Five sticking points for career changers and how to negotiate them
Come to me for career coaching, and I'll promise you two things.
A structured process for identifying and exploring your options and an entirely unpredictable outcome.
The coaching process throws loads of things up in the air, including your identity, aims, intentions, and assumptions. And honestly, we can never predict how these things are going to land.
Part of my job is to pilot you through the turbulent patches en route to a career that you may be always wanted or never imagined possible.
We may not know where you'll land until you get there. But predicting places where you're likely to get stuck along the way, that we can do.
When your career change hits one of these rough patches, here's why and what to do about it.
Hamster Head Square
Here is a discombobulating trap that you can fall into it at any stage. You get stuck doing loop de loop—your overloaded brain whirs like a hyperactive hamster on a wheel.
You're doing laps of Hamster Head Square if:
You've done every online career test ever invented to try to find your perfect match
You've gathered masses of 'data,' but none of it leads anywhere
You're caught in a spin cycle of chaotic, conflicting ideas that you can't begin to untangle on your own
You feel like screaming and running in circles
Escape Hamster Head Square
You're a smart human. If you were going to work out your next career move on your own, you'd have done it by now!
Stop overthinking everything and taking refuge in research. Get out of your head and share your ideas and anxieties with actual humans.
Take this antidote for analysis paralysis
Assumption Avenue
Assumption Avenue is a narrow, soul-sapping zone built on untested ideas fuelled by fear and uncertainty.
You're living on Assumption Avenue if you believe that:
You'd never make a living in that new career you're keen to try
You know how glamorous or tedious your career ideas are without doing any real-world research
Your competitors for great jobs are more capable and better connected than you are
You've no chance of breaking into a completely new field without qualifications and experience
You'll never crack that mysterious hidden job market
Exit Assumption Avenue
You need help to challenge these scary, undermining assumptions that can come with career change territory. Start by noting how often you tell yourself 'never,' 'no way,' or 'if only.'
Stare down career change assumptions
Crack the hidden job market
Rethink 'no experience, no chance.'
Procrastination Place
It can be tough to figure out why you're trapped in this murky, mysterious zone. You've got a plan and a map. You're motivated to move, but you just can't get going. What's holding you back?
You're spinning your wheels on Procrastination Place if you're:
Lurking at the edge of your comfort zone looking for the courage to quit it
Listening to your inner critic telling you how rubbish you are and how dangerous it is 'out there'
Lacking a cheer squad or a trusted other to counter your inner critic and keep you accountable
Quit Procrastination Place
Start taking small but significant steps into the great unknown. Build momentum by being accountable.
If you're disappearing down digital rabbit holes day after day, try using a time-keeping tool. The Pomodoro Technique or another time management app may help you limit your online excursions and carve out time for real-world adventures.
Swap going it alone for savvy support
Follow these steps for quitting your comfort zone
Groundhog Rd
You want to change, but you're getting more of the same. Your career change project feels like a scene from Groundhog Day.
You're reliving your old life on Groundhog Rd if:
You know you're sabotaging yourself, and you don't know what to change
You 'cut and run' and replace one unsuitable job with another just like it
You want to change, but you keep looking at jobs that are pretty much the same as you're doing now
You suspect your fate is mostly fixed and finite with limited potential for change
Get off Groundhog Rd
Do some digging. Look for unhelpful patterns. Which habitual ways of thinking and acting aren't serving you well? How can you change them? Who can help you?
Explore the 4 tendencies – how might your 'tendency' condition your behaviour?
Choice Court
A deluge or a shortage of career change ideas can bring you undone here. Too few options and you feel like you're stuck on the starter's block. Too many, and you're heading to Hamster Head Square.
You're caught in Choice Court if:
You're dazzled - brilliant ideas just pop up everywhere. Your career ideas list is exploding
You're stuck and don't have a clue. Your 'list' is a blank canvas – so where are the ideas hiding?
You're wondering if you should give up and stay put
You're on the verge of doing what other people tell you is 'right for you.'
Quit Choice Court
Got a gazillion ideas? Sort them out
Got nothing? Get curious
Waiting for a career change epiphany? Do this instead
Take the rough with the smooth
Negotiating speed bumps and blind alleys is part of making a successful career change. What you learn in sticky or turbulent places can shape your transition as much or more than what you discover during stretches of smooth sailing.
Whether or not your career change is currently in a rough patch, a sound way to progress is to 'Get curious, talk to people, and try stuff.'
Regular readers of my blog will recognise this advice as vintage me. In this instance, though, I've extracted it from Designer Bill Burnett's excellent TEDX Talk, '5 steps to designing the life you want.'
Need help to unstick your career change? Book a chat.
By Jo Green, Career Change Coach
I know that when you find what you love, heart and soul, your life changes. I work every day with people who are reshaping their current careers, starting new enterprises or searching for a new direction. Basically I help people who don’t like their job to figure out what to do instead!
As a Careershifters and Firework Advanced Certified Coach and experienced career changer myself, I can help you figure out what fulfilling work looks like for you.
