Defining Transferable Skills for Your Job Change or When Changing Careers

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There are four steps to identifying and translating your skills and experiences when you are writing resumes and cover letters for making a job change or changing careers:

Step One – Brainstorm

Brainstorm a comprehensive list of all of your skills. Use your resume or a cover letter to jumpstart your brainstorming.

Step Two – Basic Elements

Take each of the skills on your list and break it into basic elements. What are basic elements? It might be writing, problem solving, customer service, planning, research, organization, supervising, etc.

Step Three – Jargon

Comb through your descriptions to pinpoint and delete any language that is specific to your current career, but not applicable to a new one. This might include words and phrases like: client with a capital C; work product; pitch; deliverables; ERP; BPI; operating units; deploy.

Step Four – Translate

Write your skills and experiences using the language of your new job or new career.

Not sure about that language? Use job postings for clues. What are the words that are used to describe the responsibilities or skill requirements in job postings in your new job or new career?

Stealth Search: Look for a New Job Under Your Employer’s Nose

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Question:
S writes: How do I look for a job without my employer finding out?

Answer:
Use a Stealth Search

You want to make a job change. You have identified some ideas. But, you do not want your current employer to know that you plan to make a change, until you hand in that resignation letter. A stealth search is the answer for you.

A stealth search is conducted differently from a normal job search. In a normal job search, you would apply openly for jobs, ask your contacts to keep an ear open for relevant opportunities, and although you might not tell your employer you were looking, you would tell other people. In a stealth search, you are not going to tell people you are looking for a job. You are simply going to tell them you are interested in learning more about a specific career.

The tactics of a stealth search are: networking, research, and a focus on exploration.

A stealth search may take a bit longer, but it is a very effective way to make a job change without your employer finding out.

Get Me Out of This Place! New Year’s Career Resolutions

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For some reason, the new year brings extra pressure to change jobs or change careers. We make it through the holidays and then the urgency to make a career change returns with a vengeance.

What to do when ‘Get Me Out of This Place’ tempts you to tell  your boss to: Take This Job and Shove It!

Take a deep breath. Getting a new job or changing careers is a lot easier when you are already employed, even if it’s in the wrong job.

Second, make a New Year’s career resolution to develop a career plan.

Time for a job change? What are you aiming for in the new job? Will you relocate? What are your requirements for salary, benefits, culture, working hours, etc. Is your resume up to date? Do you have references lined up? Are you ready to answer those hard questions in a job interview?

If you’ve got your eye on changing careers, do you know what your new career will be? What the education and experience requirements are? What the salary ranges are? How to write a career change resume? How to convince a potential employer that you can succeed in that new career?

If your answers are yes to the questions above, you can skip this blog. If your answers are no, read on.

Clues for Changing Careers: Answer Love It, Hate It, Tolerate It

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To get clues to potential careers you might enjoy when changing careers, it is helpful to go through the process of identifying the type of work (skills and tasks) you enjoy, what you don’t enjoy, and what you tolerate.

As you think about skills and tasks, do not limit yourself to your current job. Include your past jobs, volunteer experience, and any other experience that is relevant. Keep this list handy and add to it as you think of new ideas.

Exercise: Love It, Hate It, Tolerate It

What skills/tasks at work do you love?

What skills/tasks at work do you hate?

What skills/tasks at work do you tolerate (not love or hate)?

Why Your Career Criteria is Critical

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One of the reasons people get stuck when thinking about a career plan, changing careers, or choosing a career is they know what they do not want, but they have not identified what they do want. The process of creating your criteria is focused on what you do want.

Without a clear set of criteria, lots of careers can look attractive, but you have no way of evaluating if a career is right for you and no basis for making a choice between two or more possibilities. Your criteria will become your guiding force in exploring changing careers or choosing a career, deciding what path to follow now and in the future, knowing when it is time to leave a position, and plotting your career plan.

Get Over the ‘One Career for Life’ Myth

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It used to be that people chose their careers in high school or college, and expected the choice to shape the rest of their lives. They would get the education, training, or experience they needed, find an entry-level job, prove themselves, move up the ladder, make more money, get a better title, and finally, retire with a pension. They might change jobs once or even twice, but they would stay in the same basic field and company for the duration of their working lives.

Today, you can expect to have 10-12 jobs in your working life, and as many as 3-5 different careers. The younger you are right now, the more change you can expect during your working life.

In fact, you might even have more than one dream career during your working life.

Functional Resumes for Job Changes and Changing Careers

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Functional resumes are organized by function or category, rather than time (chronological). The advantage of a functional resume is that you can highlight the most relevant experience, even if it was volunteer work, a hobby, or three jobs ago.

Some very conservative organizations/industries (e.g., banking, Wall Street), do not like functional resumes, so be sure to check it out first, before you develop your resume.

The basic building blocks of a functional resume are:

1-Summary/Profile

2-Skill Groups

3-Work History (Usually just a list with relevant details, but without descriptions)
-Title, Employer, Location, Dates

4-Education

5-Other Pertinent Information
-Training, Awards, Volunteer Experiences, etc.

Sometimes a functional resume can be just the ticket to that job interview you’re seeking.