Don’t Know Where to Start with Career Change? Here’s What to Do First

Episode 2: If you’re thinking about changing careers but feel stuck because you just don’t know where to start then this episode is for you.

Join Certified Career Change Coach Dana Stevens as she shares why most people begin their career change in the wrong place (by job hunting!) and what to focus on instead.
You’ll learn how to start your career change journey with clarity and confidence by identifying what you truly want and need in your next chapter, not just what you think you should do.

In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

• The biggest mistake people make when starting a career change
• Why “panic applying” keeps you stuck in old patterns
• The first essential step in designing a working life that actually fits your needs
• How to define your Life-First Criteria,  the foundation for confident career decisions
• How to gently challenge the belief that you “don’t know what you want”

Connect with Dana:

Website: https://www.danastevens.com/workwithme
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dana_stevens_coach/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danastevens1/
Free Coaching Consultation: https://calendly.com/danastevens/initial-coaching-chat

If this episode resonated, follow The Career Change Studio and share it with someone who’s feeling stuck in their career.

And if you’re ready to design a working life that truly fits your needs and lifestyle, book a free clarity call at https://calendly.com/danastevens/initial-coaching-chat

Special thanks to @Lou_Greenaway_Music for the piano composition and performance.

Transcript

Hello

I’m so glad that you’re here today because this episode is going to be super helpful if you’re feeling stuck and overwhelmed, this might be because you are thinking of changing careers but you just don’t know where to start.

Here’s the good news - I do know where you need to start. And I’m going to share that with you in today’s episode of The Career Change Studio Podcast.

So if this is you, I just want you to know - it’s OK, it’s normal - this is one of the top things that I hear from my clients before we work together: “I don’t know where to start”.

Now before I jump and tell you where to start, I’m just going to point out where you might be starting out instead because this is what I see time and time again - you might be making a common mistake that lots of people are making. YOu might be starting at the end, starting at what I consider the END of the process.

Let me explain.

The most common error I see is because you are thinking ” I need a new job”, your brain jumps to  job hunting mode” so you start TREATING IT LIKE GETTING JUST ANOTHER JOB

You might be panicking and think you must take action straight away and ‘DO’ something. 

So initially this might look like you spending lots of time on LinkedIn, endlessly scrolling for jobs. Or on other job sites searching for hours for different types of roles.

You might be jumping right into activities to help you ‘secure a job’ - spending hours tweaking your linkedin profile or working on your CV.

(or intending to this and procrastinating)

It can be easy to distract yourself and tell yourself that you are being productive this way. 

You might even be applying for lots of jobs - potentially quite random jobs. You’ll be looking at things thinking - yeah I can maybe do that, so you send out lots of CVs and applications hoping that you might just get something. 

You might even be telling yourself that this is good practice.

And here’s why this approach does not work. You don’t want just another job - you want CHANGE.

So if  you really want to make a change there is no point jumping straight into applying for jobs before you really know what change you are looking for. 

If you haven’t worked out yet what isn’t working, what you now want from a new role, what needs to be different and what is really right for your LIFE moving forwards - chances are you will just be applying based on what you’ve done before, what you’ve tried in the past and you KNOW that this hasn’t worked already - so why keep repeating the pattern?

These are what I call -  PANIC APPLICATIONS  - they will not lead you to something new and exciting that is based on where you want to go and who you want to be in the future. 

Typically you will be looking to your past so see what’s possible -  basing what you think you could do on your PAST EXPERIENCE, the skills and experiences you’ve done historically rather than focusing on your future potential, future possibilities

And because you won’t be 100% sure that these roles are right for you and feeling confident about the value you will bring to them - this will come across in your applications, even subconsciously  - , chances are you might not even hear back from most of the applications, let alone get interviews and this just further erodes your confidence. 

And might even you start telling yourself 

“ there’s nothing out there”

‘I’m never never going to get a job”

“ what’s the point?”

And you get even more despondent and lose hope and motivation. And you;re more likely to Give up, feel more stuck

It’s important to come back to WHY you want to change your working life in the first place

Remember you want a CHANGE, and panic applying based on your past will not lead you there.

Now just before I let you know where to start instead - I just want to say that if this is you, and this doesn resonate, , if you have been jumping into job hunting mode - there is no need to feel bad, blame yourself or feel any judgement - the Career Change Studio is a judgement free space. 

It’s OK if you’ve been jumping to these actions - because this is what you’ve done in the past when you needed a new job and it probably worked - it’s just that this time it’s about change, so you need to change your approach. 

Whenever you become aware that you are doing, thinking or feeling something that isn’t helping you - we can just be grateful we now have the awareness, because this leads us to change.

So we always want to approach this with curiosity and kindness for ourselves - it’s never going to be constructive to sprinkle blame and shame over something we’ve identified

SO we’ve identified that this job hunting mode is not the right place to start - let’s talk about where you DO Want to start.

……………………………….

It’s with YOU. You must start with you.

Step one - is to start with what YOU want and need. You hold the answers.

The key is to start getting really clear on what you PERSONALLY WANT AND NEED from this next stage of your life. 

Getting clear on the criteria for what will make this next chapter right for you. 

The difference that YOU are really looking for. Only then can you know if opportunities are right for you and this KNOWING will be the FOUNDATION for your decision making later on.

And if you’re thinking - but “i don’t know” that is the point, you have to spend time figuring it out.

You now get to dig deep and get really honest about what YOU personally want. 

If you notice yourself thinking about what you ‘should’ do - chances are you are worrying about what other people think or about typical expectations in your industry or amongst your peers or social circles

You really want to take the time and space to tap into who you are today, what is different about you now than 5, 10, 15 years ago. 

What does that mean for how you want to live in THIS NEXT CHAPTER.

Just focus there - you don’t have to figure out now how the whole rest of your life is going to go, you can just concentrate on this NEXT PHASE. 

Because you will have many phases and chapters in your life and chances are that they will all have different needs and different wants and that is OK..

So start with some non-negotiables - for this next chapter, what do you need in terms of money, what do you require in terms of time & flexibility  

And what do you need to do to protect or improve your physical or mental health.

Then you can move on to what you WANT in this next part of your life - what you DESIRE

We can often feel quite coy about this, not wanting to really express what we actually want  - so if this makes you uncomfortable this is why you need to spend  more time on this not less.

It’s OK to want things, to desire things - if you can’t express what you want, how are you going to get those things for yourself?

And because this isn’t just about getting another job, you want to think holistically about the whole of your life.  What do you WANT in terms of money or finances, how important are material things to you and what are the things that you really want in YOUR LIFE? Be honest with yourself?

What do you want in terms of connections, relationships?

How do you want to spend your time?

What do you want in terms of intellectual stimulation? Or personal development or learning or growth?

AND THEN THE NEXT PART IS TO

evaluate your skills, strengths and personal qualities and what this could mean for the type of opportunities that could be open to you.

And not just what you have done so far but you want to think about your POTENTIAL, because the key is that we stay future focused and allow you to be open to how you could grow and learn, progress and change.

This is often how we unintentionally limit ourselves - for some reason we hit midlife and think that’s it. Our development is done.

No wonder we feel stuck but no!! You have plenty of time and scope left to adapt and learn and fulfill your potential. Potential isn’t something you only have when you’re young - it’s the capacity you have to develop into something in the future. And you still have plenty of that. 

If you are in your forties, chances are you won’t retire until you are 67 - maybe later. And this is so exciting, this means you have at least 27 years to learn new skills, develop a whole new career if you want to or fulfill your potential in so many ways.

—--------------------

SO I KNOW THAT…

Creating time and space to figuring these things out can often go against our natural inclination to do - to just get on with it - but I promise you  - figuring out the criteria for how you want to live and work NOW and in the FUTURE is one of the most useful things that you can do with your time

So I would encourage you to carve out time for this, prioritise this… especially if you’re used to just doing things - cracking on with your career., getting everything done in your life for yourself and other people.

It really will be so valuable to spend that time looking inwards, and really getting honest with yourself.

And if your brain is throwing up an objection - “BUT I DON”T KNOW WHAT I WANT”  - I would just gently challenge that thought.

What if that isn’t true? What if you do know? Maybe you’re afraid of finding out because it might mean you have to take action and step out of your comfort zone? 

But beneath the fear, there might actually be lots that you DO know if you give yourself the time and space to fnd out.

If you did have some ideas, what would your 3 guesses be for the types of changes you DO want to make?

What could some theories be for how you might want to live and work that you could come up with? You can throw different versions around, you don’t have to ladn on something straight away. Allow yourself time to explore ideas.

Maybe the one thing you are clear on is what  you don’t want.

If so, that is a great place to start… Just start by writing down everything you don’t want and find the opposite, the flipside or the alternative and ask yourself if that feels good to you.

Maybe it feels too extreme to go to the opposite, so what does something in the middle look like. The most important thing is that you start asking yourself the questions and start taking time to answer them. Don’t put pressure on yourself to come up with THE definitive answer straight away, allow yourself to explore some ideas you have first of all. 

THIS is one of THE FIRST THINGS I do with my Career Change Coaching Clients I provide them with structured support so that they can really answer these questions and get clear on what I call their LIFE-FIRST CRITERIA, this is the set of criteria that is going to give you the set of guidance and parameters for how you want to live and work in your next chapter. And this knowledge becomes an essential part of helping you to make a decision about what you want to do next in a way that you can feel good about. This is the first step in my proven Life-FIRST CAREER METHOD that helps you make decisions so you can secure that new job and start living differently. I’ll be sharing more about that in future episodes.

So that's all for today. I hope you can use this as a launch pad to ask yourself some questions and start listening, really listening to the answers that come up.

Thank you so much for joining me on the Career Change Studio and I look forward to talking to you again next week

Bye for now