– + Learn

The 7 Steps To Career Change Success, with Amechi Udo

by

Share

Listen On:

You feel like you want a change in your career, but you’re scared. Should you change, or should you stay put and appreciate the job you have? A change can be a positive thing, giving you new opportunities in your day-to-day responsibilities, says Find Your Dream Job guest Amechi Udo. Before making any career change, Amechi suggests asking yourself what your desired outcome is. Get clarity around what you want in a new position, and then use the resources you already have to pursue the opportunity. Start with your skills, talents, and experience and grow from there. 

About Our Guest:

Amechi Udo is the founder of Your Career Matters.  Amechi’s company helps you take charge of your career.

Resources in This Episode:

Transcript

Find Your Dream Job, Episode 436:

The 7 Steps To Career Change Success, with Amechi Udo

Airdate: February 7, 2024

Mac Prichard:

This is Find Your Dream Job, the podcast that helps you get hired, have the career you want, and make a difference in life.

I’m your host, Mac Prichard. I’m also the founder of Mac’s List. It’s a job board in the Pacific Northwest that helps you find a fulfilling career.

Every Wednesday, I talk to a different expert about the tools you need to get the work you want.

Find Your Dream Job is brought to you by TopResume. TopResume has helped more than 400,000 professionals land more interviews and get hired faster.

Get a free review of your resume today.

Go to macslist.org/topresume.

You will likely change careers several times.

What’s the best way to do this?

Amechi Udo is here to talk about the seven steps to career change success.

He’s the founder of Your Career Matters.

Amechi’s company helps you take charge of your career.

He joins us from the town of Wellingborough in the United Kingdom.

Well, let’s jump right into it, Amechi. How many times will you change careers in the forty-plus years you might spend in the workplace?

Amechi Udo:

Well, that is a twenty-four million-dollar question. You may stay in an organization for many years. That role may evolve and shift and change as that business develops. You may equally find that you move from company to company, building a career and working in different places. The key thing is being aware of the need for change. What the drive is about both internally and externally.

Mac Prichard:

In your experience as a career coach, do people who are considering changing careers understand those needs?

Amechi Udo:

Sometimes they do. Oftentimes, through external factors, as we’ve seen recently with organizations, particularly in the technology sector, declaring that they want to move people on, whether those people are ready to change or not, we can see that that movement, sometimes, as I said a moment ago, can be driven very much by external factors. Sometimes, it can happen very much around you. Your own individual circumstances.

Mac Prichard:

Can changing careers help you professionally, Amechi?

Amechi Udo:

For some people, yes. It can give you a new perspective. It can put you in a place where you’re developing new skills, working with people who perhaps you enjoy learning from and sharing your learning with, and it can also benefit you materially. It may be a rate – a salary raise. It may be a change in job titles that conveys greater status. It may be a shift in responsibility. You can pick up things that you’ve been keen to do or, indeed, let go of things that you’ve reached a point where you feel you don’t want to be doing those anymore. So, yes, it can make a real difference.

Mac Prichard:

When can a career change hurt you professionally?

Amechi Udo:

Typically, only at one time, when you’re carrying baggage from somewhere else, and you arrive in that new role, and you drop that baggage in there, too. As the old saying goes, wherever you go, there you are. You can bring that, if you’re leaving with a lot of negativity, anxiety, fear, concern, then you can often bring that into your new environment, and if they’re sensitive, they may pick up on that, and there may be space to unpack it or get support around it. If they’re not sensitive, unfortunately, it may actually sabotage your future success in that particular new role.

Mac Prichard:

So, there are professional benefits to changing careers. What stops people from making a career switch, typically?

Amechi Udo:

The number one is something that’s actually inbuilt in all of us as humans. There’s an actual fear of change. Really, you don’t want to make that move. I think it’s very well summed up in the book by Dr. Spencer Johnson, “Who Moved My Cheese?”

Some people are aware that there’s a need for change, and they start very early on to be proactive around that. First of all, by actually accepting that change is required. Other folks, it takes a little bit more, either something internal, maybe a change in circumstances, maybe how they feel about their role. They realize that Monday morning feeling now has started to leak into being a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday feeling. They start to realize, yeah, I need to do something.

And sometimes, it’s external circumstances. We’re in a period of time where organizations are now saying, hey, we want you back in office. And for some people who’ve been working remotely or hybrid, that’s kind of drawn the line. It may also be physically that they’ve relocated to somewhere that’s much further away from where their office is now. And so, the idea of returning is just not feasible.

Mac Prichard:

Well, Amechi, you’ve got a list of seven steps to career change success, and I’d like to walk through them one by one. Your first recommendation in making a career change is you need to be aware of the change that’s happening in your work place and your industry. Tell us more about this.

Amechi Udo:

Yeah, it’s very much about paying attention to how your industry, how your company, how your role is developing. We’re operating in an era where artificial intelligence has started to make its way into the workplace. For some people, that’s causing a lot of trepidation, a lot of concern. For others, they’re looking and seeing, how can this assist me? How can this help me?

And the wise folks are starting to make it their business to understand the latter. They’re getting themselves trained, they’re getting themselves developed. They’re building up their knowledge and their understanding. So, that’s just a very clear and, I would say, global example of how things can change.

At the same time, simpler things can happen, like I mentioned before. The return to office, for some people. The changes in working patterns and company culture. All of these things can affect how and why you might want to make a change, and crucially, as is often said, it can be your relationship with your manager, how they’re operating, how you’re getting on with them that can make all of the difference.

Mac Prichard:

How will paying attention to these changes and your relationship with your manager help you with changing careers?

Amechi Udo:

Crucially, it will stop you getting blindsided, I suppose, as you would say, that side of the pond. It’s so that you, instead of being caught out or surprised, you can actually start to say, ah, I can see things are shifting. Now, here’s a good time to just tentatively start thinking about what I might need to do.

And I’m not necessarily only talking about this in terms of perhaps having to leave an organization. It may be that you want to shift into a different role within your current company. You may be seeking promotion. You may even be thinking about scaling back. Hey, I’ve reached a certain point in my life where it’s been great being at this level, but now is a time to shift my responsibilities and perhaps take on a less onerous role.

Mac Prichard:

Number two on your list of seven steps to career change success is to accept change. Why is it important to accept change?

Amechi Udo:

Because a lot of energy can go into fighting it, it can tire you out. It can be mentally exhausting. It can be draining for you. It can be draining for those around you. And I’m sure we’ve all had that friend who we speak to, and he’s like, ‘Oh, and this happened at work, and that happened at work, and I’ve really got to get out,” and maybe going on and on about it for ages.

But they haven’t actually just accepted this is what is going on. It’s now time to choose. What do I want to do about it? Do I want to accept it? Or do I want to battle it?

Mac Prichard:

What can happen, Amechi, to you professionally if you don’t accept change?

Amechi Udo:

If you don’t, as I said a moment ago, it can drain you. It can make you feel very frustrated. It can impact you in the workplace, and it can impact you in your personal life. You don’t need all of this stuff taking up room in your mind when you’ve got many other things you want to focus your time, and your energy, and your attention on. So, acceptance often helps both inside and outside of your work.

Mac Prichard:

Well, terrific. We’re gonna take a break. When we come back, Amechi Udo will continue to share his advice on the seven steps to career change success. Stay with us.

Before you change your career, you need to update your resume.

Go to macslist.org/topresume.

The experts at TopResume will look at your resume for free.

Go to macslist.org/topresume.

Get tips you can use to fix your resume on your own

Or hire TopResume to do it for you.

Go to macslist.org/topresume.

Now, let’s get back to the show.

We’re back in the Mac’s List studio. I’m talking with Amechi Udo.

He’s the founder of Your Career Matters.

Amechi’s company helps you take charge of your career.

And he joins us from the town of Wellingborough in the United Kingdom.

Now, Amechi, before the break, we were talking about the seven steps to career change success that you share with your clients, and let’s go on to item number three on your list, and that is that in order to change careers successfully, you’ve got to do what you call “manage in the meantime.” What does that mean, Amechi, manage in the meantime?

Amechi Udo:

Well, a lot of people think, change, it’s really big, it’s really scary. As the quote by Amy Mullens has it, “Adversity is just change that we haven’t adapted ourselves to yet,” and it’s always built up into a really, really, really, really big thing. But actually, managing in the meantime means getting this back down into perspective, working out what small steps we can take gradually and consistently.

What actually stretches our comfort zone rather than placing us so far outside it that it’s painfully uncomfortable? Usually, when people stretch too far, that’s when they don’t make the change. It’s too rapid. It’s too difficult. Instead, by pacing themselves through, gradually moving it through, that’s often where the success of the change happens because it’s something that can last and stick.   

Mac Prichard:

Many of us might struggle with even getting started in making a career change, Amechi. What’s the best first step you recommend if you’re thinking about changing careers? How can you go from thinking about it to actually taking action?

Amechi Udo:

Different people have got different approaches. Sometimes, it’s about drawing up a pros and cons list. If I stay where I am, these are all the pluses; these are all the minuses.

Sometimes, it’s something that they feel, oh, I’ve just got to get out of this. That often requires you to sit down and say, do I want to give up everything? Or is it certain things within what I’m doing that I actually want to stop doing?

Some people have a clearly drawn system of thinking, actually I want to go here. I’ve wanted to go do this. I’ve been waiting for ages, or I’ve always had an ambition to do this, and I just want to work out how. Again, they may need to sit down and get really clear about the “what” it is they want to do. And then, often, they come to me to work out the “how.”

Mac Prichard:

You mentioned a pros and cons list, perhaps working with a coach like you. What other steps have you seen be effective when someone is trying to take this big hairy goal, making a career change, and break it into manageable steps that can be done a little bit at a time, as you said a moment ago?

Amechi Udo:

Yep, one of the things is simply to take whatever small step you can. So that might be that you’ve got this question bouncing around in your mind. Do I? Don’t I? Do I? Don’t I want to make a change? Do I? Don’t I? Do I? Don’t I?

Just choose. I choose to make a change. Literally, write that down. I choose to. By writing it down as a choice, it liberates your thinking. It empowers you. It allows you to tune into opportunity, to actually start to see, now, I’ve chosen, here are things that are coming forward towards me to help me.

Another approach, particularly for those people who are in jobs right now where they think, oh, it’s awful. It’s all difficult. I’ve really just got to get out. Find one thing to be grateful for in that job. It might be that the salary is putting a roof over your head and food on your table. Something I’m not gonna quite say you take for granted but you’ve simply stopped paying attention to. Whilst that income is coming in, it’s giving you the space to start to consider what else you do and how you do it, and we’ll touch on that a little bit more here in a few minutes.

Mac Prichard:

Well, let’s move on through your list. Number four of your seven steps to career change success is to create a sense of direction. Why does this matter? Why do you have to be clear or create that sense of direction?

Amechi Udo:

Because if we’re driven purely by fear, we only go so far. If you imagine, in any office complex or factory or school, normally they will say to you, in the event of an emergency, make your way out of the building, and we’ll meet in the car park, or we’ll meet in the shop area opposite. They take you out of the immediate danger.

The thing for us humans is when we’re in that fear state, we don’t differentiate between whether it’s a saber-toothed tiger or a scary boss. We just want to get out. We just want to be away from.

Whereas, if you start to develop that sense of direction, perhaps it may be, unfortunately after you’ve got out of a challenging situation. After that initial adrenaline has eased off, you’ve then got to think about, now what? What next? If you’re doing that at a time when you need to earn income, that’s a very stressful situation.

Conversely, if you’re in a situation where you’re thinking about it, you’re exploring it, but you’re not under undue pressure, starting to develop that sense of direction is much, much more helpful. That initial exploration. Those little career experiments. Testing things out. Getting to a better sense of what it might be like. Maybe using a day’s leave to just experience what it might be like to do something like that. Just to try it on for size. That can be so much more helpful, productive, liberating for you than having to do it with all pressure on.

Mac Prichard:

Number five on your list of seven steps for career change success is what you call resourceful living. Tell us more about this. What do you have in mind there?

Amechi Udo:

I’m gonna use the Arthur Ashe quote here to describe this. It says, “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.”

So often, when people talk about career change, they talk about it from a position of lack. Oh, I lack the experience. I lack the time. I lack the opportunity. I lack the money. And that means that they miss out on all of the resources they do have available to them.

Oh, actually, although I haven’t started this career change yet, or I haven’t finished it, I do have the ability to choose. That’s an amazing resource to have. To be a choice.

Oh, I’ve only ever heard about this. I’ve never spoken to somebody who does this. We live in a world where, electronically, we can reach out and connect with people and say hello. I’d love to learn more about what you do. We can watch videos. We can listen to podcasts. We can explore. We can maybe look at launching a side project to test out an idea.

There are so many ways in which we can tap into resources to help us to test out our plans or our ideas before we take the full big step. In fact, we probably never will take that big step; instead, we’ll take a series of much smaller ones to give us the momentum to achieve what we want.

Mac Prichard:

Number six on your list of seven steps for career change success is to define success on your own terms. How does this help you change careers, Amechi?

Amechi Udo:

Because you give it the hard thought. People don’t always enjoy doing the hard thought about what does success means for them. But it is really important.

Success for you in your twenties might be very different to what it is for you in your thirties, and likewise, what it is in your thirties may be very different for you in your forties or your fifties or beyond. Defining it and having clarity about what success is, how you measure it, and how you describe it can make all of the difference in creating a more compelling and exciting future for yourself that you really want to commit to in making your change.

It’s also really important to know what success means for you in your terms because when things get tough, and they do, when you hit those roadblocks, you need to be able to look back and say, ah, right, this is what I’m working towards. This is what’s motivating me. This is why I’m doing this. This is what it’s for. That’s what will keep you going, and also, if necessary, have you stop, check, and decide, is this still the right direction for me, or do I need to change course?

Mac Prichard:

The last item on your list of seven steps to career change success is to celebrate. What do you recommend celebrating, and why is it important to do this?

Amechi Udo:

You need to celebrate each and every step that you make that you consider to be an achievement. The reason for doing this is so that you mentally have this clear in your own mind. Oh, progress. This isn’t about delayed gratification. Oh, I’ll celebrate only when I have finally got the new job. I’ve made the big change, et cetera, et cetera. This is about celebrating, and recognizing, and putting mental markers into your progress.

So that, again, when you face the challenging times, those moments where you don’t feel you’ve achieved enough, you can look back and say, hold on, this is where I started out from, and look where I’ve got to now. All of this was once a thought. I’ve now translated that thought into proactive action. And these are some of the benefits and the results that I’m gaining from taking the actions that I wanted. This is how it’s changing my life. This is how it’s changing the quality of life for those around me.

That’s why you need to celebrate. That’s why we celebrate birthdays. That’s why we celebrate festivals like Christmas. They serve as positive markers every year. You need it for that positive reinforcement.

Mac Prichard:

Well, it’s been a terrific conversation, Amechi. Now, tell us, what’s next for you?

Amechi Udo:

Well, thanks for asking. One of the things is making sure that the listeners get the opportunity to connect via LinkedIn with me if they want further support. Another is that they can go across to our website at yourcareermatters.co.uk and make use of the resources we have there. And lastly, to look out for a resource that we’ll be making available that will summarize a lot of these key points we shared here on the show today using the URL that you’re gonna share with the listeners in a few moments, Mac.

Mac Prichard:

Terrific. We’ll be sure to include those links in both the show notes and the website article about your interview, Amechi, and when people do reach out to you on LinkedIn, I hope they’ll mention they heard you on Find Your Dream Job and the special URL you mentioned is for a resource about the seven steps to career change success, and listeners can find it at yourcareermatters.co.uk/macslist.

Now, Amechi, given all of the great advice you’ve shared today, what’s the one thing you want a listener to remember about the seven steps to career change success?

Amechi Udo:

That you’re resourceful, you have skills, talents, knowledge, and abilities to help you through making this change. Look at what you already possess and utilize that. That’s gonna be the key to your success. Start with that.

Mac Prichard:

Make sure you never miss an episode of Find Your Dream Job.

Subscribe to our free podcast newsletter.

You’ll get information about our guests and transcripts of every show.

Go to macslist.org/newsletters.

Again, that’s macslist.org/newsletters.

Next week, our guest will be Emma Britton.

She’s the director of career services at the National University of Natural Medicine in Portland, Oregon.

There’s someone who could help you with your job search.

But you have no connections in common.

What do you do next?

Join us next Wednesday when Emma Britton and I talk about how to make a cold networking request.

Until next time, thanks for letting us help you find your dream job.

This show is produced by Mac’s List.

Susan Thornton-Hough schedules our guests and writes our newsletter. Lisa Kislingbury Anderson manages our social media.

Our sound engineer is Matt Fiorillo. Ryan Morrison at Podfly Productions edits the show. Dawn Mole creates our transcripts. And our music is by Freddy Trujillo.

This is Mac Prichard. See you next week.