s Money Court and O’Shares ETFs chairman, said, “Companies don’t like it because they invest in you. If you’re going to leave them after a few months, that’s a total waste of money for them.” O’Leary cites that many companies have to spend money to train you and buy equipment or other necessary items for work. If someone is going to end up leaving after less than a year, there’s no point in spending money on them.
This lines up with a 2018 survey by job site TalentWorks, which looked at a sample of 7,000 job applications in different U.S. industries and found that employees who held their previous job for less than 15 months were 43% less likely to be hired when applying for new jobs. This is because most hiring managers aren’t likely to give the applicant the benefit of the doubt or think “deeply” about each applicant. Even more worrying? The survey also found that having a short stint at your previous job was equivalent to wiping out about five years of experience from your resume.
How Long SHOULD You Be Staying At A Job?
According to the Harvard Business Review, it’s become very common to jump between jobs more often. As a result, employers are less likely to hold it against you. There are some guidelines to still keep in mind. As O’Leary still recommends that employees invest at least two years to a job.
“Have a mental commitment, whether you like [the job] or you don’t, to stay there for at least two years,” he said. “If you’re asking to become part of a team as an employee and represent that company, you’ve got to have a minimum of a 24-month commitment.”
Suzy Welch, the bestselling management author, said that there’s an exception though. If you’ve been at previous jobs for a longer period (e.g. you were at a company for five years), then there’s some forgiveness with hiring managers if you have some stints that are only six or eight months long.
Do you have a lot of job-hopping on your resume? Signature Source can help you turn your various jobs into a positive! We help people write resumes that will help them stand out as a potential hire. If you want to learn more, check out our website here.
