Plugging that CV gap - the right words?

princessdon

I agree with above - Have you been applying to agencies for temp work and short term contracts?

My OH is in IT and to get a worthwhile salary has to work miles away but he is a specialist, he gets daily emails re contract work for help desk and 1st line support.

If you have applied to that many and are getting interviews - then look at interview techniques, if you are not getting interviews then look at your CV. it can be worth paying for a professional in the IT field to change your CV.

As to your years gap I assume you have been doing training (even home training like setting up an old pc and lappy to do VMware etc) and also volunteering. How many charities would like a bit of help or schools as a classroom volunteer in IT.

Good luck in your search and I hope you find it soon

TrickyWicky

princessdon wrote: »

As to your years gap I assume you have been doing training (even home training like setting up an old pc and lappy to do VMware etc) and also volunteering. How many charities would like a bit of help or schools as a classroom volunteer in IT.

That means nothing to most IT employers. I have my own small datacentre under the stairs - 5 different computers, VMware on many, all headless, access by RDP, used for different things, from sandboxing to program development, mail servers, to FTP servers and even writing my own system services and it's landed me zero jobs.

Whats annoying is that years ago I worked for a council and we had a machine drop dead. I diagnosed it as a dead hard drive within seconds and even told the IT people when they came to look. Despite that they had to take it away to look at it and see if they could fix it. TWO WEEKS later it came back - I asked what they found: Dead hard drive. When I asked the lady what method they used to install windows (EG from CD / HDD image etc) she said she didn't know - she'd just grabbed an identical hard drive from another machine and plugged it in. She didn't know anything about windows configuration and she was more than happy to admit it yet she was working in IT earning over £20k a year.

My bro works in IT and found some of the stuff I do was beyond him yet no employer will look at me at all so I'm sorry I must disagree with your advice.

princessdon

It shows that they are keeping their skills up to date and not vegetating, and yes won't get a job, but looks better than saying they are going to the pub or taking long walks.

And I disagree - My OH is an employer in IT and he takes someone who can demonstrate good skills (even in their own house) over a graduate with no real life experience. They get a grilling at interview over how VM, Cloud etc work, but he wants Real Life experience answers and not text book.

bernieuk

Thank you for the replies so far - very much appreciated.

For the last year I have been training/updating skills. This includes ITIL and VMware. I recently bought a couple of old PCs, hubs etc and set up a small network and server. It has all been good practice. I have also done the usual thing of repairing PCs for friends, family, neighbours. One area I would like to get experience on is Macs and Iphones. My previous job was for IBM working at a customer site for almost 13 years. It was strictly a PC enviroment. A lot of the vacancies I have seen lately are asking for Mac experience - even Ipad- and I have none. Sadly funds are limited like most people. I cannot imagine I will ever find Mac stuff sold cheaply.

As for volunteering for schools/charities etc - perhaps that is something I should have done. I have to attend the infamous Work Program for the first time this coming Monday. Who knows what they will find me. Perhaps I might suggest to them about volunteering.

Despite the 100s of vacancies I have applied for - there has been few interviews as a result. Some of the vacancies have had as many as 500 applicants. One of the replies here used the word "saturated". That certainly is true sadly.

It is clear from some of the replies that the IT job market is not good at the moment but then again so is every other too in some respect.

Anyway, roll on Monday and the Work Program! :j Something good might come of it.

Thank you again all.

princessdon

If you are not getting interviews then I would look at your CV it needs to make you stand out. IT isn't the booming market it once was for sure, but a good CV that shows you are willing to learn (even if you can't afford the badges) is worth it's weight in gold and worth paying £50 to have someone alter it professionally and many agencies will offer advice free of charge.

Ring some local businesses that specialise in Mac/Apple etc and ask if you can volunteer for them for free, even at weekends around the work programme.

Mista_C

princessdon wrote: »

If you are not getting interviews then I would look at your CV it needs to make you stand out.

I carried out a little experiment a couple of years back. I typed out a standard CV and made a copy. On the copy I deleted my name and address and replaced it with a picture of a VBInformation box containing my name and address.



I sent out 10 standard and 10 Info boxes to various companies. I got several replies from the info boxes but only 1 from the standard CV format.

cashbackproblems

Iv found you can say in the interview you have been doing voluntary work but dont have it on your cv and when it comes to background checks what you say doesnt get checked only whats on paper.

Pupnik

bernieuk wrote: »

Thank you for the replies so far - very much appreciated.

For the last year I have been training/updating skills. This includes ITIL and VMware. I recently bought a couple of old PCs, hubs etc and set up a small network and server. It has all been good practice. I have also done the usual thing of repairing PCs for friends, family, neighbours. One area I would like to get experience on is Macs and Iphones. My previous job was for IBM working at a customer site for almost 13 years. It was strictly a PC enviroment. A lot of the vacancies I have seen lately are asking for Mac experience - even Ipad- and I have none. Sadly funds are limited like most people. I cannot imagine I will ever find Mac stuff sold cheaply.

As for volunteering for schools/charities etc - perhaps that is something I should have done. I have to attend the infamous Work Program for the first time this coming Monday. Who knows what they will find me. Perhaps I might suggest to them about volunteering.

Despite the 100s of vacancies I have applied for - there has been few interviews as a result. Some of the vacancies have had as many as 500 applicants. One of the replies here used the word "saturated". That certainly is true sadly.

It is clear from some of the replies that the IT job market is not good at the moment but then again so is every other too in some respect.

Anyway, roll on Monday and the Work Program! :j Something good might come of it.

Thank you again all.

Good idea to learn about Macs, where I work we use both Macs and PCs and while there is a whole team of PC support there is just one guy who is a Mac specialist who is really overworked as there are so many Macs and despite popular opinion they seem to go wrong often. Perhaps you could find design agencies, publishing houses, art schools, local newspaper etc - anywhere where there are a lot of Macs and see if they will let you do work experience. I know money is tight, but you might be able to get some old Macs from freeads or ebay to play around with.