If a stay-at-home mom has to return to work, here’s how she can write a job description for a resume!
Resumes can be a tell-all document. They can tell an employer what you have – or haven’t – been doing for the last few years.
Being a stay-at-home mom is valuable work. If you’re returning to employment, use your resume to address your recent career break with confidence.
If you’re job searching now, update your resume clearly to explain your career break and accurately describe your recent role.
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Table of Contents
Skills You Develop as a Stay-at-Home Parent
Most Important Things to List on a Resume
Considering Homemaking Over Working?
Full-Time Parent Professional Experience
Your work as a stay-at-home mom was all encompassing. A title should reflect that.
Household manager or family manager are accurate representations for homemaking work. In duties as assigned, you can include things like, “managed a team of four people.” And “responsible for leading the team in a positive work culture and outside committments.”
A stay-at-home mom hones valuable skills, like project management, team management, conflict negotiation, time management, teamwork, and adaptability. These skills may be the first thing you consider listing on your resume! Just because you were a stay-at-home mom doesn’t mean you weren’t developing necessary skills you can apply to the work place.
This is something called transferable skills. Transferable skills are skills you can use across a wide variety of industries.
Time management may be the most popular one. In order to get your children fed, bathed, and in bed before they are hitting a wall of total exhaustion, you have to have time management skills. If you’re children are older and involved in extra curricular activities, you have to have time management skills. You can’t show up for a practice with 5 minutes to spare. You have to be there on time!
Adaptability is a skill that should be on every stay-at-home mother’s resume. When you’re child is trying to drop a nap and you need to get a house project done, you’re practicing adaptability. When you forget to let meat thaw for dinner and you’re creating a new meal from something in the pantry, you’re practicing adaptability.
The pantry example also lends itself to problem solving. Juggling those kinds of plates gets you suited for work in an office where you might be thrown a situation that will only be solved with unconventional methods. That’s problem solving!
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Most Important Things to List on a Resume
Contact information and recent experience are things absolutely necessary for a resume. Even if you have never entered the work force, put something in the prior work experience section of your resume.
If you have been apart of the workforce, include your most recent position in the “previous experience” section of your resume. Even if the role was several years ago, the information included with your description, like duration of employment and the title of your role, can solidify your work experience for your employer.
Personal projects and contract work may also be worthy to mention as previous experience. Remember – prospective employers aren’t just looking for college degrees. They’re looking for people knowledgable about their field of work!
Specific Skills to List on a Resume
Motherhood takes time management, organization, and patience. Think of everything that you manage! It takes skill to do what you do!
Consider listing those very things on your resume!
Other skills to list can be categorized by area of your home. If you’re in the kitchen, food preparation and meal planning are skills. Creating a menu to meet dietary needs and restrictions is a versatile skill.
In the general home, operating in the green or black of your budget is an incredible skill to have. What corporation wants to lose money every year? Paying bills on time, managing positive relationships with contractors (in a homemaker’s case, any service you call in could be a contracted relationship. Think lawn care, pest control, even your plumber!), and maintaining company supplies are all necessary skills.
Skills can also be listed per the position you’re applying for. Specific positions may require specific skills.
You can also examine your skill set. As a blogger, I have experience in writing, editing, content creating, time management, and photography skills. I have a personal website I have developed over time that has given me other skills in web design and writing code. These are all skills I could list on my resume!
If you have hobbies that have given you niche experience or you have taken a course to learn more about a hobby, examine that skill set and detail them on a resume.
Other Resume Tips
It’s always a good idea to list certifications, work history, and volunteer work on a resume. Cater your selections to your employer and anything specific in the job ad a hiring manager may have listed.
Outside of your resume, you could consider cleaning up your social media or creating a LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn is a social media platform specific to the professional space. It’s a great way to connect with old employers and keep a pulse on what’s popular in the working world today.
Have you ever heard the saying, “dress for the job you want, not the job you have?” Consider purchasing a blouse and a nice pair of pants if you are entering clerical work or office work after being a stay-at-home mom.
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Reconsidering your time in the workplace?
I reentered the workforce when my child was about 7 months old. Leaving her was one of the hardest things I’ve done!
As a stay-at-home mom, I sometimes questioned the value of my work if I wasn’t bringing in an income. I had to do a lot of heart work to see what an incredible asset I am to my family.
If you’re struggling with the same thoughts, here are a few blog posts for you:
Homemaker vs. Housekeeper – What’s the Difference?
God’s Definition of a Homemaker
Resume Examples
Feel free to copy these resume examples!
Job Title: Family Manager
Job description: Provided comprehensive support to a family of (number of family members here). Responsibilities included coordinating multiple schedules, travel, meals, and overseeing household finances. Also responsible for rotating household inventory, maintaining a sanitary work environment, and supervising household tasks.
Job Title: Homemaker
Job description: Managed a peaceful, yet busy, home by effectively balancing time management, project management, and team work. Assistant led a family of (number of family members here) and operated the annual budget in the black. Coordinated, and oversaw, all household tasks, which included planning nutritious meals, organizing family events, and handling all family communications.
Job Title: Home Engineer
Job description: Specialized in managing all household communications, which include personal engagements, financial management, extracurricular engagements, and volunteer work. Other responsibilities include planning and executing nutritious meals, maintaining a sanitary work environment, and supervising a household of (number of family members here).
Encouragement for the Working Mom
Moms can successfully balance work life and family life. And I know that you will find out how to make that happen.
My prayer is that these resume tips will help you in whatever season of life you’re in.
If you are returning from family leave, I hope that the time spent with your loved ones was pleasant and that everyone is healthy! I wish you the best as you return to work.
If this is a busy season of life for you, I have blog posts dedicated to time management and finding relaxation as a mom! Check out this list of related blog posts and get encouraged today!
Related Blog Posts:
How to Create a Simple Home Management System
How to Find Rest in Your Busy Homemaking Routine
How To – Strategies and Tips for Mastering Meal Prep
Beginners’ Tips for How to Organize a Planner
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