How do seasoned executives successfully master career change?

Ernst Bechinie, Executive Coach, has interviewed 45 company owners, executives and professionals about their experiences. The following shows a summary of the key strategies used.

1) Being aware and Listen to inner signals for change

The majority of the participants decided themselves, to look to change something in their career. The trigger points for starting to analyze change usually came from a combination of three sources: the desire to find new professional challenges, being unsatisfied with their present situation, and the search for a new meaning of life. Important for them was to realize these signals and learn to follow them.

2) Success came from acting in the market

Successful professional changes were happening in a process of trial and error in the market. They were not the result of introspection isolated from the market. Most importantly, successful career changes were not obtained by following a career handbook.  Transformations in careers typically result of intuition, trying out new routes to market, overcoming failures, taking chances in the right moment. At the beginning of the process people usually did not know where it would end.

3) Having confidence in their own resources and former success

The path of change for most participants was often clouded with doubts, unanswered questions and racked by insecurities. Important however, was the ability to draw on ones’ own resources and capabilities that were already there. Having a fundamental trust in what had worked before and doing more of it.

4) Discovering and following our passion

All participants had been working on their professional competencies and had compared them with their relevant markets. This was a standard procedure for everybody. However it was found important by many, to examine carefully their emotional connections concerning a future occupation. To understand where their passion lay and what it could mean for their professional search.

5) Learning from role models

For many participants it was very helpful to talk to people who were already established and successful in an area they were interested in; people who could help them open their eyes. However these contacts were not always found in the participants’ normal environment. They had to leave known paths and venture into new territories.

6) Listening and talking

Today everybody is talking about networking and also participating in the corresponding events. However many participants found it difficult at the beginning to find and create the right environment where they could benefit and talk freely about themselves. The challenge was to broaden their search to meet people outside their former area of activity and comfort zone and get to know different business worlds. All participants stressed the need and importance of building up a circle of contacts they could trust implicitly with very personal questions.

7) Allow enough time for the change

The transition phase of the participants took in average a little over one year. There was a minimum of about 6 months and some transitions took up to three years. The basis of this calculation was from the first intentions for a change until the moment of a new professional start. For most of the participants this was a time of confrontation, both with the market and with themselves. All felt in hindsight that it was an intensive time of learning with lasting positive effects.

8) Professional changes and consequences in personal life

The professional reorientation was for a number of people also the catalyst for questioning existing life patterns. Personal relationships had been influenced – in different ways. On one side, some participants reported that they had ceased a relationship with their life partner during the period of their professional change. On the other side the job shift could lead to a more intensive relationship with the surrounding.

Ernst Bechinie – ebechinie@solutioncoaching.ch - www.solutioncoaching.ch