What Do I Tell a Prospective Employer if I Have Been Terminated?
An employer can terminate your employment for many reasons. Termination of employment is justifiable if you were a poor fit for the position or had personal differences with your manager, or wrongful if a company fired you illegally or without just cause. Regardless of the reason for your termination, it is important that you correctly handle the situation when applying for a new job with a prospective employer.
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Resume and Cover Letters
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An employer can terminate your job due to the company’s economic prospects, errors you committed or unfair or retaliatory practices. Regardless of the reason resulting in your termination, you should always remain upfront about your previous work history with a potential employer. Do not leave the employment out of your resume if you worked at the company for more than a year. You should not, however mention why you left your job on a resume or in your cover letter. In most cases, during the interview process, the hiring manager will ask why you left.
Job Applications
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Some job applications may directly ask you if you lost your job due to termination by your employer. In most cases, if you worked for the company for less than one year, you can leave the job off of the application. However, gaps of more than one year become extremely difficult to explain, so you should not generally omit the job from the application if you worked there for a considerable amount of time. Also, you should make sure that any references you list on your application will give you favorable recommendations.
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Interview
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The question why you left your job will almost certainly come up during the interview process. Never directly state you were fired or terminated. However, you should never lie if directly asked. If you are not honest and make false statements during the interview process, a new employer can legally dismiss you at a later date. You should try to put a positive spin on the job without going into too many details about the reason you actually left. Instead, focus on how your previous job experience makes you a more valuable employee now.
Considerations
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If directly asked, you need to own up to your mistakes and admit the failings that led to your firing. However, you should only offer a brief, simple explanation and move on to another subject as quickly as possible. You must emphasize your strengths and not the errors that resulted in the loss of your former job. Try to make the interviewer understand that this was part of your past but not your entire work history. If you remain positive and focus on what you learned from the experience, you can help turn the situation around when applying for a new job.
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