on this episode
Our hope in going through a career change is to find a dream job and live happily ever after. But… life is often not that simple. Career change is an iterative process of working to move steadily closer to our ideal role and our ideal life. On the podcast this week, Laura Parker shares her story of what happened when she worked very hard to change careers, only to discover that her new role wasn’t the exact fit she had hoped for.
What you’ll learn
- Why it’s important to gain insight into identifying exactly what you want, so that you know exactly what to ask for, which makes you more likely to get it.
- How to pivot when you accomplish a career change only to immediately realize that you’re ready for another career change (spoiler: it’s ok, it’s all part of the process!).
- Why you should discuss your job dissatisfaction with your manager in a way that allows the two of you to cooperate to make your role better.
Success Stories
I see much better now how my five Clifton strengths tied together and the ones that I had felt were really not that much of a big deal, I can see better how they are innovative to me as a person and to my strengths and where they come from. And that was a kind of a new thing. What I love is new situations and learning, and I actually actively look for opportunities to push myself out of my comfort zone. So, and if I look back at past roles, I would tend to have to go back to go to the land and to run a major program that had been failing. And I didn't know a lot of the nitty gritty, the detail of all the different projects, but I had the organizational skills, I wanted to learn about the different projects. I wasn't fazed by the fact that I didn't know any of that detail. So I had the challenge of learning and the environment initially and also the challenge of language as I learn to. And that satisfied my learning.
Judith Bhreasláin, LIBOR Discontinuation Project Manager, United Kingdom
Get the Full Backstory
My favorite part of the career change boot camp was actually having some of those conversations and getting feedback and positive feedback about strengths. And to me that was key, because in that moment, I realized that my network not only is a great for finding the next role, it also is helpful to… they help you remind you who you are and who you will be in your next role, even if the current circumstances are not ideal.
Elizabeth , Digital Marketing Analytics Strategist, United States/Canada
Get the Full Backstory
I just remember from that visioning exercise, being able to say no to something, even if it's a great opportunity or a great experience. It shows that as we moved through these journeys, whether it's life or even business that we… we have to stay true to what we're really searching for and wanting to create.
Matthew Toy, Yoga Instructor, United States/Canada
Get the Full Backstory
Laura Parker 00:02
I work for a technology, SAS company, my role is around retaining our customers in Europe, so outside of the UK, and also growing them. And the interesting thing for me about why I was in this position is because I did a big career change about two years ago to get this job. It was my two year anniversary yesterday, actually. So that in itself was a big shift. I've had a big learning curve over the last two years, but I was a little bit sad to find myself in a position and having to think about a new career change.
Introduction 00:36
This is the Happen To Your Career podcast, with Scott Anthony Barlow. We help you stop doing work that doesn't fit you, figure out what does and make it happen. We help you define the work that's unapologetically you, and then go get it. If you're ready to make a change, keep listening. Here's Scott. Here's Scott. Here's Scott.
Scott Anthony Barlow 01:00
Look, everyone loves a happy ending. And a lot of time on the podcast, we talk to people, they share their stories, and they come off as pretty straightforward. They were unhappy, they felt stuck. Then they decided to change careers. It was challenging, but eventually they succeeded. And now they're incredibly happy. Hooray. But we've been having conversation behind the scenes for about two or three years now, that there's a danger in that. And we want you to understand how it really looks from the inside when you decide to make a career change. So today, we wanted to highlight a different kind of career change story, when that wasn't as simple.
Laura Parker 01:43
It's just that the job, it wasn't, you know, there were plenty of people out there that will love that sort of moving fast paced, moving from customers-to-customer, but it just didn't sit well with me.
Scott Anthony Barlow 01:54
That's Laura Parker. She made a big career change to get out of a role where she was unhappy, but just two years into her new role, realize she was not thriving and needed another change. The truth is, the career change is a journey, you don't necessarily achieve your dream job, achieve your dream career in just one step. And even if you do, it turns out, you're human, your life goes on, you continue to change, and develop new interests. And you may find that you need to make another change. And not only is that okay, it's actually great, because it means you're listening to yourself and keeping track of what you need to feel happy in your role. Laura does a great job of describing how she made a career change, and then made another one. I want you to listen just for that and in our conversation. Later in the episode, Laura will talk about the experience of knowing when it was time to change careers after she had just changed careers. Here she is talking about what led up to her career change.
Laura Parker 02:59
So before joining this technology company, I had spent about 12 years working predominantly for one global law firm. And I had a variety of roles. I had the opportunity to go to Hong Kong with them for a couple of years. But I knew after I got back from Hong Kong, which was probably about four years ago now, that I was going to need a new environment, a new working, a new role. I knew I wanted to leave professional services. Anyone who works in professional services will probably understand where I'm coming from but partnerships are their very own special working environments. And for me, they had some frustrations after being in that sector for 12 years. For example, it's quite hard to get partners to make decisions. They will call it a collaborative environment, but it can be... it's quite difficult because typically no one person has leadership so you can end up sort of analysis paralysis by an analysis type situation. I know after being in that type of environment trying to create change for that period of time, I knew that I had to move on to really stretch myself and work in a different environment, it was more empowering. There were lots of specifics as to what I thought I wanted to do in a new job, I wanted to move to a smaller, more nimble company, more agile, I was interested in trying to move into technology just because I thought for no particular scientific reason, I just thought it would be a good thing to move to in today's world. I wanted to get a bit more back on the frontline of sales, which I haven't been in working in partnerships, you don't really sell in the way that you do when you're selling a product. So I wanted to get back on the front line and sales. So I had quite a lot of criteria that I was looking for when I made the move, but essentially, I just knew I needed to be in a different more empowering environment but it took me a long time. I was probably looking for another job for probably about two years actually before I found this one, it was very hard to move industries. I didn't know any other recruiters beyond the legal and professional services environment. It was quite a hard piece of work.
Scott Anthony Barlow 05:08
So you worked for around two years to make that change.
Laura Parker 05:13
Exactly.
Scott Anthony Barlow 05:13
Which was, incidentally, I've also about two years ago, and then we did all this work and all this effort, made the change, and then somewhere along the way, found that you wanted to make another shift. Is that right?
Laura Parker 05:28
Yes.
Scott Anthony Barlow 05:28
Tell me about that
Laura Parker 05:29
My experience in the law firms have been looking after or managing the largest clients of, most recently, it was investment bank clients. Most of them were worth about between one and $10 million to the law firm. And when I was offered the role here, I was offered the opportunity to manage and up-sell to the largest customers in at the time in the Amir region. What happened was, though that by the time I'd done my notice periods, which in the UK is, you know, for senior people, it's typically around three months. By the time I'd work my three months notice period at the law firm, when I joined here, the team that I was meant to join looking after the largest customers no longer existed, they've made a decision to disband it. So my role ended up being looking after hundreds of customers, you know, I've had nearly 150 at one point and trying to sell to those customers, and that after probably about 12 months, I just noticed it really wasn't playing to my strengths. It was taking up a lot of mental energy because I was having to re-adjust actually some of my baseline values to a certain extent, and it was exhausting. And I just thought this is not what I want to be doing. As I say, I was a bit frustrated and found myself in that position so soon after making a big career shift. But that was why that I really wanted to own it and do something to improve my situation. But then, I earned...
Scott Anthony Barlow 06:57
I think that's a place where a lot of people find themselves. And I'm a little biased because we run a company where people find us when they want to make career changes. But often, when we get to interact with a variety of people around the world, they are in a similar position to what you experienced, where you decided, okay, this is not working, and that working with global law firm, and in that industry, that area wasn't working for many different reasons, wasn't the right type of collaboration, etc, etc. And then you did all of this work, all those effort, which was pretty awesome to make a change, knowing that you needed a few different pieces, and then you got to the new role, which you know, again, kudos to you for doing something about it and owning it, as you said. And then you realize that there were some other pieces that you maybe haven’t necessarily considered like I heard you say something about, some of my baseline values were adding up in the way that I wanted them to. So what would be an example of that?
Laura Parker 08:01
The main example that comes to mind is when you've got targets, and you've got a large customer base to try and sell to reach those targets, it feels very transactional in nature. And that is not what I had spent 12 years doing beforehand, my strengths, and I guess my values aligned to really building relationships for the long term, bringing value to people, understanding what they value, and then figuring out how I can bring that to their table. And I just didn't have the opportunity to do that when I had to try and keep in touch with 150 different customers and try and sell to them. It was just very transactional and that it meant I was turning up on phone calls without I was used to knowing everything that went on in the customers I had before, probably more than the partners and that wasn't the case here. I was sort of having to be dropped in without having done research, without having half the time to sit down and talk to people, without really potentially ever having met people before. On the customer side, that was probably the prime example of why I thought this just isn't sitting well with how I want to operate. It's just that the job it wasn't, you know, there were plenty of people out there that will love that sort of moving fast paced, moving from customers-to-customer, but it just didn't sit well with me.
Scott Anthony Barlow 09:15
Well, it sounds like for you to get the most out of your role work, you need to have a continuous relationship, for lack of a better phrase, and that continuous collaboration and that know what's going on and that is much more fulfilling for you. I'm guessing shot in the dark then the parachuting in and making the sale.
Laura Parker 09:37
Yes, absolutely. I love the wind of the sale. I do love getting signatures on the dotted line and but I want to do it because we found a solution that really works for that customer because we can help that customers business and we're gonna help our stakeholders look good, feel good, do their job better. And for me, that just means I prefer to spend more time understanding what that looks like for as many people as I can.
Scott Anthony Barlow 10:01
Very cool. That's amazing that you know that about yourself. So my question then becomes, at what point did you decide, I did all this work, I now recognize that I need to make a different shift in one way or another, what transpired to have you say that, okay, now’s the time?
Laura Parker 10:19
I mean, I knew it probably after about nine months were very orderly target driven business. So I'm thinking in courses. How the courses, I miss my target and why I was missing my target. So after about three quarters, I was thinking, this a… it had been a really steep learning curve, and I had completely underestimated that but I done learning curves in the past, I have moved industries, most jobs I've had have moved me from industry to industry, but this was a really steep learning curve. So I found that quite difficult, but be then the fact that I wasn't playing to my strengths. So I was probably about nine months in and I was having... I did have conversations with my manager, I mean, I think the manager does play a role in these conversations. And if you've got a great one then, you know, you really need to leverage them. So I was being open that the response back from the business was, well, you need to tell us what you want to do if it's not this. And my issue was, I know about all the jobs that exist. I don't know what future jobs people might be thinking about creating. So I was struggling, I didn't think I wanted to do any of the jobs that I sort of saw existed, the people I interacted with regularly were struggling to think “well, what's the new job that I might do?” And I started talking to people, but actually then I got put onto your podcast by a colleague, and that sort of set me on a fantastic path.
Scott Anthony Barlow 11:41
Well, I'm so glad that your colleagues set you on the direction of our podcasts, because it turns out very well in the end. But I'm curious, when you started down that direction after you found the podcast, what happened next that sent you the direction that turns out?
Laura Parker 11:58
So I listened to a few episodes of the podcast. And then I think it was literally at the end of one of the podcasts, I think you say, “you know, you can email me if you have any questions.” And I just thought, how or I argued this email thing ago, let's see what really happens, and you reply, and I thought, wow, this really exists. And then it all happened quite quickly. I had an initial call. I can't remember who he is, sorry. But he was asking some great questions about my situation and what I thought I wanted to do, and then that sort of got me onto the career change bootcamp program. And I just thought, you know, it was a quite a lot of money up front, but I thought I had been in, for me damaging career situations in my 20s. And I thought it happened to me twice before and I've managed to get out of them. And I promised myself I'd never let that happen again, because I knew… I know how damaging is it takes a long time to build up your confidence when being shaken. You know, you can lose your confidence very quickly and then it takes a lot longer to build that back up. And I really didn't, I really wanted to try and nip this in the bud this time, my confidence was struggling after that sort of nine month period I mentioned. So I couldn't believe that I was in this situation, but I thought, you know, I just need to really do something quite, drastic’s the wrong word, but what I wanted to do was have some things that were... do something and earn something that had longevity. And that's what I've loved about the program is that I know I've got access to these resources forever. And you know, the coaching skills I've had from Jennifer, the coaching sessions have been amazing. And it really helped me understand things about myself that I hadn't been able to piece together before but even so, notwithstanding that just having access to the resources and the worksheets has really helped me create an environment that is feels sustainable. They all happen quite quickly. Once I had that initial conversation, I thought, “no, I am going to put my money where my mouth is. I'm going to do this program and I'm going to make it work.” Say that I don't keep finding myself in this it you know, I'm in my early 40s now so that's why I kind of couldn't believe that 20 years on I'm back in indecision I remember being in many years ago.
Scott Anthony Barlow 14:07
Share with us what has, I already know, but what at this point has happened because as you said, for you it has moved rather quickly. But what are you getting to do right now? Because you're in a state of transition, right?
Laura Parker 14:22
Yes. So do you want to know what… how I'm self-managing my current goals at the moment or what I did to get to this point?
Scott Anthony Barlow 14:32
Both. So you are transitioning internally. You found yourself, just a backup here a second, I heard you say earlier that, you know, I had a great manager. They were very open to, so what do you want to do? And that's fantastic. That's not necessarily in every single situation, but it does happen more commonly than what I think most people feel like. That said, you, I think did a great job of taking advantage of that opportunity and trying to figure out what could this look like. So, how did that transpire?
Laura Parker 15:07
I can't tell if the career change bootcamp and was quite religious about that, I took off I did all the… I've joined the Facebook group, set up a coaching sessions, did all the pre work and you know, had some great coaching sessions with Jennifer, connected with someone else in London who was going through the program so we met up a few times. I blocked the time out, you know, made the time to do it all. So that was all sort of following the process. What at the same time, what I had decided to own as well was start talking to other people around the business here to find out I'm quite a few people here have changed roles, like significantly change from department to department and I started a couple of people in the London office had done that. So I started talking to them about how they done that and the common theme was, being clear with your manager that you want to move, but also going out to the business and finding out what's going on in bits that you don't know about, parts of business you don't know about so that you can actually come up with some options. So that's what I did. I started getting in touch with senior people, not so senior people, people in departments that I thought I might want to work in. We're not very big in London here, you know, there's only about 40 of us now. So I was contacting people in our San Francisco, Melbourne, New York offices. And just, they were people who had either shifted roles quite significant. And I wanted to find out how they done that, or they were people, as I say, who were in departments that I thought maybe I'd be interested in, working in. Or all they were just quite senior people that have a broad scope of what's going on. They see more the what's going on than I was, so I could get their take as to what they thought the challenges in the business where, what some extra effort would be valued. And I had all these conversations, I sat down with Jennifer, I work through what my questions were going to be that I was asking them. So I kept the same questions for everybody. So that allowed me to have some things coming out from all those conversations. So I could spot patterns and actually come up with a plan and not just have lots of random bits of information that didn't connect. So I got some really great intelligence from that. And it was through those conversations, plus all the career change bootcamp stuff to help me really understand what my strengths were, that allowed me to design essentially, I've designed a job for myself here. I took that to… my manager was great. He supported me in getting that up to the leadership. And where I'm at now is leadership bought into it. They didn't want it to be a sort of all in right now. So that's the transition point also, because I do carry a target and we have investors who care about revenues. So I can appreciate that there are some, there's a bit of a business imperative for me to keep... trying to keep bringing in some of the revenue that I'm targeted for, but they have dropped my revenue target by 20% to allow me to spend 20% of my time on the new roles, on scoping it out. And then I know they've created a backfill for... their starting the process for having a backfill for me in the summer.
Scott Anthony Barlow 18:14
Okay, so in that 20% and the role that you're shifting to, what do you get to do?
Laura Parker 18:19
So right now, a couple of key things have happened. I was an off site in our San Francisco office for a group of people that are quite instrumental, so the goal I get to have does involve supporting our largest customers, you won't be surprised to hear, we have about...
Scott Anthony Barlow 18:36
Not surprised.
Laura Parker 18:37
We have about 80 of those across the whole business. And we have a group of four people that are responsible for kind of delivering our product to that customer. Those four people had an off site last week in San Francisco. So I went to that off site and have been able to contribute to that and part of my role will be to start to understand, at the moment, all four of them as kind of treating that role a little bit differently. They're delivering different things in different ways to the customers. So we're trying to bring some standardization to then allow people to flex where they need to, but where we're kind of starting from a bit more of a more standard approach. So that was one thing that I've kicked off. And then other than that, the main thing I'm doing for the rest of this quarter and again, with Jennifer's help, I've really been very clear as to how many days this quarter, the 20% means I can contribute, you know, that helps set expectations and help people don't expect too much for me or me expect too much for myself. So with the time taken in San Francisco, I mapped out how many other days I have left, and I'm using those days to start connecting to other people with this new hat on to see what they think the value that I could bring in this new role and what challenges they've got that they'd like some extra resources supposed around and someone a bit of a fact finding mission until the end of March, for sure, initially.
Scott Anthony Barlow 19:59
How would you describe some of your strengths and how they fit into this new role? Which I understand this role doesn't have a name yet. And honestly, I think that it might be easier if a lot of different roles have the name and we just focused on what they actually do and what your function is and what results you deliver. But for you, you have done a great job identifying some of your strengths and what you want. But if you can share just a little bit about how you describe your strengths and where they fit into this role.
Laura Parker 20:29
So actually, of all my coaching sessions with Jennifer and all the work that we did through StrengthsFinder, the phrase that really resonated with me, that she, of course came up with, because she's fabulous. With the idea of being a conductor in an orchestra. That sort of was the best way that I could visualize it. And when I look back at where I've been most successful, it is getting people focused on an outcome, bringing the moving parts together, trying to streamline things, but enabling people at the same time. And that was the crux of what I thought I could bring. We're a fast growing business, will probably double in size again this year, it's a really real opportunity to get people aligned in a direction, as I say, help enable people to focus on aspects they might not currently be able to say, everyone's too busy rushing around. So that idea of being a conductor, just bringing people together like defining what we're trying to achieve, bringing people together, getting people focused on delivering that and empowering them to do that is the kind of pretty much where I the main crux of the skills I wanted to put to use.
Scott Anthony Barlow 21:40
You know, what is, I think just crazy. I see it all the time. I'm still blown away by it. The simple fact that when you, and I think you've done such a great job of this, when you go through and get clear about what you want, all of a sudden that puts you in a much better position to be able to ask for exactly what you want. And the crazy part is that when you ask for what you want, people are so much more likely to get what it is that they actually want. And I think you've done such a phenomenal job of that here. So kudos to you, first of all. And then second of all, I'm really curious about something that you said earlier, you had mentioned the idea of confidence and you promising yourself that you're never going to let yourself go down the track where your confidence is depleted or diminished so much because you know, just how long it takes to bounce back from that. And I would absolutely agree with that, you know, thinking about my own experiences and the experiences that we see all the time, you know, we see sometimes people that have overstayed in their job for three or four years and it just takes a significant period of time to be able to bounce back from that from a confidence standpoint. So I'm curious a little bit about, what you meant by that? And how did you recognize before it got to that undoable point that this is something that needed to change now? Not later.
Laura Parker 23:09
Yeah, I mean, I recognized it quite quickly because of having been in the situation before, albeit it was a long time ago. But I recognized it quite quickly. It was a while before I figured out what to do about it. And I had, as I said, I had had the conversation with my manager that I wasn't enjoying where I was, I knew I wasn't delivering what they needed the goal to deliver but I was struggling with that, as I mentioned, for some of the sort of values way I operate. So I had had that conversation. What actually worked really well that kind of also really helped move me down this path apart from my colleague here, tell me about your podcast, was it struck me, my managers in San Francisco, he's American, and I think and I'm British, and it really opens a doorway. When I was much more, well, for me quite blunt about where I was at, you know, British people, skirt around things, and we certainly read the tones. And I think I hadn't been blunt enough with him. So he hadn't appreciated where I was at. And I got to a point where I just had a really open conversation. So I don't want to be in this role. That helped a lot. Because then and but at that point, I was able to say, but I'm doing something about it. By that point, I'd signed up to the boot camp. So he really valued the fact that I was doing something about it, that I... and he understood finally, what I was really saying, rather than me being British and not saying it clearly enough for him. And from that point on, he was able to sort of connect me and open a few doors. So I've forgotten your question, my confidence, but I knew my confidence. I recognize it quickly. It's just a few things came into line that meant I was able to do something about it, which was finding out about Happen To Your Career, having that open and frank conversation with my manager and really getting to understand my strength and then doing something about it.
Scott Anthony Barlow 24:58
What did you feel like was the hardest part of making this most recent change? And I know it's still not complete. However, it's well on its way and it's going to happen in entirety, it sounds like on some kind of timeframe here, but what did you feel like was most difficult for you?
Laura Parker 25:19
I think the most difficult bit is probably still to come if I'm honest. And I have one more coaching session less so I shall be making a list to Jennifer. In that time, I've done brand new roles before and I know that what makes him successful, one of the things that makes them successful is sort of being given the authority to do the role. And this role is even more interesting. I've never designed a role, I've done... I've been the first person to do a role, but I've not actually created the role before. What will be interesting now is I don't have a job title. I have an idea about what team I'll be in but that is still to be fully decided, so therefore, I don't know yet who my manager is going to be. I know my current manager feels very strongly in what I'm doing, he believes in his heart, I think that we do need someone doing what I propose. So he's backing me up at the moment, but I will have to move out of his team in the not too distant future. So what teams do I go too. So I think the challenging bit is going to be getting that authority and being able to sort of start working, assuming that I have some of the authority to do what I think I want to do.
Scott Anthony Barlow 26:30
Have you been in a similar situation before too, when you're creating something new, there has a tendency to be ambiguity around it? And working through the ambiguity to still make sure that you are getting whatever results are, either necessary or that you want to and a lot of times even defining those things can be a challenge in the first place. So I totally can appreciate what you're saying in terms of some of the challenges are yet to come.
Laura Parker 26:59
Absolutely, I think so, you know, something I've learned about myself not necessarily through the bootcamp, but I know I'm not, you know, one of my strengths is not planning to the nth degree, I am someone who tends to just get on with stuff and then I'll course correct as I need to. That's been okay, so far. I've put some high level goals in my proposal. I put some success criteria, or what I think success will look like. But I haven't got a completely defined roadmap as to how I'm going to get there. I'm fine with that. Because I know that the more I talked to people, the more I'll get that defined. But I'm also conscious that just for the business, like do you need to show that there is some direction and I'm not just sort of off chatting to people without really putting anything together. So I'm alive to that as well.
Scott Anthony Barlow 27:42
One of the things you said to me before we started here, and before we really got going was I didn't expect to have so many concrete results so quickly. And I've got to ask you about that because here's the the general response we usually have when we get the opportunity to work with people, usually people say something along the lines of, "Hey, it was way different than I expected. It was far more amazing than I expected. It also took longer than what I thought it was going to." And that's the general response. So I've got to ask you about this, because it's different than what I hear on the normal side, and you've done such a great job, helping to speed up the process for yourself and really grabbing and taking control of that. And quite honestly, that's usually where I see more results more quickly, is usually those people that take more action more quickly, quite frankly. But what do you feel, first of all, when you say that, what did you mean when you said, "I got more concrete results more quickly than I expected?"
Laura Parker 28:41
I was very surprised at how quickly, I mean, I mentioned to you I think before we started recording that my target, I have a call to target and my target was dropped by 20% fairly easily. Like just within a couple of weeks me putting this proposal out there. And that was a shock to me. Like I think, as I say, this business runs on targets. That's how we show our investors that we're progressing. And my boss is very targets focused. So once that happened, I was like, Okay, this is really happening now. And that was a signal for me more than having a job title or knowing which bit the business I was going to sit in. Because we've had to really address what we're delivering as a business because of that, that happened really quickly. I said to you before we started that I wanted to show people that I'm just an ordinary person. And this is just sort of happened to me and it's not an extraordinary, I didn't want to feel this was an extraordinary thing. So I've been trying to think what was in my control that facilitated that because some things you can't control, like you can't control who the manager is, you can't control whether they have the right outlook to support you or whether they care, but like when I think about what actually progress this definitely doing the bootcamp helped and you know, obviously I would recommend people do your bootcamp but I think what it showed the company here was that I was serious and I actually came with some pretty decent value adding information when I had that proposal, like I've been through some good thought processes about myself as to how I got to where I got to. So that was valuable, I think can, you know, people can own that. And the other thing that really shifted with me having a very frank conversation with my manager, which I highlighted already, for me, I was at the point where I just thought I would just rather get this out in the open. If it causes massive issues, then I'll have to deal with that. But I just couldn't, I had to let him know where I was really at. So I would encourage people, as far as they feel possible, just be really open with where you're at, but try and do that with a plan or some thinking as to what it could look like if it was different.
Scott Anthony Barlow 30:47
So that's really interesting. It sounds like a big portion of what moved to this along for you so quickly was being able to come to the table at a different level of preparedness and having thought through a lot of these things than what might otherwise have happened. And it sounds like there's a lot of contributors to that, part of it was, you can take taking control of the process. Part of it was, you know, getting to work with our team and Jennifer. Part of it was, some of the other steps that you took throughout the process, too. But I just want to say, first of all, congratulations, because I know, you know, going and doing that, and taking that level of control can absolutely be difficult and doing that in such a short time period, I think it shows that, you know, almost anybody really can do this, if you're focused on the pieces that you can influence and you can control which I think was another factor that you alluded to as well. So it really, really nice job.
Laura Parker 31:47
Yeah, absolutely. Though, as I say, there are things that within my control, there are things are, you know, having a great manager, having a fast growth company where, you know, I'm in a fast growth company where movement is quite common. That's not in everyone's control, either. But I do when I think about being open and being honest and being frank and then taking a bit of ownership over the process of what the future could look like, that is within our control, I think.
Scott Anthony Barlow 32:13
Everybody has the ability to influence that. I love it. Well, I so appreciate the opportunity for us to sit front row and see some of these changes, and you putting trust in us to be able to assist with that. That's amazing. And I really appreciate you taking the time, not just... before we hit record, we were actually looking it up trying to figure out, you know, how many months has actually been? Well, it turns out that was just back in September, where you started to really double down on making making this type of change. So it's really only been four or five months?
Laura Parker 32:49
Yeah, probably. I mean, yeah, probably less, probably more four months because it just took a while to get their schedules with time differences. But yeah, definitely by Christmas, I sort of knew, I knew that things will know on the cards to change.
Scott Anthony Barlow 33:02
Well, great job going from listener of the podcast into getting the results that you were looking for. I think that that's absolutely amazing. And thank you for taking the time and making the time and I only have one more question for you, for people that find themselves in that situation where you were, you know, maybe they had made a change or two before and recognizing that, you know, something is amiss values or otherwise, what advice would you give them when they're at that point, trying to decide, you know, should I make a change, and should I make another change? And if so, what does that look like? What advice would you give them?
Laura Parker 33:38
My advice, when I have given this before is, do not stay in that negative environment for any longer than you absolutely need to. It's so harmful and it takes such a long time to get back up to being the best version of yourself. And when I say don't stay in it, I mean, look at what you can control and start working on those pieces. A lot of it you can't control but there are bits you can and that's where you need to focus your efforts.
Scott Anthony Barlow 34:07
That is fantastic. Thank you again for coming on and sharing your story.
Laura Parker 34:12
Thank you. I'm so pleased I could do this. Thank you very much.
Scott Anthony Barlow 34:15
Hey, many of the stories that you've heard on the podcast are from listeners that have decided they wanted to take action, and taking the first step of having a conversation with our team to try and figure out how we can help. And if you want to implement what you have heard, and you want to completely change your life and your career, then let's figure out how we can help. So here's what I would suggest. Just open your phone right now and open your email app. And I'm going to give you my personal email address, scott@happentoyourcareer.com just email me and put 'Conversation' in the subject line. And then when you do that, I'll introduce you to the right person on our team, and you can have a conversation with us, we'll try and understand your goals and what you want to accomplish in your career no matter where you're at. And we can figure out the very best way that we can help you and your situation. So open it up right now. And send me an email with 'Conversation' in the subject line: scott@happentoyourcareer.com
Scott Anthony Barlow 35:24
Since 2013, we've talked with many thousands of people about their career changes, about how they're thinking about work, about what has been great, what has been terrible and everything in between. So consequently, we get a lot of insight into how people struggle with career change, as well as how they're successful in career change. Something I found really fascinating is, when people have been struggling in the wrong career, in the wrong roles that aren't fulfilling for many years, not just like one or two or three years, but many, many years, maybe even changing roles multiple times.
Louise 36:10
Over the last 15 years or so, I've pretty much been in the same career. Just moving from, I don't do any day-to-day transaction stuff now. So I move from having to actually make sure the P&L is okay or looking at balance sheets. I hate that. That's not where my motivation lies.
Scott Anthony Barlow 36:32
That's Louise McNee. She went to business school, she worked a series of business operations jobs that as you'll be able to hear her totally satisfying for her. She does a great job explaining how it felt to be unhappy at work and how difficult it was to understand why she was so unhappy or to even explain it to other people like your loved ones. This is incredibly isolating, that sense of loneliness can actually be an obstacle in itself to career change, you know that whole, "I'm the only one who feels this way. What's wrong with me?" And the truth is that it's very common experience. Louise talks about that lonely feeling later on in this episode. So stay with us. It's something that anyone thinking about career change, absolutely needs to hear. All that and plenty more next week right here on Happen To Your Career. Make sure that you don't miss it. And if you haven't already, click Subscribe on your podcast player so that you can download this podcast in your sleep, and you get it automatically. Even the bonus episodes every single week, sometimes multiple times a week. Until next week, adios. I'm out.
Sign up to receive email updates
Enter your name and email address below and I'll send you periodic updates about the podcast.
Ready for Career Happiness?
What Career Fits You?
Finally figure out what you should be doing for work
Join our 8-day “Mini-Course” to figure it out. It’s free!
Featured Episodes
View all episodes
April 17, 2017
174: Add Value, Grow Your Career with Michael Bigelow
IT’S ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT THE LIKABILITY AND CONNECTION CERTAINLY DO HELP. BUT IT’S ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT I REALLY DO FEEL THAT IT’S BOTH WHO YOU KNOW AND HOW YOU’RE CONNECTED TO THEM, AS WELL AS WHAT YOU KNOW. MICHAEL BIGELOW Whether you’re looking to make a lateral job transition to a […]
Listen Now
January 21, 2019
267: 3 Creative and Strategic Ways to Show Your Strengths to Interviewers
Everywhere you look these days, you can find articles sharing why focusing on your strengths is more valuable than improving your weaknesses. Using your signature strengths in your role means you can be energized instead of drained, engaged instead of bored, and successful instead of struggling. When it comes down to it, working in your […]
Listen Now
