Hi Anna, Thanks for writing to us. I am sorry to hear that you couldn’t stay in your last position, but understand your desire to continue working and pursuing your professional goals. It can be a little nerve-wrecking to think about explaining what you view as “red flags” on your resume to potential employers, but there are definitely ways to address them (I’ve added a list of potential resources below). It wasn’t clear from your post if you are still in active treatment or post-treatment, which might affect how you approach the job search process. If you are experiencing any side effects from treatment (current or post) and think that you may need reasonable accommodations at work, that is something to consider when deciding on whether a position would be a good fit. A great resource for getting ideas about accommodations is www.AskJAN.org, you can look up cancer and look up different kinds of jobs and see potential accommodations. Please note that the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to eligible job applicants and employees of a private employer with fifteen or more employees, or a state or local government of any size, so you might want to think about the size of the company as you are job searching. There are also state fair employment laws that might be helpful to consider. Some states’ laws protect individuals working for employers with fewer than 15 employees. Our partner, Triage Cancer, has a Quick Guide to Cancer-Related Laws by State available at http://triagecancer.org/resources/quickguides. You asked if you should disclose your medical situation. In general, you are under no legal obligation to disclose your medical condition to your prospective or current employer (however if you want to be protected from discrimination or access a reasonable accommodation you may have to disclose some information to show you are entitled). You may choose not to disclose during the interview process and instead wait until you receive an offer to request any reasonable accommodation or even wait until you have started the job. Typically, you won’t really know what you need until you have started the job and have a sense of how side-effects and/or your treatment schedule will affect the job and vice versa (this is why it’s good to start this conversation with your healthcare team sooner than later). Remember every workplace is different, so even if you are pretty certain what the job entails and how things will work you can’t possibly know all the quirks before you are hired. Disclosing is ultimately a personal decision, I would recommend watching our webinar on issues around disclosure to get some more insight: http://www.cancerandcareers.org/en/community/videos/bwc/2016-webinar-online Some other resources I would recommend checking out are: • Resume Review Service: https://www.cancerandcareers.org/resume_reviews/new • Resume & Cover Letter advice: http://www.cancerandcareers.org/resume_reviews/new • Job Search Toolkit (2nd Edition): http://www.cancerandcareers.org/publication_orders/new (features advice on improving resumes, cover letters; interview and networking tips and other useful tools to help you during a job search) • Blog on Answering Tough Interview Questions: http://www.cancerandcareers.org/blog/answering-tough-interview-ques • Interview Resources: http://www.cancerandcareers.org/en/looking-for-work/interviewing (check out the mock interview section specifically so you can do some run throughs in advance) I've reached out to our coaches for additional insight, so they should be in touch soon. Good luck with your search! Kind Regards, Nicole Franklin, MPH Manager of Programs Cancer and Careers

Thank you for your response! I apologize, as I should have been more clear. I am currently IN treatment and newly diagnosed but I'm thinking ahead and trying to avoid a big gap on my resume when I already have many from my previous career (I'm a MPH too!) I have many short-term jobs on my resume which doesn't look good (it was all due to budget cuts and lay offs but I have to get to the interview to explain that!)

My question was how to do I broach the gap and leaving my last job so quickly on my cover letter? Nursing jobs all go through HR first which will be very difficult to get past with the short-term jobs and then seeing that I'm leaving this one after only 6 months.

I also do not qualify for FMLA or any of the laws you referenced because I was not at my job long enough.

Hope this clarifies things and you might be able to offer some advice on specifically addressing the gaps/short-term jobs on the cover letter without disclosing my cancer status.

Thank you!

Anna

Hi Anna,

Thanks for your response (and always good to know a fellow-MPH'er)! Although our coaches will provide additional information on addressing resume gaps and broaching the subject of short-term jobs with prospective employers, the cover letter and resume resources I listed above might provide some useful tips in the meantime.

I also wanted to provide a little clarification on what laws you may be covered by. While you are right that you wouldn't qualify for the FMLA, the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a completely different law that might provide some protections. The ADA and state fair employment laws prohibit most employers from asking a job applicant about a disability before offering the job and also gives qualified individuals the right to reasonable accommodations. The side effects of treatment (nausea, fatigue, etc.) can oftentimes qualify as a disability. I highly recommend you discuss likely side effects with your healthcare team in context of what your job requirement might be, so you can start thinking about what, if any, accommodations you might need. This will help you feel more prepared to speak about this with an employer should that become necessary.

Please let us know if you have any other questions and our coaches will be in touch soon!

Regards,
Nicole

Hi Anna,

I am so sorry you are experiencing this situation, especially because you have worked hard to earn amazing degrees and credentials. I would like to address the big picture of gaps on resumes to give you a different perspective. Regardless of the real reason for a gap or gaps on a resume, it is imperative to come up with a very simple one, practice it, and stick to it while spinning the conversation back to what you are able to contribute. Reasons for gaps can be layoffs, reorganizations, a new boss who wants to hire his/her own people, a family situation, relocation, raising young children, a career change, a poor cultural fit, or of course health issues (either divulging or not divulging what it is). So you might imagine that there are millions of people who have gaps on their resumes. I have not seen your resume so do not know if you are being hyper critical of yourself and/or how many jobs you actually have listed on your resume. Perhaps you can consider sending it to Cancer and Careers' resume review service as I am the coach who reviews them, and I can then give you specific feedback about how to improve it.

Nevertheless, the way to handle it in your cover letter is to write out one sentence explaining why you left your RN position and leave it alone. I would also be very thoughtful about describing why a PRN position and the organization the position is with is such a great match. You were asked to leave your role and that counts as a lay off in broad terms. In my opinion, this is what I would say and leave it at that.

I can see that you are very concerned about this however I don't think it is as much of a red flag as you think it may be. Also, be sure that you have strong references from your jobs who can attest to your skills and interpersonal strengths.

Please write back if you have other questions or comments. Thanks!

Take care,

Julie

Thank you for your response Julie! I'm not sure what you mean by saying I was asked to leave my role and it would be considered a lay off? I wasn't asked to leave..my doctors said I couldn't continue to do my job while in treatment so I was forced to take medical leave...That "one sentence" you speak of on the cover letter is what I have no idea what to say. ANY HR person would wonder why I left a job so soon and I'll send in my resume as well so you'll see I have a bad history of staying jobs for short periods of time. I'm just unclear what that sentence should be..."Unforseen circumstances have caused me to leave my current position and search for a more flexible one?" I'm so lost!

Hi Anna,

My apologies. You didn't say that your doctors had told you you should leave your job. I made the mistaken assumption that your employer did given that you are a healthcare worker.

I am not sure that you need to say anything in your cover letter about why you left your job however it is clear that you think you should. And I realize that sometimes applications ask you this question. This said, I actually like a version of what you just wrote. Perhaps just say that something situational caused you to need to leave your job and you are so excited about the job you are applying for. In other words keep it really simple. The other thing you can do if you are unable to get comfortable with what you would say is leave the job off of your resume. People do this when the situation is too hard to explain because it didn't work out in a short time or something unpleasant happened.

Take care,

Julie