Neither layoff was performance related, both were company-wide cuts, but saying that twice out loud in an interview feels like it starts sounding like an excuse even though it's true. How do people who've been through multiple rounds actually phrase this?
Went through two layoffs myself and landed on mentioning it briefly in the cover letter, one line, no over-explaining. Kept interviewers from making their own assumptions about the gap.
Recruiters have seen a lot of layoff resumes the last two years, it barely registers as a flag anymore unless you're the one treating it like one. Said it out loud a few times before the real interview and stopped hearing my own voice apologize for it.
Following, I'm in the same boat with two layoffs in 18 months. Starting to think the resume gap explanation matters less than how calm I sound saying it.
Went through two rounds myself. What worked was one short sentence per layoff, no adjectives, then immediately pivoting to what I did in between. Dwelling on it even a few extra seconds is what made interviewers uncomfortable, not the fact itself.
