Tips on Reinventng Yourself for a Career Switch

When it came to making a career change, Susan Eckert was one career coach who ended up taking her own advice. Two Christmases ago she received a camera as a gift, which got her thinking of how she had always wanted to be an artist. That and, "Here I am telling other people to follow what they love, and I wasn't doing it," she said.

Over the next year Eckert, 40, followed the career transition guidelines she had given others, and is now proprietor of LI Art Photography in Brightwaters, New York.

These days many midlife professionals are looking to switch careers, some for Eckert's reason, to find more fulfillment. Others, such as those in media and financial services, are seeing the game rules in their industries change, leading to more uncertainty and fewer opportunities.

And in the wake of the financial meltdown, Barbara Frankel, a career coach in North Hills and Manhattan, said she's been seeing a number of Wall Streeters, for whom money is a key career driver, questioning their compensation potential and looking to move in more of an entrepreneurial direction.

Donna Galan, vice president and career consultant in the Melville office of Lee Hecht Harrison, a career-transition firm that offers outplacement services, said she, too, has been hearing clients express interest in consulting, starting a business or buying a franchise, but for a certain number "when it comes right down to it, they back off and prefer the shelter or security of being an employee."

For those truly committed to a career change, coaches offer some of their best tips for planning and executing the transition.

Getting started

Hating your job does not necessarily mean you need a whole career change, said Eckert. First determine whether all you need is to tweak what you're doing now, such as switch employers or industry. She tells of one project manager she coached who found all she had to do was switch from health care to nonprofit work.

To know what would be a good match, careerwise, you need to do self-assessment: identify your own interests, personality traits and preferred work environment, said Eckert. Do you dislike the idea of office work and prefer being out in the field? Do you prefer working alone, cringing at the thought of sitting on a team and discussing how to collaborate? For a very basic self-assessment, she has sent people to PersonalityPage.com.

Consider, also, your "motivational skills," said Frankel. Those are things you're good at and enjoy doing. She tells of one client in sales who is finding a mismatch between the skills she has to perform and her own introverted, data-oriented nature.

Determine, too, your "personal realities," said Frankel, such as income and work/life needs.

When you uncover a potential career, you have to verify what you think it's like. That's "uncovering the reality," said Galan. Check with people doing the work. Ask what their day is like, what they do, the high and low points. Ask if you can shadow them for a day. You may guess at what a job is like, or look to turn a hobby into a new career, she said. But some are disappointed to find out that there is a big difference, for instance, between "taking a yoga class and being a yoga instructor," Galan said.

Staying focused

Don't target a new career based only on what jobs seem to be "hot" at the moment, and don't be unwilling to do the introspective work to help you see to what degree they are a good match, said Frankel.

Avoid launching a job search without planning, learning about the field and building relationships, said Eckert. She added that she has seen people revise their resumes, send them to employers in the new field and then get discouraged when they get no responses. You have to take time to repackage yourself so it's obvious to an employer where you fit in, not expect them to figure out how your skills can transfer, she said.

Don't look at the switch as one gigantic leap, said Eckert, which can paralyze some people. Instead, break things down into small, doable steps, she said, that you chip away at regularly so as to maintain momentum.

Avoid making decisions based on incomplete information, said Galan. The information-gathering process can be messy and produce displeasing news, perhaps related to salary, education or skills required for the new career. But don't give up without checking and double-checking the accuracy, she said. That's why it's helpful to join professional associations and networking groups so you can get a variety of views. As she put it, "Knowledge is power."

Executing a change

Here's what Eckert said she's done to move from being a coach to a professional photographer: attended local Meet Up.com groups for photographers; took distance learning classes in photography; found mentors in the field; read publications to learn the most up-to-date issues and teciques. This is not an overnight process, she said. You have to "connect with people who are doing it."

To help with this, look to special-interest groups on Linked In.com, which is not just for connecting with individuals, said Galan. Just click on "groups" to find a directory of alumni, corporate, networking groups you can search and join.

You may need to take a "bridge job," said Frankel. That means leveraging what you do now to get a foot in the door, so you can make another switch once you're perceived as an industry insider. If you're a Web developer in financial services who wants to get into health care marketing, you might look for a Web job in a health care organization and next work on getting into a marketing role.