Introduction

Transformation. Second act. Stuck. Reinvention. Crossroads. Pivot. Do-over. Considering a career change can be a gnarly swirl of exhilaration and trepidation. Whether you’re coming from a place of restless stagnation born of security or one of desperation—you cannot take another day of doing what you’re doing—you want a change.

Career change could be something you’ve daydreamed about for a while, or maybe it’s a boiling point that you’ve just hit, but it probably feels a bit out of reach. You’ve invested a lot of education, time, and energy in your current job. You’re the go-to person for people at work, a topic or process expert. You’re not a failure by any stretch of the imagination; you’re just longing for something different.

The conventional wisdom for changing careers is to follow a measured and thoughtful path. Assess your strengths, imagine possible selves, craft small (and safe!) experiments, evaluate the outcome of those exercises, and chart a new course taking into account all of that information and experience. But this approach can lead to analysis paralysis. How can you stop reflecting and start doing? This guide will help you do just that.

Who This Book Is For

This is not a book for first-time job seekers or recent grads. Rather, it’s for you if you’ve been out in the workforce for at least a few years. It’s for you if your first “real” job didn’t turn out the way you’d hoped. It’s for you if you’re well into your career (or even into your second career). This collection is for people with a complicated context: You have an advanced degree, and the student loans to prove it. You have a family that anticipates an annual holiday to relax and reconnect. You have a network that enjoys trading favors and tapping your expertise. And you have direct reports who are counting on you to help shepherd them up the ladder at work.

But a complicated context doesn’t mean you’re trapped. There are benefits to having held at least one career. You have experience. You have a network. You’ve faced a crisis or two and survived—even learned something. You know what you like and what you don’t like. You know how you prefer to work and something about which type of culture or work environment you do best in. You understand the distinction between being good at something and enjoying what you’re doing.

If you know exactly what you want your next career to be—you just haven’t figured out how to cross over—this book is for you. Maybe you don’t know what you want to do next—just that the current situation isn’t the right fit. The content in this volume will help you see how even sifting through the long list of things you don’t enjoy and wouldn’t want to pursue can help you narrow the field to find something that would interest you.

You can take that knowledge and close the gap between dreaming of something else and actually doing something else. Change, especially for something as deeply held as your work identity, can feel scary. But it’s an enormous opportunity for discovery and growth. We all have numerous possible selves. What would our lives look like if we took a different path? What’s a safe way to test a new direction? This guide will give you questions to reflect on what you want, stories to inspire you, and tools to help you take action.

How to Use This Book

Just as there’s no one track for any of us to follow in our careers, there’s no one way to read this book. Some of you will want to read it cover to cover, craft a detailed transition plan, set milestones, and start ticking through items. Others will dive into the section that speaks to them. If you feel despair because it seems like a significant change can never happen, the success stories in the Get Inspired section will motivate you to work through the challenging, more self-reflective sections of the book. Some of you may dip your toes in by trying some of the experiments in the Get Going section. Others may read the chapter on job crafting and discover a way to keep treading water until they’re on the other side of this lull.

We’ve selected the most practical and thoughtful pieces we’ve published on career change to help you consider what move you might make, assess whether you’re ready to take the leap, and then figure out how to ease into a transition. There’s no prescription or formula. Every one’s situation is unique, so we’ve carefully curated this guide to share the research, insights, and advice from a host of experts to give you the best foundation for navigating your own way.

Career change is a normal part of a long and rich working life. Set aside any nagging self-doubt, and begin the work to turn wishful thinking into a concrete, actionable plan. You can get out of your head and into a new job. Change is within your reach.

—The Editors