Posted on

Testing things out

Yesterday I was listening to someone talk about her experience of underwater diving. When she tried it for the first time, she was gobsmacked. She couldn’t believe what a wonderful world existed beneath the water. Then and there she decided that she wanted to return. She wanted to somehow work in this underwater world. She was willing to change her life for it. But she needed to test it out, and see if it was really for her. 

So she had an opportunity when she had a three week gap in between the tv production projects she was working on. She decided to go back to Thailand where she’d had that underwater experience, and see if she felt the same. Maybe this time she’d just think it was pretty and not have the same amazing life changing reaction. And that would be her guide. If she felt the same, she’d act on it. 

The rest is history. She went on to have a career spending years at sea, exploring the deep sea, which resulted in working on the production of the tv series Blue Planet II. 

It’s hard to test things out right now. We might not be planning a trip to Thailand to work out what we want from life, but being out and about can be key to career change, if your situation allows it. Meeting people, networking, exploring. Going to a workshop, doing an in-person course, visiting someone’s place of work or doing work experience or job shadowing. We don’t currently have the same freedom to be out and about or travelling around. 

But we can still go with our instincts. If some area of work is calling to you it’s easy to dismiss it as too hard to get into, too competitive, too expensive to retrain. But, there are different ways of going about things. 

Stuck at home, you can still build a clearer picture of what that work is all about. You can read about people currently doing that work. Articles, blogposts, social media posts, books. Also: podcasts. You can find people doing interesting work, and find out how they got there. Seek out how they spend their time. You can read about them, you can try contacting them and asking them more. Most people are quite flattered if you tell them you’re interested in their work and how they got there, and are happy to give a few pointers.

You can work out what you might need to do to get there. Maybe you do have the required transferable skills. Perhaps you can sign up to a free course which will give you some insight into that area of work, and new skills. You can work out how much money you would need to retrain, what do you need to start saving? 

The main thing is getting started, and not staying stuck. Research, and then start taking some kind of action.

Photo by Kris Mikael Krister on Unsplash

Posted on

Trouble Networking?

What do you do when you know you need to get out there – networking, contacting people, asking for help, meeting people – but you’re too scared? It can be a real issue when you’re trying to change career but are overwhelmed at the thought of all the people you’re going to have to contact.

Case study

I had a client who struggled with networking, Andrea. She didn’t have loads of friends, she found socialising tricky, and her confidence was low. She was well aware that her mindset could be quite negative.

Andrea’s dream was to work for a start-up, and write articles about entrepreneurship on the side. The thought of having to get in touch with people who she knew could help with her career change, was crippling her.

She’d have to apply for jobs. She could try to speak to people in the start-up industry who could give her some pointers or advise her about opportunities, maybe ask them for a phone chat or to meet for a coffee. In terms of the articles, she needed people to interview. She would have to make the first move in getting them involved.

Building up to it

Andrea knew that being more comfortable contacting people would be a massive step for her. It was important to her being able to move forwards.

So together we agreed that building up to networking was going to be challenging. But it would help both in progressing career wise and in building her confidence.

Breaking it down

But Andrea had lots of excuses! There was always a reason why she couldn’t do something, always a barrier. So we broke it down. What would doing each task actually look like, how could she prepare? Could she prepare questions, set a time limit on how long the call or coffee would be? Maybe it would help to create a list of contacts and tick them off one by one? We had a think about what was the worst that would happen, was it someone saying ‘no’? Could she cope with that?

Once we’d broken things down into small, easy steps, and prepared for the worst case scenario, Andrea felt calmer about networking. Slowly she followed the steps we’d set out, and things became easier for her. She realised how great it felt having a positive interaction, and saw that people responded well to her.

Do it your way

Andrea is coming on in leaps and bounds. She goes for things and doesn’t feel the same fear around contacting people for help. She made it into the start- up world by starting her own online travel advisory company on the side of her day-to-day job. She’s also completed various courses including and incubator training programme to learn more about the industry she’s interested in.

Networking doesn’t have to be roaming around ‘events’ desperately finding people to talk to. It can be about focusing on what you need, slowly and quietly doing things in your own way. And getting the results you need.

If you’d like to some coaching sessions with me, contact me at joaopoku@gmail.com or here on LinkedIn.

Photo by Pavan Trikutam on Unsplash