Mid-Career Health & possibility
January is the time when your inbox fill up with ads and notes about physical health. What about your Career Health?
Perhaps you’ve made your 2023 personal resolution but what’s your aligned career vision for the next 6-12 months?
When’s the last time you asked what is possible?
What’s possible when you have been working for over 10 or 15 years?
What is possible when your resume could stretch to 5 pages?
Did you have jealous pangs when you saw your coworker take a new role?
Regardless of what your imposter syndrome voice has been telling you, your career options are plentiful today. Even in a downturn, companies still need experienced, high performing leaders. The key is to get ahead of a layoff or personal emergency when career decisions are knee jerk by pausing and asking what your career vitals are and where you want them to but.
Here are options I explore with my Coaching Clients:
//Career Plan 2.0- A very modern balanced path is to preemptively avoid burnout by changing things up drastically. A wonderful example of this is New Zealand Prime Minster Ardern announcing that she is thoughtfully stepping down as she said “there isn’t enough in the tank” for the role. I’d like to give her and other clients a standing ovation for ending on a high note with mindfulness and a succession plan in the works. This is very hard to do but always an option with planning.
//Level up for Legacy- Find a new career pathway that’s tandem to your current role, but with more impact. This can be done by networking to find the biggest, most impactful role in your field when you have the energy and experience mid-career. This can look like finding a role with a bigger purpose, team, title, budget to leave a legacy for your industry or firm. Often this requires leaving your current role if you aren’t seen as a ‘big player.’ The rewards are endless here.
//More is More path - Wendy Euler, who goes by @goodbyecroptop on social media has made a career of mid life resurgence doing what she loves but for 50+. She is using her contacts, relationships and experience to have a strong career. She is ‘pro-aging’ with all of the experience and knowledge under your belt, it’s hard to dismiss how efficient you can be when you’ve ‘been there done that’ already. Mistakes lesson and you can hit your stride.
// Sabbatical- Take a break to rethink, relearn and find joy. write, travel, staycation and complete that pottery course. This time is imperative to slow down and rest. For more on why pausing is key, read Do/Pause. Give this break an end date to make a decision to return to your current role or find another. Many companies offer short and long term leaves for associates with tenue. If it’s not in your handbook, ask. *Maternity, paternity or caregiver leaves do not count!
//Stay and side hustle- If you like to test out theories and try on new ideas, create that side business. Make sure you tell your current employer as necessary in their policies. Designing your Life authors and professors make a case to ‘try before you buy’ a new career. Just because you love art doesn’t mean it should be part of your job. Start with your interests and make a play to grow it as a career or go back through your resume and find a time you were at a peak work experience and break that down. These are all clues to career health.
Here are a few twists on the initial prompts:
What is possible to maximize your career health?
What’s possible with your experience?
What do you know about your career and what do you want more of for the next phase?
How can you be the best version of yourself at work, for your own health?
