How to change career in your 20s
Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Pexels
Thinking about making a career change in your 20s? You're not alone — and you're not behind. Here's what I learned from doing it twice, plus the tips I wish someone had given me.
I changed careers at 24 and again at 27, so when it comes to navigating that particular existential panic, I've been there — twice.
Here's my story (or skip ahead for those tips).
Like a lot of people, I stumbled into my degree rather than choosing it. Biology was my favourite subject at school, and my parents were firm believers that university was simply what you did after school, so — off I went. Three years later, armed with a biology degree plus zero desire and fewer clues about what to do with it, I did what many of us do: I ‘fell’ into something.
That ‘something’ was relocation. I'd just moved to London and found myself helping relocated corporate managers find houses in the city. Think ‘giving directions’ while quietly checking Google Maps yourself! I made some great friends, but I knew almost immediately that relocation wasn't for me.
I’d lie awake at 2am:
Having no idea what else I could do in my career
Fretting that I didn’t have enough experience to move to something new
Wondering who the hell would want to hire me
Worrying about what my parents would say
Thinking ‘Here I go AGAIN, stressing about my career’
I was deep in one of those ‘I hate my job, and I don't know what to do with my life’ spirals, when the turning point arrived. It was triggered by a late-night conversation with a housemate who worked in marketing recruitment. She mentioned ‘market research’.
It’s odd to imagine this now, but this was the pre-internet-at-our-fingertips era. So, figuring out what market research even was meant after-work treks to the local internet café.
The more I read, the more I thought, ‘I did plenty of statistics in my degree —I could do this.’ I threw myself into a gruelling application process for a place in a graduate training scheme … and got in. Did I stop to ask whether going into market research was the right move? I did not. Did I speak to anyone who worked in market research? I did not. I just wanted out of a job that wasn’t working.
And that’s how I learned my first major lesson about career change: don't make big career change decisions based on a Google search (or an AI deep dive, for that matter). Because my actual job as the most junior person in the team was not nearly as absorbing, meaningful or creative as I’d imagined.
My parents told me to stick it out. I tried. But the moment they left for a three-week trip to India — completely unreachable — I felt something loosen. A small sneaky sense that I could break free. I started quietly applying for roles. I half-expected to be laughed out of interviews and was genuinely shocked when recruiters told me I had enough experience to move.
I landed a role at an internal market research agency attached to a newspaper company. My boss was brilliant; my projects came with a healthy sprinkling of creativity and autonomy and felt more like sociology than marketing. This was exactly the confidence-building shift I needed.
24 year old Jo on a trip to suss out Sydney
Then, at 26, I upended everything and moved to Australia — because why not?
Sitting in a focus group in Sydney, listening to people debate where the bubbles should sit on a wine label, something in me snapped. A startlingly loud voice in my head yelled, ‘Jo, you don't care a fig about the bubbles! You need to do something that really matters.’
So, there I was again, freaking out about my career, in a new country, with no safety net.
This time though, I worked with a career coach — and that changed everything. She helped me get beneath the surface of what ‘meaningful’ meant for me. Then she suggested I apply my research and marketing skills in the not-for-profit sector. I landed a 6-month contract, which gave me time to get a sense of the sector and some solid experience under my belt.
The result? I began my next chapter in my career far savvier and more self-aware. Not perfect self-awareness; I still had lots to learn about using my strengths — but I’d come a long way. I stayed in the not-for-profit sector for over 7 years, so I’d got something right with that shift!
Looking back, I can trace the double-stranded thread connecting my career changes. I thrived in roles that combined my deep curiosity about human behaviour with the chance to manage significant projects. Both these things are at the heart of the coaching work I now do and the way I run my business.
I won't pretend those transitions were graceful. They were messy and stressful, and I wish I could go back and reassure younger me that it would all make sense eventually. But I'm genuinely grateful for every bit of it — because those experiences gave me something no textbook ever could: a real, lived understanding of what career change feels like from the inside: the fear, the uncertainty, and the false starts. And then there’s the happenstance that shows up looking like lucky breaks and all the other unpredictable adventures until we come out on the other side.
So how do you change career in your 20s?
Check the stats - You're not alone — and you're right on cue
Australians, on average, have 3–7 careers in their lifetimes. If you're thinking about making a change, you’re probably … well … just like the rest of us. What’s more, under 25s spend just 1 year and 8 months in a job. Think about this for a minute, and you’ll see it makes perfect sense. Changing your ‘early career mind’ isn’t any kind of failure. You’re simply updating your thinking in the light of better information and some seriously formative experience.
Plus, your 20s are the lowest-risk years to do it. You’ve got fewer financial commitments, more energy, and plenty of time to reset a ‘dud’ turn. Even the messiest path isn't a failure — it's just data. Every dud turn or dead end tells you something pricelessly practical about yourself.
Know your ‘why’ before you chase the ‘what’
The temptation can be tough to resist, but don’t move just to escape a bad situation. Think ‘frying pans and fires’: a desperate leap is likely to land you somewhere equally wrong, just with a different job title.
Get clear on what you're running toward, not just what you're running from. Reflect on your strengths. They tend to show up earlier and in stranger places than you might think, including jobs that feel like dud turns.
Work out what energises you versus what drains you. Pay attention to activities that drop you in the flow zone: that place where you’re so absorbed and engaged that you lose track of time doing something you’d probably happily do for free.
7 Ways to know you’re in flow —and how this helps you change careers.
Accept your changing values
After years of semi-impoverished study, our priorities are often simple: get a job, earn money, prove ourselves. That's completely valid. But for many of us, somewhere in our mid-to-late 20s, something shifts. That salary, which once felt like an exciting and satisfying end in itself, now feels less so. You want to care more about how you earn it. You want to link it to something more impactful. You start asking ‘why’ more than ‘how much.’
This isn't you being ungrateful or unrealistic. It's you growing up. These questions are invaluable career clues — if you pay attention to them.
Take time to get clear on what genuinely matters to you now. Chances are, it’s not what mattered to fresh-from-study, early-20s (or younger) you. What do you value now? Is it impact? Creativity? Autonomy? Working with people? Being part of something bigger than yourself? Your values are your compass. Have a go at finding your true north, before you start googling job titles.
Purpose-driven careers: Where to look, how to land one.
Do real-world research
Disappearing down Google rabbit holes and doing AI deep dives are both fine, just don’t choose or change your career based on what you discover there. The day-to-day, week-in-week-out reality of any role in any field is unlikely to match its online profile. Chances are it’ll be more complex, more nuanced and less glamorous.
Real-world conversations will set you straight on the good, great, gruesome and the ‘OMG I never would have thought that’ aspects of careers you’re curious to explore. Talk to people doing the work you think you want to do — ask them what a Friday afternoon really looks like, what they wish they'd known when they started, what they love about the work, and about the awkward, unlovable bits. Gather the solid data that’ll help you decide if that role or field is or isn’t for you.
How to have confident career change conversations
Test the waters
You don't need to have everything figured out and factored in before taking a giant step. Before you commit and quit your ‘old’ job, take small steps towards your next one: volunteer, start a side project, do a spot of freelancing, shadow someone in your target field.
These bet-hedging shifts will build your confidence by showing that your current skills are way more transferable than you think. They’ll prove that you don’t have to start from zero in (or outside) your head just because your job title is changing. Plus, the experience you gain and the grit and flexibility you’re demonstrating will deliver great career currency at your next job interview.
Small steps to move your career change forward.
And speaking of grit and flexibility….
Stay curious and get comfortable with uncertainty
OK, just to be clear, AI isn't coming for everyone's job, but it is changing almost every job. It’s automating tasks that used to take days. It’s restructuring roles and generating whole new fields. In a world of warp-speed change, being someone who isn't paralysed by uncertainty, knows their strengths, and stays curious isn't just useful. It's essential. Your 20s are the perfect time to develop those mental muscles.
Brainy ways to curb career change uncertainty.
Hone your AI-proof skills
No matter how startlingly clever AI gets, its giant, data-loving robot brain will never be as creative or emotionally and socially intelligent as your human one. Nor will it ever be as physically dextrous or as adept at ethical decision-making as you can be. And nuance and context will always elude its steely grasp.
And beyond AI, these are the skills that make most jobs meaningful. Most humans who approach work and life with a flexible mindset find that, with experience and time, these skills increase naturally. But why not get ahead of the game by consciously practising them right now?
This is also why distinguishing between tasks and jobs is so important. AI can take over certain tasks, but it can’t replace the full scope of a job that requires complex, interpersonal, and creative skills.
On that basis, the jobs AI is least likely to replace in the foreseeable future are those requiring physical presence (healthcare, trades), deep human relationships (therapy, coaching, executive sales), or high-stakes judgment with legal accountability (senior law, medicine, executive leadership).
Grow your AI smarts
If there’s one AI-proofing skill set you need to develop, it's this: the curiosity, tenacity and desire to keep learning and adapting to warp-speed changes in whatever career you’re currently in. As an innovation strategist and author, Shawn Kanungo puts it,
‘A nurse practitioner who keeps up with AI diagnostic tools is safer than one who does not. A plumber who figures out AI-powered customer acquisition becomes a local monopoly. A corporate lawyer who understands AI governance is the one getting the biggest cases.’
Source: The 10 Highest-Paying AI-Proof Careers of 2026
In the unlikely event that, as a 20-something, you’re not already using AI for work and play, the Internet is awash with courses, including this one: Google AI Essentials.
As a career changer, explore how AI is being used in the industry you want to move into and start using those tools at home. When it comes to your next job interview, you’ll be set to show that game-changing adaptability employers want to see.
Get someone in your corner
Changing careers from inside your head is hard. Even if you’ve got Google and your best AI buddy onside, enlist some human support: a coach, mentor, or trusted friend. They’ll help you see your blind spots, broaden your idea of what’s possible, and open doors to contacts and opportunities you wouldn't find on your own.
They also cheer you on, buoy you up when things get crunchy, and hold you accountable for the progress you’ve committed to making.
7 Ways support can help you change careers.
Up for a twenty-something career change? I can help.
Hi, I’m Jo Green, a Career Change Coach.
I help thoughtful professionals who feel stuck or unfulfilled in their work find a clearer direction and move into work that feels meaningful and aligned with who they are.
Since 2016 I’ve supported hundreds of people to reshape their careers – whether that means changing roles, starting something new, or finding work that contributes more positively to people or the planet.
If you're thinking about a career change and want structured support, you can learn more about my career change coaching here.
Or you’re welcome to book a free 20-minute consultation to talk about where you’re at and whether coaching could help.
Not sure it's time for coaching yet?
I can send you three questions to ask yourself before you change careers — so you leap towards the right thing, not just away from the wrong one. Free, and it takes about one quiet coffee to work through. Sign up here to get the free guide (and I'll send occasional career tips in my newsletter).
