Different is Valuable When Returning to the Workforce At Path Forward, we create return-to-work opportunities in partnership with forward-looking employers such as HubSpot. We asked Shyam Venkatramani, DI&B Recruiting Program Manager, for the employer’s perspective when interviewing job applicants who have a career break on their resume. His insights below provide a thoughtful view on what returners bring to the table and how to make your attributes shine. * *…
Patricia Boothe, a senior vice president at Trimble, facilitated Trimble’s returnship program launch this year, in partnership with Path Forward. She talks to us about the success of Trimble’s pilot program, what surprised her most about working with returners, and why both she and her colleagues can’t wait to launch a second program. What’s your role at Trimble and how long have you been at the company? I’m a senior…
We get it. The resume advice you’ll often hear is to hide your career gap. That’s because of the unfortunate stigma still around about hiring people with breaks, especially those who put their careers on pause in order to provide care. For returnship positions, though, the opposite is true! A gap is required and needs to be apparent on your resume. For these opportunities, there’s no need to justify your…
Matt took a break from his software engineering career for five years to care for his newborn daughter. When she was ready to start preschool, he decided it was a great time to return to his career. Matt completed a returnship at Seeq, a software company that publishes advanced analytics applications for manufacturing companies, where he now works full-time as a senior software engineer. Matt tells us about all the…
Company: Grubhub Position: Data Engineer Pratyusha stepped away from her tech career for six years to take care of her two sons. When she was ready to return to work, Pratyusha found it difficult to get as much as a call back from recruiters, despite her experience and a Master’s degree in Computer Science. After attending a Path Forward webinar with Grubhub, she applied for a returnship at the company,…
Kathryn Zaharek returned to work after a 3 year break by completing a returnship at Audible, where she now works full-time as a Senior Product Manager. She tells us about how she prepared for her return, how Audible supported her during her remote returnship experience, and explains why returners should always have an elevator pitch ready. Tell me a bit about your career break. What type of work did you…
Company: Red Ventures Position: Software Engineer Gunjan Bhatia took a six-year break from her software engineering career to support a family move to the US and to care for her son. Gunjan completed a software engineering returnship at Red Ventures, where she now works full-time. She talks about her remote returnship experience, how Red Ventures and her team supported her return to work during the uncertainty of the pandemic, and…
Two years ago my friend and a member of Path Forward’s Board of Directors, Gayatri Agnew, started a new holiday called Mother’s Monday. The idea was simple: While we “honor” mothers on Mother’s Day we don’t support mothers, and especially mothers with careers. The expectation is that Mom celebrates with her children on a Sunday but then pretends she has no caregiving responsibilities when she gets to the office on…
Minal Verma has been a Senior Recruiter at VMware for over 5 years, and her journey with the company has taken her from technical to full-cycle recruiting, as well as a move from Bangalore to Australia. She helped launch and handle recruitment for VMware’s first returnship program in 2019, as well as their second program in 2020, held remotely due to the pandemic. As VMware launches their next returnship program,…
Company: Trimble Position: Financial Analyst Karly took a break from her finance career to spend more time with her son. After six years, she was ready to return to the workforce, but found it difficult to get interviews with a career gap on her resume. That’s when she learned about Trimble and realized the company would be a great fit for her – so she applied and returned to work…
