Power Tips for a Winning Midlife Career Transition

Attitudes become our realities. At midlife, if you believe your age is a reality, you’re probably right. If you believe it’s a disadvantage, you’re definitely right. Midlife is an incredible time to invest in the future. Rich with experience, at the height of your professional expertise, you’re positioned to put all your talents, interests and abilities together for the most productive and fulfilling years of your life. Take this advice and power on!

1. Create your brand: Differentiate yourself in the marketplace by creating a brand that is recognizable, repeatable and outcome based.
2. Expand your horizons: What have you learned today? Whom have you met? How often have you laughed? What risk did you take?
3. Get in fighting shape: Are you ready for the competition? Would you bet on this horse?
4. Define your market niche: So, ok, you can do most anything, but where do you excel? Where do your talents, interests and skills meet?
5. Invest in people: We are herd animals by nature, and we are inherently integral to each other’s lives. Nurture your relationships; create new connections.
6. Fish where the fish are: “Cruising the net” is probably the most popular, and least effective, way of finding a great new career opportunity. The courting ritual that goes on in front of monitors is like guppies in different tanks posturing in front of the glass. Interesting but probably not going to produce new guppies. Get out there and meet people face to face.
7. Get a Coach: Would you put a winning basketball team out on the floor without a Coach? Isn’t your life worth as much as a ball game?
8. Create a power resume: Forget the nonsense of a 1-2 page resume. If you’ve got it, flaunt it! It’s your sales brochure, the owner’s manual for a cutting edge product.
9. Bury the past: No one hires a wounded bear, so move on. Save the recriminations, pain and regrets for your journal and then burn it. There’s too much possibility in the future to waste emotion on the past.
10. Get with it! There is a time to cogitate, a time to ruminate, a time to meditate, but make it quick. Exploring new options is exactly what you should be doing at mid-life. This is a beginning, not an ending and you don’t want to miss the party.

“This time, like all times, is a very good one,
if we but know what to do with it.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson