Archive for Career Changes
Finding a Career
Posted by: | CommentsFinding a career can be time consuming, formidable, and just downright frustrating.
If you’re just entering college, you have dozens and dozens – if not hundreds — of majors to choose from. Of course you want to make the perfect choice here. After all, you’re talking about the rest of your working life, right?
Maybe you’re a recent victim of economic woes and are fresh out of a job due to downsizing or even company closure. You might be frustrated with the career field you’re in and want something new. Worse, the field you’re in may be becoming obsolete, making a new job even harder to find.
Whatever the reason, finding a career that works for you is not a task to be taken lightly.
Where to Look
To get you started immediately on your search, career websites are plentiful and offer career assessment tests to help you identify careers that may be suitable to you based upon your skills, abilities, interests and hobbies.
Even if you’ve taken job assessment tests in years past, take them again. Maybe the results will be the same, but maybe you’ve changed and new career paths will be brought to your attention. Maybe new careers have sprung up over the past few years – careers you hadn’t heard of, but might be just the career for you.
Here’s one I recommend that is free and very good because it gives you a detailed report, the Keirsey Temparment Sorter 2.
The Hottest Jobs
But no matter what your interests are at this moment, be sure to look at the fastest growing careers.
As technology and population demographics change, so do the careers in demand. Some of the top careers right now are computer related, for obvious reasons in our high-tech world. But as you contemplate the condition of our society, would it surprise you to know some of the fastest growing careers are personal financial advisors, substance abuse counselors, forensic science techs, mental health counselors and marriage counselors?
These top careers mean lots of job opportunities, lots of variety in the jobs offered, quicker advancement due to the sheer number of jobs, greater relocation options, and possibly more competitive salaries.
But I Need a Job Now…
If you don’t need additional training to enter the career of your choice right now, or if you need a job to tide you over while you get further career training and education, job search websites are waiting for you. Some of the more popular sites you’ve probably heard of: monster.com, hotjobs.com, and careerbuilder.com. These job search websites are national and can help you locate a job in a particular field, a particular city, or both.
But if you’re content living where you are right now, don’t forget to look for local career job search sites. Jobing.com, for example, has many regional sections to make finding a career in your own hometown accessible.
For the executive looking for new employment, several websites offer strictly executive job searches for positions paying no less than $100,000 per year.
Another advent of our high-tech, web-driven society is the growth of online jobs. More and more companies offer full work-at-home jobs or a split between time in the office and time working from home. You can even find technical support jobs you do from the comfort of your own home – and pajamas, if you choose.
Career Change Advice
Posted by: | CommentsLooking for some solid career change advice?
It wasn’t all that long ago that a man got a job and worked for that same company for 20, 30, even 50 years in some cases.
But times have changed and now you’re facing a career change crisis? This can happen at any age and even right after college. It’s startling when it happens after spending over 10 years in your career. It’s even worse when it’s because of a shift in the economy!
Sometimes a career change is spurred by technological changes making some jobs obsolete. In the printing industry, for example, many paste-up and plate-burning jobs are gone forever due to the advent of “direct to plate” technology where the print job goes from the computer directly to the printing plate. In manufacturing, robotics advancements are eliminating numerous “people” jobs.
The other side to those examples, however, is that careers in computer technology and robotics are growing rapidly. Unfortunately, you probably can’t go from the old job of manufacturing the parts by hand to building the robots to do it for you without several years of further education.
Are You Stuck?
Maybe your desire for career change is because you feel stuck or lack a sense of accomplishment in your current field. Do you wonder if a career change is right for you?
Before telling your boss you quit and you find yourself without a job or an income, take a breath, consult with a career coach, and plan out your next move with some solid career change advice. In fact, leaving any job right now is risky. Those that find themselves unemployed often end up with less pay and statistic show it can take 10 years of more to get to the income they had before the layoff.
Some important questions to ask yourself as you look at a new career option:
- What skills do you have now?
- What careers interest you?
- What personal preferences do you have in regards to working with people? Do you like people? Do you like variety or predictability?
- What lifestyle do you want or need? Will this affect your choice of career?
- What is job growth and availability for your new career?
- If you’re relocating, are jobs available in the new area?
- Do you have savings to fall back on while you go to school full time?
- Where possible, have you tried part time or volunteer work in your prospective field?
Career Change Advice
Take some career assessment tests and talk with your career coach to ensure you’re on the right path with achievable, realistic goals.
Some other scenarios… Maybe no one has given you a proper performance review with clear goals, or no one has discussed your future with you or told you how to advance. All these things can make a person feel “stuck”.
Sometimes the grass isn’t greener on the other side.
Over the years I was able to keep valuable employees by finding out what goals they had or what they felt they struggled in and was able to help them get back on track.
I wasn’t able to do that with everyone, but what if you had a career advocate, someone you could discuss things with and brainstorm ideas? Could you come up with a clear plan for getting feedback from your supervisors or getting promoted if you had some good career change advice? Maybe. There are ways to find out. More on that in another post.
The “Career Change” Resume
So now that you’ve decided on your new career, taken classes, received your certifications, how you get employers to look at your resume over those of candidates with direct experience?
A “career change” resume.
Resumes can be created in several formats: chronological, targeted, combination. But the style you’ll want for your career change resume is the functional style resume.
When writing your functional resume, you’ll take the skills and experience from your previous career and show how they will benefit your prospective company.
Instead of showing off your past, you’re showing off your future. As a manager that has looked at many resume’s I think career changes are exciting for most people and managers look closely at the “why’s” of career change. Make it positive and real.
A “career change” cover letter is a must, too. Here is some career change resume advice:
* Be honest. Don’t try to hide that you don’t have direct experience. Be the first to call it out, but then show them why you are indirectly experienced.
* Show how you can help them, not how they can help you
* Show how your past experience will help their company. Don’t expect them to connect the dots on their own.
Because changing careers is an emotional event, take the time to plan and map out your change, if your situation permits. And by all means, Contact Us. We’re here to help.
