Fall in Love with your Career Break! Learn to make it more attractive and get an edge over others

Are you on career break? 

Love it! 

Crack it! 

And exploit it.

Image by Flickr

A new study by Center for Talent Innovation (CTI) showed that almost 36% women leave the workforce in India and almost 91 percent of women who take a break in India wants to come back to work.

Read more: Why Indian women leave workforce - a survey

Market knowledge: Keep checking on the job sites and other such resources to gauge what's going on in the market. This will give you knowledge about what kind of jobs are available and what experience are the companies seeking. Stay abreast and employable at all the times. Always keep your resume updated on these sites. You will get an idea what kind of jobs are in the market and which companies are hiring in your area.

Network: Network, Network and Network. Cannot emphasize more on this. Please don't lose touch with your old colleagues and bosses. Do not dilute your connection with your colleagues and friends just because you are not working.  In today's era, it might seem odd to hear but yes this is still the best way to find the job and as Forbes study suggest almost 41% of the jobs are landed through network. Use linkedin and facebook to its full potential to maintain your network.

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Conferences: Plan and attend any related event once every quarter. Attend the expert talks, seminars, webinars. Make sure you still remain in the game. These kind of events and seminars provide a great platform to network and upgrade. This will also keep you abreast with the current knowledge and skills.

Current affairs: Read the newspaper daily and be updated with what is happening in and across the globe. It is a very effective means of gaining knowledge. You can influence several decisions in your favor by just the use of your knowledge. Moreover, we cannot exist in vacuum. We all are affected by what is going on in the outside world. Scientists say that people who are more up to date with current affairs keep fit and stay healthier and have lesser chances of Alzheimer.

Online training: No time to step out for any skill upgradation, don’t worry, online platforms come to the rescue. Enroll for a training and upgrade yourself from the comfort of your home. There are several online training portals like lynda.com, coursera.com and manipalprolearn.com

There are plenty of other websites that provides online trainings, do a research and find out which one suits you best.

Education: Make sure your certifications are up to date. Don’t loose on certification validity just because you are not working. Do give the refresher exam to keep your certification valid. 

Develop a hobby and monetize it: Sujata Pedely of Hyderabad based Jason Creations says: "Empowering the housewives is my only motive, any women can come to me and learn the skills of making Jute bags, paper bags, cupcakes, cakes and chocolates. Once the training is completed all these businesses can be run from the comfort of your home with some effort on digital media marketing. " She also conducts classes for jewelry making. One can find out more about such hobby courses in their own area and start monetizing it.

Freelancer: Look online for projects where you can enroll as freelancer and work. Keep looking to find the job appropriate for you and then you bid for it. The websites that you can check out are freelancer.in, worknhire.com, elance.com and upwork.com. You can work from the comfort of your home and make some extra bucks also!

Teaching others is the best way of retaining knowledge. 

It is so rightly said that you learn twice when you teach. A big opportunity in the teaching industry is opening up for women in the form of online teaching​. With commuting becoming more of a hassle in the cities and going to someone's home to teach not being a safe or comfortable option, more and more women are taking to teaching online these days. You can work from the comfort of your home, teach a variety of students, develop your skills and earn decent money on the sides. There are many such online teaching platforms and one such organization is Uplift Academy  whose founder Dr. Arti Aggarwal is passionate and in her own words partial to bringing more and more women on her platform. Having gone through the challenges of balancing a career and raising a family herself, she empathizes with women who face the same dilemmas and is at the forefront when it comes to giving them a chance to work and lead their lives with dignity

Flexible work option: If you wish to join back work for limited hours, there is a good news here. Several companies provide flexible work option to women. There are organizations which run campaign especially for women on their career break to join back work. It is very encouraging.  Keep a tab on any such opportunity.

There are several successful portals that help you get work from home and flexible options in big organizations. You can try powertofly.com and sheroes.in. There is another portal called v-pact.com whose founder, Shilpa Rao, is very passionate and dedicated to provide flexible work opportunities to women. Shilpa says, " Women constitute approximately 50% of the total adult population in the world. Yet, in terms of opportunities, they face several challenges particularly relating to gainful employment. There is a need to provide remunerative and flexible opportunities to women to make a more satisfying use of their time, thereby promoting the well-being of the society as a whole. Many women have professional skills, but due to various reasons—family, children and other commitments, are unable to take up full time employment. Such women can now look at part time employment opportunities or jobs on assignment basis or hourly basis. This will allow women flexibility to manage commitments at home and professional aspirations.

V-Pact.com is a platform dedicated for providing part time job opportunities to women professionals within India. Those who wish to utilize the opportunity may log into v-pact.com and register for the jobs."

V-pact.com is an exclusive portal only for women. Several women have been successfully placed through this portal.

Blog: It is the best way to write down your thoughts share your knowledge with others. It is also a great way to destress. Two major blog post sites are blogger.com and wordpress.com. There are other creative ways of blogging like tumblr.com. Share your blogs with your friends, ask them to give feedback and improve on the content. There are ways of making money through the blogs, boost your readership and generate target traffic using seo. Read more about blogging tips here:Tips and Tricks to make money online

Entrepreneurship: It is a good choice to start your own venture. I have seen women starting their own venture out of their hobby.  Good with kids and arts and crafts, make some extra buck, run a summer camp for your neighborhood kids. Suraksha, once a full time employee of a renowned bank quit her high paying full time job for family and took up her hobby of making chocolates. She makes chocolates and sells online and in the nearby area and yes make profits also.

As Thomas Edison once said, I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work. 

Companies hire you for the experience and skills you have. In your entrepreneur journey you might fail multiple times before you succeed or you might succeed initially but may not be able to sustain long term. Both the outcomes give you immense exposure and experience. I once attended a session of Bhanu Varla, CEO of GrayLogic, He said "If you tell an organization you started up your own venture and you failed, they will love to hire you for the experience you have gained in failing. So don’t be worried about failing in your startup."

NGOs: It is not only about sponsoring education or providing financial help, It is about using your knowledge and time as a tool to make a difference in others life. Just few hours in a week, you can teach needy kids basic language or math, play with them, do color and play activity. You can also share your skills with the destitute women to train them to make some earning of their own and become independent. This will bring an immense satisfaction to you and will give you the purpose. Find one in your area and work with them.

Lastly, get a mentor who understands you. Whenever you plan to join back work mentor will help you rolling at a faster pace. It will help you regain your work confidence. It can be your colleague, anyone who understands and knows you and has industry knowledge. Finding a good mentor is as important as finding a good teacher for your child.

Don’t let your career break become a full stop. Consider it as just a pause. It doesn’t have to be a bad experience, there are so many women who wish to take a break in their career but couldn’t do so. Think of this as a blessing in disguise, use this time for your professional and personal development. Make sure you don't lose your skills and remain hirable at all times.

Image by Freepik

Leaving the corporate life to manage home is a full time job in itself. In between running chores make sure to take out time for yourself, be career savvy and ready to conquer the outside world at any time. This is not the end of your journey but a fresh start.