Work experience: Switching Jobs

Thanks. How would this affect my essay though? It may be harder to streamline what value I can add to the class because of limited industry knowledge in Insurance and Assurance, as I'd only have 1yr of experience in one and 2yrs in another. Would that leave me to the mercy of people with more focused resumes with 3yrs in one or the other?

I guess you could streamline it as just being an "accounting professional," but I'm not sure if that would hold much weight.

Well, it's not a question of "Streamlining" so much. And it's not necessarily true that experience in one industry is better than experience in two. Actually from the Adcom point of view, this is pretty much irrelevant. What IS important though, is that your story make sense. You want to take your experience, and your "promotion" and SHOW the Adcom how you are moving forward, moving up, advancing, but not just that, but to something SPECIFIC - and that specific thing of course is your long-term goal. It is soooooo important that you construct a logical narrative that will allow us to follow your progression and say to ourselves "aha! so that's where he is going!!!"

Thank you, that helped me out a lot.

Thank you everyone this thread has been very useful as I have been wondering the same things.

Jon, is having more than two job changes viewed negatively? I am considering a job switch, however if I do make the change it will be my third job post undergrad. I don't want to give the impression to adcoms that I am unable to hold steady employment.

The reason for all my switches is that in my current and previous jobs, progression is slow. I was able to leverage my skills from my first job to progress to my current job and am looking to do the same for the next switch. I am thinking that this is the only way I will be able to show career progression. Thoughts?

Thanks,
HImba88

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Good question! And I stand by what I wrote above, that if it makes sense in terms of what your long-term target is (or rather if you can make sense of it) then it is usually not a problem. Especially if there is a clear progression in terms of experience and salary and responsibilities.

Buuuut there is one thing you do want to be careful about - You don't want to appear to the AdCom as someone who changes a lot because they are always unsatisfied, or too patient to learn to climb their way up the corporate ladder. Again, the way you present your narrative of how and why you switched jobs is ESSENTIAL to giving across the right feeling of (ambitious and constantly seeking improvement towards a SPECIFIC goal" as opposed to the more dangerous "Doesn't know what he wants, but wants too much and too quick".

I feel it is not so much a matter of XXX jobs in YYY years, but that it is a qualitative issue, and if you can make things make sense in your essays, it should not be a problem (plus, in terms of life decision, if they are offering you a LOT more money, then well... it just makes sense)

Thank you Jon for your valuable insight. I am beginning to understand why the essays are so
Important to the admissions process.

The switch is definitely a step up both in terms of responsibilities as well as progression toward something I am interested long term.

Thank you for clarifying the qualitative vs quantitative issue. For some reason I thought a certain quantity of employers would signal a red flag to adcoms signaling impatience or job "ADD."

Posted from my mobile device

Great! I'm glad this helped you out!

and you do make a very good point - this is why the essays are so important. Because they allow YOU to control your own narrative. Without the essays, all we have is a bunch of facts, and if left to interpretation, may be perceived one way or another, but through the essays you take control of your own story.