Career Pivot
Wanting to leave is not the same as knowing where to go
Many people who feel they need a new career need a different manager, team, city or workload instead, and some really do need a different kind of work. This session helps each participant tell which it is, using their own examples rather than a quiz, and decide what to do next.
Explore this page6 sections
The wish to switch careers is often a symptom, and the cause is somewhere else.
A person who is tired, underpaid, stuck under a difficult manager or bored by a project often concludes that the whole career is wrong. Sometimes that is true. Often a move to another team, another employer, a conversation about workload or a few months of rest would remove most of the feeling, at a fraction of the cost of starting over.
The opposite mistake is also common: staying for years in work that no longer fits because leaving feels too large to think about. A decision made slowly and on purpose is better than either a sudden resignation or a long drift.
This session is not here to push anybody towards a switch, or away from one. It is a structured way to find out which problem you actually have.
The questions the session works through
34 topics across 7 areas. Seven parts, starting with what is wrong and ending with what to do this month.
What Exactly Is WrongWriting it down in specific terms.5
- The tasks you dread, and the tasks you do not mind
- Which days of the last month felt worth it, and why
- Whether the dread is about the work, the people or the pace
- What you would miss if you left tomorrow
- What you would not miss at all
'I hate my job' is too large to act on. The examples underneath it are what can be tested.
Work, Workplace or LifeThree places the problem can sit.5
A change of career fixes only the first of these. If the cause is the second or the third, a switch can leave you in the same state with a new job title and a lower salary.
- The work itself: the kind of tasks and problems you spend days on
- The workplace: manager, team, culture, pay, growth, hours
- The life around it: health, family, money, commute, rest
- Which of these would change if you changed role, and which would follow you
- Cheaper fixes to try first: another team, another employer, a conversation
What You Are Moving TowardA reason that is more than an escape.5
- What you would want to spend most of your days doing
- What kind of problems you enjoy, in your own words
- What you want from the work: money, learning, stability, independence, meaning
- Which of those you would trade away, and for how long
- Two or three roles that seem to fit, found by looking at real job descriptions
If the only reason is that you want to leave, the switch has no direction yet. That is a normal place to be, and it is worth saying so.
What a Switch CostsMoney, seniority, time and energy.5
The cost depends heavily on the field, the employer and your own situation, so the session does not offer figures. It helps each person work out their own, using real postings and conversations with people who have moved.
- A possible drop in pay, and how long you could manage it
- A possible drop in seniority, and how you would feel about it
- Months of evening and weekend effort for a course, a project or a search
- Fixed commitments: rent, EMIs, fees, dependants
- What the people at home think, asked before the decision rather than after
Three Honest OptionsStay, adjust, or switch.5
- Stay and accept the trade, knowing what you are accepting
- Adjust: another team, another employer, different hours, a bigger or smaller role
- Switch: a different function, industry or kind of work
- Which option you would choose if you could not fail
- Which option you would choose if the money stayed the same
People Who Have MovedInformation that does not come from job portals.5
- Finding two or three people who made a similar move
- What to ask them, and what not to ask
- What they would do differently
- How to ask a stranger for fifteen minutes politely
- Treating one person's story as one story
A Small Next Step and a DateDecision by experiment, not by resignation.4
- One cheap test that gives you real information this month
- Who you will talk to, and by when
- A date to review the question again
- What would make you say yes, and what would make you say no
A decision with a review date is easier to make than one that has to be permanent.
Common mistakes when deciding
- Treating one bad quarter as a verdict on the whole career
- Choosing a destination because it looks good from outside
- Choosing nothing, for years, because choosing feels risky
- Not telling the people who will be affected until it is decided
- Spending on a course before testing the direction
- Resigning to force the decision
What participants leave with
- A written account of what is wrong, with examples
- A view on stay, adjust or switch
- A short list of roles to look into, if switching
- One small test to run this month
- A review date
How the session runs
A facilitator walks through the questions with short exercises that participants do on paper. One or two people who have changed careers, and one who decided to stay after thinking about it, describe how they decided. The rest of the time goes to small-group conversation about each person's own situation. Evening or weekend sessions, in person or online. Nobody is selling a course or a coaching package.
What your students leave with
- A plain statement of what is wrong, separated from what you assume is wrong
- A view on whether the problem sits in the work, the workplace or the life around it
- A short list of what you would want from the next stretch of work
- A clearer sense of what a move would cost in money, time and seniority
- A cheap first step to try before any large decision
- A date to decide again, so the question does not drift for years
Scheduled sessions
Nothing scheduled yet
Sessions are arranged with a college once a date is agreed. Ask us and we will find the right person for it.
A student rather than a college? See what is coming up, or ask your placement team to host this.
Know which problem you have before you pick the fix.
Tell us who your students are and what stage they are at. Sessions are free for participants.