If you’re looking to change careers there are several things that can get in the way of a smooth transition.  You want to be sure you address these areas, while not getting stuck or slowed down by poor preparation.   True, economics can play a role in available opportunities, but by your using a more focused and strategic approach, you’ll get faster and lasting results, beating out the competition.  Here’s a few key areas to assist you:

DO’S
1.  Update and make relevant for the job you seek, your resume, appearance, attitude, contacts list for possible introductions, personal and professional assessments, learning and training.

2.  Fully research what you would be doing in the new job, confident you are the right fit for it, and learn all you can about your customer, competitors, best marketing practices, the economic industry ranking and financial expectations, networking strategies and your most effective business development channels.

3.  Set up your support team.  Who will help mentor you?  Who will help position you?  Who will coach you?  Navigate into new territories with a select boat full of your best advisors and confidantes.

DON’TS
1.  Avoid unnecessary or excessive research of jobs sites, newspaper ads or job boards.  Cover the basics, but don’t overlook step one which is develop  a list of potential supporters, conveying your short blurb on your chosen career area and your top 3 qualifications for it.  Request specific support for introductions and ideas from them.

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When we don’t build our field of dreams, it’s often because we don’t want to invest time and energy in naming and detailing our most cherished goals unless we can be sure they’ll happen.  Yet it’s odd that we’re willing to waste so much time walking around and surveying the wrong fields and putting our energy into less rewarding projects.    

It’s as if our goal is to create the perfect field itself. We keep planting fresh sod and raccoons come and turn it over looking for grubs, and the sod doesn’t take root.  But at this point most of you give up.  In fact, and I speak from my own grass-growing and goal setting experiences, you will win this competition if you keep on replanting.  Here’s your step-by-step guide for laying out that perfect field of dreams: 

1. Write Goals Down —  To make your ideas concrete, write them down.  A popular 1979 Harvard study of students and other similar studies have demonstrated that those who write down goals far more often achieve them, than those who don’t write them down.  So this should strengthen the importance of this step for you.   There has been some research done on the kinesthetic relation between your ideas being handwritten to your brain’s receptivity of the writing, plus you can’t always carry your computer around to input fresh ideas.  Even so, typing your ideas is faster and you may be less concerned with neatness.  But however you get your ideas down, brain dump all your ideas first, then write down the eventual details of your chosen goal.  

2.  Choose Your  Goal — You can’t have what you want until you know what it is. Imagine, Choose, Create in this order.  You may want several goals that all seem beneficial, but to get started, choose one.  You will manifest it more quickly and be on to the next, rather than continuing to rethink or reconstruct your one idea over and over if you give this phase a fixed time incubation period.  Yes, knock it down and criticize it, question it with varying perspectives, but then move on to implementation.  Let “simplicity and speed” be your motto so you don’t drag out getting the result you want and you accomplish it with less effort.  You’re now putting out your clear intention to the universe, rather than just imagining it, and the universe will listen and begin to reflect results back to you. 

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