The Seasons of Your Career: How to Master the Cycles of Career Change

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This is not only the case in IT but it is also the case in every sector. The financial sector is a major victim of optimum timing. So are the real estate, healthcare, business sectors, and so on. When you do something in each of these sectors is critical. This all speaks to the title of this article: What is the expected life cycle? How long do you have to act on a product, a certification, a career, a degree, a job, an advertisement, an investment, a lead? When looking at changing careers, making a move, the key word is when. The key noun is timing — optimum timing.

The key question is how long. The interesting side of this is that most of us can't do a thing about timing, about a product's life cycle, a certification's life cycle, or a market's cycles when something happens for the good or bad. All we can do is to be ready to act when the moment is right. This article focuses on the top 10 questions that address the issues of when, timing, and how long when changing a career. There will be a number of ancillary questions.

But if you answer them honestly and record your answers in your Word doc, you might find the key to changing your career is not if , but when. Think about the important moments in your life that revolve around time. For those of you of a "certain age," do you remember where you were when President Kennedy was killed?

Do you remember when you got engaged? When you got married? What about when you started school or when you graduated? These are all important times in your life. And these times occurred after some time in your life had come and gone. You don't get married when you are 10 years old. Most do not go to college when they are 10 years old. In the words of the acclaimed writer, "There is a time for everything. One of the reasons I am not a doctor today is timing. One of the reasons I am not a member of the clergy today is timing. There is a life cycle for careers like these in everyone's life.

We cannot change history or the social circumstances of the past, but we can be ready to identify the trends and tendencies and be open to change with the times. Here is a great example that I cited in previous articles. When I was in college the PC for the most part did not exist. I am not as old as dirt, just older than Select colleges and other institutions had some enormous mainframes that had the processing power of an earthworm. Some 20—30 years later I am teaching computers and integrated networks that did not exist when I was in college. How long will it last?

Why You Still Have Time To Change Career

That is a timing question. I have to be ready for the changes that will occur. And so do you if you want to land the ideal career. So what are the questions that can help you make those decisions and adapt to the times? Here are some worth considering. Based on the earlier questions in this series, you know what you want to do and what you like to do. But when do you want to do this? The key is to know when you want to do this. Maybe you want to do this in 3—5 years, in 5—10 years, or when you retire.

The other key is to understand that history and social circumstances continually change. You might now have all the skills, knowledge, degrees, internships, and so on. You might have met all the current requirements. But what happens if the hiring body, the governing agency, or the credentialing institution goes through a metamorphosis and changes the requirements?

And you no longer meet those requirements? It has happened to me. More than once in my life. One such instance occurred sometime ago. Some 25 years later I am still bugged because the rules changed and I could not do a thing about it. I could write a book about this chapter of my life.


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In fact, I have a table of contents for this book that concerns my life and my experience with a major institution that I have titled "Chasing a Moving Target". Because this article doesn't deal with this institution, I won't go into the details, but I did not strike when the iron was hot—when the folks I knew who made the rules were in power. When the ruling body changed, so did the requirements, and so did the opportunity for me to be admitted to pursue a career I felt called to.

If you are ready, and the market is ready, and you know when you want to pursue your new career, go for it. Don't let time pass you by.


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So the question of when you want to do this applies not only to IT folks but also to folks in every different sector. If you're not ready, when will you be ready? How long will it take for you to get up to speed and be ready to go to work? Every career has a limited life span.

We as people have a finite life span and we have a finite amount of time where we can be productive workers. And what we do, just like any skill or product, has an optimum marketing season. When will others be interested in what you offer? Will others be more interested in you when you are young and fresh out of school, or when you are older with years of experience?

In that same light, you have to recognize and accept that some folks prefer working with someone older, whereas others prefer someone younger. Is that age bias? Some call it preference, but anyone in this market who does not recognize age bias is not in the market. There are some sectors who prefer a younger workforce; others prefer a workforce that is older, more experienced, and maybe less ambitious. Whether you call it bias or preference doesn't matter; it exists in IT and in all sectors of the market.

Some would say that older workers are more marketable, although others feel that younger workers are more marketable. In your ideal career, are you in the age bracket that is marketable? Be honest and write it down in your Word doc. Another way to look at this is with this question: How long is your selling season? I found out recently that Home Depot has a selling season for its products, as does Walmart and Sams.

One of the things that drives me nuts is that Christmas trees are on sale in mid-August in my area of the southeast, and you cannot get a Christmas tree three weeks before Christmas—but you can get an Easter outfit. The selling season is over for Christmas goods three weeks before Christmas. This makes me shake my head. The same is true when you evaluate your skills and knowledge to determine your selling season. Has your prime marketing season passed you by?

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Or are you ahead of the curve? To figure out how long you are marketable, ask how long your selling season is. If you are supporting a product or vendor in IT for example, you also have to ask what is the marketable life span of the product. For every product and service there is a beginning, a middle, and an end. If you are in IT you know the life span of most products and versions of those products is short, less than a blink of an eye.

When supporting IT software and hardware, it is virtually impossible to keep up with the changes—making it very difficult to stay up with the market. So if you are supporting hardware or software, you have to be realistic when you ask how long you and your skills will be marketable, and what you will do to either stay current on the IT treadmill or move on to a less-volatile sector. For example, if you are a Windows MCSE and you have supported Server since it was in Beta, how long do you have before the Server life span, marketability, selling season will be over?

And consequently, how long before the skills you have developed will no longer be profitable? Questions like these must be considered when you are changing careers. In short, how long is this product with its associated skills marketable? Does it have enough time, before being retired, to make it worth the effort?

In the same way that you have to ask about your marketability, the marketability of a product, you also have to ask about the marketability of the company you want to work for. In this day and age, when major companies are folding, financial firms are closing their doors without notice, and mills and plants are shutting down, there are no more absolutes.

You cannot say with certainty in most cases that you will be able to work for employer X for 30—40 years and retire. Employer X might not be around for 30—40 years. So how marketable is your employer, how long a life span does your ideal employer have, and how long is the life span for this employers' products and services? These are all tough questions for which you might not have firm answers, but write down what you think and feel when you consider how long you are marketable. When do you quit your current job and move onto your new frontier?

‘Tis The Season: The 12 Days Of Career Change

When do you change direction? When do you change your goals? And most importantly, when do you change your mind about your career? Your toughest audience is you. You have to be convinced that the direction you want to go is the right one, and the goals you have are the right goals. That time is very personal and subjective.

Some will say they just know it. Others, like me, will say it is a gut feeling. Most of the time, there is no objective crossroad that pushes you one way or the other, but sometimes there is. When you decide to make the change to a new career, you will experience a new chapter in your life that will call on all that you know and feel in order to succeed. About 12 years ago, I was in a good job that included some issues that annoyed me. I was a school teacher and Technology Manager. I was not looking to start a new career, but I was looking to expand my knowledge and skills.

It was a spur-of-the-moment decision that was monumental because it was unplanned. It has been a great professional chapter in my life, and I will always be thankful for it. But I would encourage folks to, as my mom would say, "don't do as I do, do as I say. So give careful thought to when you want to make your change. As a follow-up to when do you want to change, you also have to figure out when should you start looking for the new job, the new career. If you know when you should start looking, you also have to ask how long you are willing to look before you resign yourself to accepting the imperfect offer.

You might not land the ideal position in the timeframe you hoped, so it is wise to know how long you are willing to hold out. This is a tough job market and companies are playing hardball when hiring employees. So you have to know how flexible you will be in terms of how long you will hold out for your ideal position.

You also have to be realistic and ask how long before you will go broke or lose your mind and maybe your home by holding out for the ideal. Idealism is great, but reality is real. And sometimes you might have to accept second best as a stop gap measure. In line with these questions you also have to determine how long you are willing to stay in this new position before you will want to advance and move up the ladder. Some positions that I have worked in require that you remain in the current position, which the ruling body says is the required base, for three years before you can move to another site or move up into your position of choice.

Is that fair or right? I did not think so at the time and still do not, but that is the reality and I could not change the rules. So when do you want to start, how long are you willing to hold out, and how long before you will want to move up? What do you think? Write down your answers in your Word doc. For everything there is a season—a time for coming and a time for going, the prophet wrote.

We just looked at when you want to start. The reality is that for every start there is a finish. When is it time to leave your current job? When is it time to leave your new job? As mentioned earlier in this article, some folks take new jobs and enter careers for the short term.

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That's okay as long as it is fine with you. What is short term to you? How long should you stay in a job? Many folks opt to take a job for a short period of time and the next thing they know it is 10 years later. Somehow they fell in love with the job and got tired of looking. Others, like a friend of mine, will take a job with long-term expectations, relocate to another coast, and find after a very short time that the money to pay him has dried up.

His time to go was based on financial restrictions. So he had to move back to the original location to find a more stable employment opportunity. So how do you know when it is time to go? Do you lose interest? Are you only willing to stay X years? Debra continues to enjoy her music as a hobby. A high level of enthusiasm combined with a loosened grip on success will serve the Spring individual well through abrupt career changes.

What steps can you take now to effect change if you want a new job or career? Do you intend to remain in your present job? What, if anything, is the one thing that dampens your enthusiasm for your job? Do you see a way to rekindle that enthusiasm? If you could decide all over again, would this be your career choice?

If you could leave your present job today, with no strings attached and regardless of compensation, what would you choose to do? Do you think your personal history limits your choices and career mobility? The Soul Web links you to other individuals in the world. On every step of your career journey the Soul Web, via your own personal and work connections, brings you feedback. Feedback from the Soul Web, which can be extremely varied, will determine your next course of action.

The Soul Web responds with feedback. Adjust goals and cast new dreams.