Explaining Your Leave of Absence

This one is from the mailbag:

Two years ago, I took a leave of absence and shortly thereafter
resigned from my job as an elementary principal after two years in
the position due to stress and a bad situation with a teacher that
was getting worse.  One year earlier, I had had successful
surgery/treatment for a cancer (melanoma) .  I had new serious
symptoms as a result of stress.  My doctor suggested time off.

I have moved to a different area in the state and want to apply for
another elementary principalship.  Prior to my two years at the
district from where I resigned, I had three years of successful
“principal” experience.  How do I explain my leave of absence and
later resignation?  How do I allay fears that I am a job hopper?
Thanks for your help!

My rules for explaining unplanned leave of absences (or departures from the workforce) are very simple:

Rule 1: Keep the reason short and simple. You have to think about the hiring manager’s fear here and how you prevent that fear from continuing. He or she wants to know that the reason you were away from work was legitimate. We are generally understanding that life situations come up. Personal health issues (that includes mental health), children get seriously ill, parents die, we understand all of this. So allay those fears as quickly (and as briefly as possible) because you can also get into way too much detail about it.

Rule 2: Move forward. If you can’t think of anything you did during that time to progress your career (things like continual education, networking, etc…), focus on how you are moving forward past the unexpected leave based on your past performance. And by the way, I would encourage people to continue to try to stay connected their field during a leave of absence but if you can’t, you can overcome it.  You can point to your past experience and say “Look, this is what I’ve done before and I am extremely confident that I can do it again. That’s why I am re-entering the workforce right now.”

As to your other question, I don’t think their concern is going to be about job hopping.  I think if it comes out that your last job stressed you out to the point where you needed to take a break, the question will be if you can handle it again (and you should be prepared for that). You can allay fears by talking about ways you’ve grown and improved and how this position is possibly different from your previous one.

In any case, good luck. It is always harder to get that first job after something like this.