Want a career change? Don’t panic
You’ve had enough of your job. You’ve had enough of your industry, so much so that you’ve decided to change careers and pursue a path that’s inspiring, motivating and more rewarding.
It can be stressful making such a major decision, even if you know what you want and will be happier.
What’s important when making a career change is planning and avoiding panic. This will make your transition super smooth.
It’s key to avoid acting out of desperation. If you move too quickly, you may find yourself at the same place you started, which is in a(nother) position that isn’t perfect.
This expert article provides tips on how to change careers in a calm, orderly fashion.
Articulate your goals
Our expert recruiters regularly talk to jobseekers who want change but aren’t quite ready for it. To help you prepare, it’s important to:
- articulate your goals
- highlight your achievements
- refine your thinking.
This will make you more confident and better positioned to go for it.
Sort out your career portfolio
Start by updating your resume and LinkedIn profile. This will give you a solid base to work from when you tailor your resume to each position you apply for.
In your resume and LinkedIn profile, emphasise your unique value. Also emphasise the skills you can transfer to your new world.
Avoid general, unsubstantiated statements. Pack a punch by proving your claims with facts, figures and examples.
Don’t just say, in other words, you managed a large, successful project. Say something like this: I managed a large project that increased efficiency by 50 per cent and saved my company $20,000 a year by reducing the number of steps required to process orders in half.
These expert articles will help you focus:
Boost your interview skills
You may not have been interviewed for a loooong time. No need to panic. Boost your skills with research … and practice so you shine during interview.
These expert articles will back you:
- Strengthen your interview skills today
- Be a star with star techniques (especially if you’re going for a role in government)
- Scored an interview? Steps for staying calm
Clean up your social media profile
Prospective employers (and recruiters) check online for evidence of your presentation and personality. This means it’s important to tidy your social media profile. This doesn’t mean creating an online presence that isn’t truly you or recreating your social media profile so it’s flat and boring. It does, however, mean removing anything that might reflect badly on you.
This expert article will help you gain perspective on what this means.
Think about cultural fit
To successfully transition to a new career, reality check you’re the right cultural fit. More employers are concentrating on culture fit and culture add when recruiting, with good reason.
First, it’s expensive to recruit so employers want to get it right. They want to avoid hiring someone who won’t be comfortable in their work environment.
Second, employers know that they can easily train on hard skills (tasks and knowledge). Training on soft skills (personality type) is more challenging.
Learn more about cultural fit:
Think about culture add from an employers’ perspective. This will broaden your horizons.
Talk to a recruiter
Professional recruiters who care are on hand to support jobseekers wanting to change careers. They do so with:
- quality advice on ‘all things’ recruitment
- great ideas for thinking laterally about possibilities
- support with resume writing and interview techniques
- help negotiating the best deal (including terms and conditions)
- views on whether to take the first job offer that comes your way.
face2face recruiters offer free services to all jobseekers at all levels and in all parts of Australia. We don’t pay our recruiters commissions which means they aren’t driven by dollars but the joy of matching a quality jobseeker to the best position.
Here’s more about why you should choose us, how we work and why you should work with a recruiter that makes waves is smart.
Don’t necessarily take the first job offer
It can be daunting when leaving the comfort of an existing job and diving into a career you’re not familiar with. That doesn’t mean automatically accepting the first offer that comes your way. Here’s why.
This article will help if you’ve been offered more than one job offer.
We can help you find your perfect job
Whether it’s your first job, a new job, a career change, a promotion or re-entering the workforce after a break, we’re here. face2face will help you create a winning resume, boost your interview skills, and support you to find your perfect position.