life@work

What It Takes To Change Careers In Midlife

I get a number of calls every month from people in their late 30’s, 40's or 50's who want to know what kind of process I go through with clients to help them change careers. They’re all revved up about possibility and change. Some of them sign up for the adventure while others, sighing as they hang up the phone, do not. 

Changing careers after 10 or more years is an incredibly daunting task. It’s a complex process that takes a whole lot of energy, creativity, persistence and work. And chances are you are already engaged in a life that requires a whole lot of energy, creativity, persistence and work.

I was interested to read this useful piece that sums up the process of changing careers in mid-life. If you’re thinking about it, I recommend you check it out.

Here is an overview of the steps, with my editorial comments:

• Assess yourself (There are 468 ways to do this, including written exercises and various tests.)
• Know what’s important to you. (Pay, hours, tasks, challenge, industry, people contact, etc.)
• Find out what’s out there (Research online and/or use a career counselor or coach.)
• Narrow down career options. (Between two and four options is manageable and not overly limiting.)
• Talk to people in the field (informational interviews, attend professional association meetings).
• Volunteer, work as a temp, or moonlight to try something out first while minimizing risk.
• Engage your existing network of people to assist you. (This is one of your biggest advantages over younger career-changers, so use it!)

You've heard about all of these steps before - none are difficult to comprehend. A big challenge for most people is deciding exactly how and exactly when and exactly with whom they are going to accomplish the steps.

But perhaps the most daunting challenge is keeping up the interest, momentum and sheer stamina it takes to change careers, while at the same time navigating the ever-changing currents of the river called My Life Right Now.

Just because you're in the midst of engineering a career change doesn't mean you can't go through a re-org at work, or the dog won't die, or your teenager won't test your limits, or your spouse's mother won't need to move into assisted living, and so on and so forth.

It can be tempting in the face of such distractions to give up on your career change plan altogether. But with a little patience, and a caring person in your life to nudge you, you can do it.

I'd love to hear: What made it possible for you to change careers?

Why Deciding to Change Is So Difficult

Why is it so hard to make a career change?

Let me count the ways. We may not have the information, training, education or contacts that we need, just for starters.

Or perhaps simply the act of making the decision to make the career change is a huge hurdle to clear. After all, deciding to make any important change can confound us. But why?

One big reason is that when faced with a decision, we humans perceive the pain of loss to be about twice as potent as the pleasure of gain. The fancy term for this is loss aversion.

It's part of a larger psychological phenomenon known as negativity bias, which as Jonah Lehrer explains in his book How We Decide, means our brains perceive that bad is stronger than good.

Loss aversion is not rooted in logic; psychologists discovered that it's a defect hard-wired in the brain, present in all of us who experience emotion (which is as I see it, most of us). Loss aversion has widespread implications for many areas of our lives, including relationships, how we manage investments, and how we steer our careers.

When we consider changing careers, we naturally imagine all kinds of losses. We fear losing financial security, traction in our career trajectory, close relationships with people we work with now, that feeling we have of being competent at what we do, even perhaps the good opinion of our friends and of society.

Compared to the losses, the possible gains, such as feeling more satisfied, feeling reinvigorated, learning new things and even earning more money trigger a weaker emotional response.

So what can we do about loss aversion? According to Lehrer, "The only way to avoid loss aversion is to know about the concept."

So now you know. You can practice being aware of when you're engaging in the mental habit of loss aversion and then turn your attention to the facts of your situation.

Does this mean that emotions play no part in complex decision making? Absolutely not. In fact as it turns out, making complex decisions requires tuning into our emotions (also known as a "gut check") after we've had a chance to mull over data.

You can overdo the pros and cons list-making, however. Psychologist Ap Diiksterhuis found in his experiments that that the longer people spend analyzing options in complex decision making, the less satisfied they are with their decisions.

Deciding to change is hard because we focus on what we have to lose if we make the change. But when we realize that potential losses may not in fact be a bigger deal than potential gains and decide to do more investigating, we just may make the best decision of our lives.

I'd love to know: Have you ever decided to make a career change, despite fearing what you had to lose?

Changing Careers: Research Before You Dismiss

At some point in our careers, most of us dream about doing something completely different. Those of us who want to do more than dream can quickly feel stymied and frustrated.

Many people I talk to who are thinking about making a significant career change feel alone in this pursuit. It seems to them that everyone else is happy enough toiling away at their current job, or have dismissed ideas of change because, "I can't afford it" or "I'm too old" or "What would I do, anyway?"

If you notice that you keep imagining yourself doing something else, you owe it to yourself to look at that carefully and give it due regard.

This doesn't mean you have to follow every whim. But if you pay attention to the truth in your gut and have the courage to research the possibilities, it could be one of the greatest gifts you can give to yourself.

Why does it take courage to research? Because for a lot of folks, there are large psychological barriers to making a career change. We want to stay in our comfort zone (remember homeostasis from science class?) We are used to a certain income per month. The state of the economy seems like a good reason to hunker down. Certain people count on us to continue to be what we are. Facing risk is just plain scary.

When we quickly dismiss our ideas, we get to stay in our comfort zone. When we research, we may find a way to move forward, and we can feel pretty ambivalent about that.

But when you take your ideas seriously and take the time to research the possibilities - talking to people in the field, talking to companies and organizations and researching professional associations, salaries and job openings online - you can experience some relief from the persistent nagging in your gut that you've been ignoring. (Note: "Research" does not mean merely taking one person's opinion as the Gospel Truth).

Through research, you might discover a way to pursue what you want to do "on the side". You might decide that going back to school for a Master's degree is feasible after all. You might resolve once and for all that acting professionally was a pipe dream, and then be ready to put all your energy into something that is going to work for your life.

Doing the research isn't sexy, but it can lead to all kinds of options.

When I talk to a new client who is tentative about sharing her desire to go from, say real estate agent to kindergarten teacher, I've noticed she likes to hear about what changes other people are making. So here's a partial list of the recent changes that people I know professionally and personally have made:

• From mechanical engineeer to attorney to manager at a start-up specialty beverage company
• From college athletic coach to self-employed personal trainer
• From journalist to law school student
• From full-time instructional designer to contract instructional designer
• From laid off administrative employee to self employed retailer
• From technical writer to TV production
• From hi-tech manager to at-home parent
• From corporate training manager to self-employed consultant and professional speaker
• From working for corporations to working in two-person partnerships in law, management consultancy and architecture
• From full-time high school teacher to part-time curriculum designer
• From biotech marketing to self-employed chef-for-hire
• From community college dean to e-learning consultant and retiree

What's your gut nagging you about? What questions need to be answered so that you can do more of what you want to do?

What are you waiting for?

How to Know Whether Entrepreneurship Is Right for You

There's a lot to be said for being your own boss. You get to chart your own course, create your own hours, and choose your own employees.

However as glorious as it can sound especially in today's job market, entrepreneurship is a big-deal decision that isn't right for everybody.

What do you need to mull over to make a decision? If you're thinking about owning your own business, first see how accurately you believe the following statements describe you:

• I am comfortable owning my own business and not realizing a profit for one to three years, even if I need to work long hours.
  
• I feel comfortable knowing that entrepreneurship involves employing skills in a variety of roles, such as technician, manager, administrator and accountant.
  
• I am self-motivated and rarely procrastinate.
  
• I enjoy challenging myself to move beyond my comfort zone.
  
• I have had positive experiences selling and/or I believe I have some talent in sales.
  
• I am willing to challenge myself and explore getting out of my comfort zone.
  
• I find taking risks to be exciting, motivating and energizing.
  
• I am persistent.
  
• I shrug off mistakes and failures pretty easily and get back to what I need to be doing.
  
• I am decisive and action-oriented.
  
• I enjoy talking with people, am a good communicator, and I get along with most everyone.

Recently the Wall Street Journal Online interviewed Pamela Slim, author of "Escape from Cubicle Nation: From Corporate Prisoner to Thriving Entrepreneur" and blogger extraordinaire at Escape from Cubicle Nation, about what kind of mindset it takes to be an entrepreneur.

"Entrepreneurs are wired to be comfortable with open-endedness and ambiguity," Slim offers.

Some people choose to start new businesses repeatedly, while others switch back and forth between entrepreneurship and working for an organization.

If you're ready to take your entrepreneurship exploration to the next level, SCORE offers small business mentoring.

Another key step to take is to talk with entrepreneurs about their experiences. What are their challenges and how do they handle them? What do they find are their most critically used skills? What advice can they offer?

There are many other considerations in addition to the viability of your business idea, your temperament, your skills, and your contacts that you'll want to think about before taking the leap into entrepreneurship. Two key considerations are money and family.

Money

Obviously you'll want to crunch the numbers carefully before quitting your day job. Many people start businesses in their off hours at first, as profits can be slow to trickle in.

Family

If you are part of a partnership and/or are a parent with children at home, be sure to think about and discuss the ramifications of being a business owner with them. What would need to change at home to make this work? What additional support might you need?

If you decide to start your own business, you don't have to go it alone. There are many support organizations for entrepreneurs to connect with and learn from.

If you're thinking about starting a business, what's holding you back? And if you own your own business, what do you most appreciate about that?

LinkedIn is Essential

The other day I met with a client who's a professional in his 40's who is not on LinkedIn. He admitted this fact rather sheepishly, and was not surprised when I "assigned" him the task of joining it and setting up his network.

It's time to get over your fear of transparency or procrastination or whatever it is that is keeping you from bothering to join LinkedIn! Even if you're not looking for a new job, get on there. Like it or not, LinkedIn has become an incredibly useful tool to build and maintain your contacts, and in today's climate, working your contacts is Job #1.

One caveat: don't join LinkedIn if you're not willing to commit. By commit I mean bothering to set up a complete profile, and by complete profile I mean writing compelling copy about yourself, getting recommendations from others and writing recommendations.

Like any other tool, LinkedIn is only helpful if you use it. Signing up and not showing up gets you the same results as paying for the gym membership and staying home to watch TV.

It's easy to prowl around on the site and learn about its features, but there are also more ways you can learn how best to take advantage of LinkedIn. Here are just a few:

• The official blog
• Linked Intelligence, the unofficial source for all things LinkedIn
• I'm on LinkedIn, Now What? It's a book by Jason Alba, and there's a blog, too.

So what are you waiting for?

I'd love to hear your story about how LinkedIn has helped you in your career.

How to Choose the Right Career Coach

I'm a life and career coach, and if you're looking for someone to coach you about something in your life or career, I may be a good match for you.

Then again, maybe not.

Coaching, as you can imagine, is not a one-size-fits-all service. That's why it's important to know before you start shopping for a coach what specifically you want. For example:

• Are you having trouble in your job search?
• Are you thinking about changing careers and have no idea where to start?
• Are you looking to advance to the next tier in your company?
• Do you know what you "should" be doing but just aren't getting it done?
• Are you wanting to take your business to the next level?

These are very different challenges. Most coaches will have great interest and experience with some of them and not as much interest or experience with others.

Good coaches will only accept clients who are looking for results the coach is adept at producing. No one benefits from a client-coach mismatch.

This article from Career Journal offers great advice about how to find the right career coach for you.

I'm best at helping people make important career decisions and create and follow through on a plan of action. Want to leave your organization? Propel your career forward? Decide on a career after college? Change some habits so that you'll be a better manager or a better parent away from work? Start a business? Call me and let's talk.

If you've tried everything in your job search and it's still not working, I've got someone in mind for you to talk with. If you need your resume re-written, I know just the person. If you need inside contacts in a particular industry or city, I suggest you find mentors.

When you're highly motivated to move forward toward your goals and are paired with the right coach, you'll be amazed at what you can accomplish in very short order.

Heather Mundell
Dream Big Coaching Services
www.dreambigcoaching.com
heather@dreambigcoaching.com

Three Reasons Why Now is a Good Time to Plan Your Next Career Move

They say there's no time like the present, but when depressing news about the economy surrounds us, it doesn't seem like a good time to look at changing jobs, let alone careers.

Many of us believe this, but I believe the opposite is true.

The perfect time to look at our next career move is now, when the media is clogged with bad news about jobs and the housing and financial markets.

Let me stress that I'm talking about looking and planning. Whether it's a good idea to actually change jobs, companies or careers depends on many factors that are individual to your situation.

 

Contemplating change when we feel insecure isn't easy. When the forecast is bad it's tempting to hole up in the proverbial root cellar and wait for the storm to blow over. You fret, you wonder when it will be safe to come out, and you're in no position to plan what you'll do next because you're underground.

Here are three reasons why now is a good time to plan your next career move:

1. It feels better to plan and strategize than it does to sit passively.

When there's an opportunity to feel better, take it.

2. The uncertain economic time creates a sense of urgency that can be a useful motivator.

Many of us are deadline-driven creatures who need a bit of fire to get us going onto something new. If you're anxious about your job or your organization's future, use that anxiety to push you into starting to think, research and plan about what might be next for you.

3. You'll find all kinds of people who are thinking what you're thinking.

Hey, everyone's thinking about what's next - what a great time to find like-minded people to join forces with. Form a group and share resources, ideas, contacts, and support one another in forming contingency or career development plans.

At the very least, networking in general is up right now, so if you're shy about getting back in touch with long-lost co-workers and managers, don't be. Everyone else is doing it!

I invite you to share how you're planning your next career move!

Heather Mundell
Dream Big Coaching Services
www.dreambigcoaching.com
heather@dreambigcoaching.com

Career Change One Baby Step at a Time

Photo by bobmarley753

If you're feeling overwhelmed thinking about a career change, you're not alone.

You may be feeling pressure to find the "perfect" job, the one that is absolutely better than what you're doing now, the one that is completely aligned with your purpose on this planet.

You may be assuming that there is probably only one or possibly two of these jobs in existence, so you better get cracking, and you better make the right decision.

This is all in addition to the pressure you may be feeling about changing jobs during a recession.

I'd like to offer an alternative view. What if the next job only has to be a step closer to your purpose on the planet? What kind of relief from the pressure could you experience then?

Career change usually is achieved through a series of steps, such as education, volunteering, part-time work, freelancing, and/or full-time employment.

I like what career and life coach Annemarie Segaric has to say on the topic of your next job in this article: "It doesn't have to be perfect."

Losing the pressure to choose perfectly does introduce a new pressure, however - to do something. My basic philosophy on doing something:

Dream big. Yet plan very small steps to get there.

Heather Mundell
Dream Big Coaching Services
www.dreambigcoaching.com
heather@dreambigcoaching.com

How to Get the Coolest Jobs

Alexandra Levit, author, career consultant and blogger, has written a cool book about cool jobs.

Even if you're already established in a career, aren't you curious about what it takes to be an art curator, image consultant, travel journalist or computational linguist? Don't you want to know what a computational  linguist is in the first place?

In How'd You Score That Gig? A Guide to the Coolest Jobs and How to Get Them, Alexandra describes what it takes to break into 60 different careers.

First you take a quiz (I love quizzes!) to figure out your "passion profile":

• The Adventurer
• The Creator
• The Data Head
• The Entrepreneur
• The Investigator
• The Networker
• The Nurturer

Each profile features 8-10 jobs. Alexandra describes what each job entails, how to enter the field, how competitive the industry is, and in some cases, how much it pays.

What I especially appreciate about this book are its focus on jobs you don't normally read about in career reference books and its up-to-date links to resources. I also enjoy the conversational writing style and the interviews with people who are currently doing the jobs.

Alexandra has obviously thoroughly researched each of these careers and doesn't hesitate to share the possible downsides. I like this too.

Whether you're just graduating from college or are considering a career change after a number of years on the job, this book is a helpful guide that you'll actually enjoy reading!

Heather Mundell
Dream Big Coaching Services
www.dreambigcoaching.com
heather@dreambigcoaching.com

Changing to Your Dream Job? Be Patient.

Photo by caspermoller

Career change takes a while.

That's my big declaration today. If you can dream it, do it...but please be patient.

I don't mean to be a bummer and rain on your parade. I really want you to go for that career change. I just want you to keep these things in mind (inspired by this piece on CareerJournal.com):

1. Every dream has its gestation period.

Whether your career change dream has more in common with a chipmunk (31 days to get a new one of these) or an elephant (it's 645 days before this one shows up), you will experience a delay between the moment you want a new career and the moment you get one.

2. Build on your existing skills and network of contacts.

No need to throw out the baby with the bath water. Leverage what you've done and who you know.

3. Plan in phases.

Keep your day job for as long as you can while you work on your career change on the side. This might mean volunteering on a nonprofit board, or taking on a couple of photography clients on the weekends, or studying for the GRE.

4. Fully explore what you're getting into.

We all have our ideas of what other people do, but how accurate are they? Is advertising really a glamorous industry? Is writing children's books really all about inspiring kids? Can you make a living wage as a horticulturist?

Talk to people who are doing what you want to do and grill them, ever so nicely. Find out the dark side of what you are dreaming about. Can you handle the dark side? Is it smaller than the sexy aspects?

5. Find ways to keep your dream alive during the gestation period.

You're going to feel impatient, and you're going to feel tempted to quit. Who or what will keep you going? Plan who you'll call when you're feeling discouraged. Create a visual reminder of your dream and put it on your wall (and look at it).

Changing careers is more like a marathon than a sprint, so it's wise to plan accordingly. This means pacing yourself, keeping your energy up, and understanding the peaks and valleys that are a natural part of the journey.

If you have completed a career change, I would love to hear your story in the comments!

Heather Mundell
Dream Big Coaching Services
www.dreambigcoaching.com
heather@dreambigcoaching.com