Career change after 40? Here are 5 key points to consider
A lot of older people must be considering career shifts, because Harvard Business Review just published two articles on the topic:
How to Make a Pivot in the Latter Half of Your Career
4 Strategies to Prepare for a Late-Career Shift
It makes sense. Many of us are working longer, staying healthier, and determined to remain engaged and productive. But the career you chose in your 20s or 30s may no longer be satisfying decades later.
It happened to me. I got my Ph.D. in clinical psychology and worked diligently to become an effective and successful psychotherapist. I was sure this was my lifetime’s work, and I actually envisioned myself dying in my therapist’s chair during a session with a client.
And then, one day in my late 40s, I was meeting with a new client and I found myself thinking, “I know you. I know what you’re going to say, I know what I’m going to say, I know how long this will take, and I know how it will turn out.” I was very troubled, because I knew my client deserved a therapist who was more engaged, and I knew I deserved work that was more engaging. To my great surprise, I realized it was time for me to consider a different career.
It's one thing to consider making a midlife career shift. It’s another thing to actually make it happen. The HBR articles offer several very good suggestions:
Identify how your skills are relevant to your new career. That includes both specific “hard” skills and more general “soft” skills. In my case, my skills included a deep understanding of what makes people tick and extensive expertise in how to help them make changes, which were highly relevant to my new career direction as a business leadership consultant. Soft skills might include your work ethic and your executive presence.
Build your multigenerational network. By all means, use your existing network, but also seek out early and mid-career professionals. They’ll have useful information on how to enter your new industry and can serve as “reverse mentors.”
Focus on how you continuously learn and grow. It’s particularly important to demonstrate your eagerness to keep up with technological innovations.
Own your age unapologetically. Age discrimination is real. But it’s especially toxic when it’s inside your own head. When I started my MBA program at age 48, I talked to one of my professors about my fear that no one would hire a 50-year-old newly minted MBA. He replied, “Gail, there are people who won’t hire you because you’re a woman. There are people who won’t hire you because you’re Jewish. And there are people who won’t hire you because you’re 50 years old. Those are stupid people and you don’t want to work for them.” It was a great answer and it enabled me to move forward and land a great consulting job before I had completed the program.
Prepare for the tough question. You’ll hear, “But you haven’t actually done this before, have you?” Don’t ever admit that. Instead, show how your well-established skills and experience are relevant and valuable in your new role. In my years as a therapist, I had worked with plenty of senior business leaders on work-related issues. I had consulted to organizations on managing transitions and building their culture. Practice how you’ll answer this question because you will almost certainly get it.
Almost everyone I know who has changed careers in midlife has found it to be a transformative and rejuvenating experience. For sure, it’s scary. Six months into my new job, I was crying at my dinner table because I felt so overwhelmed and incompetent. I had been successful and respected in my previous life. Why on earth had I messed up my life like this? And then I realized — I had made a choice. I could be bored or I could be scared. I had chosen scared.
And now, 20 years into my second career, I am no longer scared and I’m certainly not bored.
If you’d like to talk about making a midlife career change, contact me at ggolden@gailgoldenconsulting.com
