St.Louis Business Journal
LEAVING A HARD-WON CAREER CAN BE MIND BOGGLING

By Anna Navarro

September 2007  

Author's note: Client stories in this column are based on actual situations fictionalized to protect privacy and told with permission.



What do you do when you are unhappy with what you are doing but aren't sure what kind of work you want to do next?

This is a mind-boggling question for anyone. But it is especially difficult for people who have invested a great deal of time, money or effort to get where they are and have a lot at risk in making a career change.

The best clues to solving this dilemma are hidden in an unvarnished review of your history, and an honest assessment of what you want and want to avoid in the future.

Sam, a cardiologist who worked in an academic setting, admitted he went to medical school because he did well in science and was attracted to the money medicine promised. But he’d been bored with patient care from the beginning and wasn’t interested in his research projects. The only part of his work he enjoyed was lecturing and politicking to win grants.

A careful analysis of his natural abilities revealed he was good at thinking on his feet, quantitative analysis, negotiating, public speaking and persuasion. Investing was one of his passions, and acquiring wealth was a life priority. He had a preference for fast, competitive environments where he was in control. He disliked teamwork and managing people.

These clues, and others that emerged later, eventually led Sam to becoming an investment banker specializing in the healthcare industry. By the time we finished this analysis, we had a pretty good idea that he wanted to be in the world of finance. But we still didn't know exactly what he wanted to do, or how to get there. To figure that out, we began to brainstorm possibilities and systematically investigate them.

We started with a list of nine ideas: venture capitalist, finance manager, technology transfer, industry economist, finance professor, derivative analyst, investor relations, corporate finance consultant and stockbroker. From these nine, we picked the three that were most intuitively interesting, and launched a plan to investigate them. This involved library and Internet research as well as talking to people in the field. I coached Sam about how to find people, how to persuade them to talk to him, and what to say during his meetings.

The research stage was rocky for Sam, as it is for most people. Several ideas he was initially attracted to dropped out because they didn’t fit his needs. But as ideas dropped out, new ones emerged. That's typical.

His research was driven by our understanding of what he wanted in an ideal work situation. I had cautioned him not to expect to get 100% of it, but to persevere until he found a set of tradeoffs that worked for him. In practice, I have found that most career changers can achieve about 80% of what they want if they work hard at finding it.

Investment banking wasn't even in our original brainstorming list. He investigated a related career, being a venture capitalist, and discarded it because it seemed too risky for him. But in his meetings with venture capitalists, the idea of investment banking emerged. And as he investigated it he concluded that it was a good fit.

Once Sam got clear about where he was headed, we were able to put together an action plan for getting there. He kept his job at the university, and used his free tuition benefit to get an MBA with a focus on finance. Then he took an entry-level job in investment banking, starting as a financial analyst and rising quickly to become a dealmaker. His income took a hit for about 18 months after he entered the field, but within a few years his earnings far surpassed what he was making as an academic cardiologist.

The research he had done to zero in on being a dealmaker in investment banking had many side benefits besides helping him get clear about a goal. He also learned what entry-level jobs led to the kind of position he ultimately wanted, what employers look for in candidates for those jobs and how to use his MBA research projects to open doors into the field. By the time he graduated, he already had an entry-level position lined up.

The process I have just described is a challenging one. But it is a road tested method that has helped many people who are trapped in an unsatisfying career find their way to work that truly fits them as individuals.

Anna Navarro is the founder of Work Transitions, a nationwide career consulting firm that trains independent career strategists and consults with individual clients.

This column was originally published by the St. Louis Business Journal. The actual title of the column and date in which it appeared in the Business Journal may be slightly different from what appears on WorkTransitions.com.