Is remaining in employment hurting my chances of getting a new job?

completedit

Just a little background: I've worked in the job I currently am employed in throughout college over a number rof years. I've intermittently worked in the company on and off, including time spent away on a J1, other extended travelling, emigration and further studies. I can't help but feel that remaining in this job is hindering my chances of getting another job in the area I want to work in. I know conventional wisdom is to remain in a job until you can find another one, but at this stage it feels as if employers just see me through the lens of the for all intents and purposes part-time profession that I've worked in, as opposed to judging me through my academic background. like my job and they've been a great employer but I feel I need to get out and feel fully unemployed as opposed to the current quagmire I find myself in where I work but it feels like I'm unemployed.

Any advice would be great.

Diziet

What is stopping you from applying for jobs in the area you want to work in? How employers see you greatly depends on how you present in your CV.
I don't see how being unemployed would present better?

LimeFruitGum

Don’t quit the job, you don’t need the hassle of explaining a gap on the CV.
What gap is there between what you studied and what you work at?

Is it possible to try to apply those courses to a freelance/side gig in some way, so at least you are building experience? I did this in my 20s for a couple of years as I was stuck in call centre grad hell.

PommieBast

While it is preferable to only hand in notice once you have a new job lined up, this in practice is actually surprisingly difficult and of all the jobs I have ever had only one of them was offered while I was still working elsewhere. And it was not my current one.

Job-hunting itself is more or less a full-time job by the time you factor in things like proper interview preparation and the time off needed to give it a good shot on the day. I think many of the phone interviews I failed in recent years were due to trying to fit them around my working day, with the tiredness and stress of doing a full day of work and then rushing home to take the call has meant my brain was not up to the task. Just taking days off in order to attend interview is itself a pain, which is worse with companies that do multiple rounds, although with the current Covid-19 WFH this itself is ironically not so much of a problem at the moment. Being unemployed means you can give it your undivided attention.

The down-side is that quitting a job without an offer in hand brings with it its own issues, such as being cash-flow negative.

Maybe the OP can give some indication of what area their current job is, and what they want to break into.

Purple Mountain

If you quit your current job, you'd have to wait weeks before you could claim social welfare.

Del2005

completedit wrote: »

Just a little background: I've worked in the job I currently am employed in throughout college over a number rof years. I've intermittently worked in the company on and off, including time spent away on a J1, other extended travelling, emigration and further studies. I can't help but feel that remaining in this job is hindering my chances of getting another job in the area I want to work in. I know conventional wisdom is to remain in a job until you can find another one, but at this stage it feels as if employers just see me through the lens of the for all intents and purposes part-time profession that I've worked in, as opposed to judging me through my academic background. like my job and they've been a great employer but I feel I need to get out and feel fully unemployed as opposed to the current quagmire I find myself in where I work but it feels like I'm unemployed.

Any advice would be great.

I'd say that's a bigger issue for a perspective employer than your current job, you don't appear to stick with a job and quitting with no job lined up will only increase their doubts that you will be reliable.

LimeFruitGum

You could be really lucky, but you're probably looking at several months of full-on job hunting before you land something. Being unemployed isn't going to expedite things, so you may as well keep working.

Mrs OBumble

LimeFruitGum wrote: »

You could be really lucky, but you're probably looking at several months of full-on job hunting before you land something. Being unemployed isn't going to expedite things, so you may as well keep working.

Especially i the current climate when most recruitment is vastly slowed down.

Quitting a job in this environment without one to go to would make you look crazy.

dinneenp

How would you answer this question in an interview- "So why did your latest employment end?"

"at this stage it feels as if employers just see me through the lens of the for all intents and purposes part-time profession that I've worked in, as opposed to judging me through my academic background". Or is this what you think or yourself?

Make an appointment with a professional and get help with wording your CV, if you've worked there years on-off you probably have covered a lot of jobs & tasks.

Do not quit your current job, I can't see a single reason why it would be beneficial.

nextgengamer

Yeah, don't quit your current job, unless you are moving countries, have no commitments, are young free and single, just won the lottery, love life on the dole, have some other job offer ... maybe then then just go. You know there is a pandemic out there and there are a lot of people out of work who would probably kill for your job. Maybe you need to talk to your employer about your role, position and future. Be proactive and smart. Maybe you need some time out, need to see somebody about your mental health, etc, etc. If you are bored, do something creative in your spare time. You need to keep your job while looking for another one. Believe me, it's a lot less stress. You'll feel more confident going into interviews while you have a job!

I did this a few years ago, with family commitments, as I was getting nowhere in the job except burned out, anxious and depressed. In hindsight I should have taken sick leave and later continued to look for job while employed. It is harder to look for a job while employed as you've got to make the extra time to study, prepare, organise interviews. But that's the only downside.

If you try to look for a job and don't have a job, then employers are not interested and can "wait" for you and they can play down your salary options. I found HR not so interested, once I didn't have a job. And I had to have the "why did I leave the last job" excuse ready and you get asked over and over ... BUT once I did manage to get a job offer, suddenly they were so interested in how much was my offer and blah blah blah.

So, don't leave your current job.