With a new year on the horizon, it is a good time to take stock and reflect on what it is you want from your career in 2024 and beyond. Perhaps your career priorities have changed, your values have shifted or you are just ready to try something new this year. Here are some tips to help you kickstart your career goals and start moving forward.
Damn that ‘dream job’ that we’re meant to be finding! Of course, it’s right to aim high and of course, you’re worth it. But isn’t it a little exhausting when supply of dream jobs is a bit low in your niche?
Supposing this week, we sack the dream job idea in favour of the right-for-right now role? It’s not quite so big and perfect, but can answer most of your needs and some of your wants and get you on the path to the dream. Doesn’t that sound good (in a slightly pink and Barbie way)?
What is a right-for-right now role?
We’re going pretty ‘Ronseal’ here; this is not your forever role (that’s not really a thing anyway) or even your five-year role. It’s going to tide you over for 18 months tops, I’d say.
Why do I want this?
You want this because you’re stuck and can’t find (or get) the longer term role you want. It allows you to get back into the work environment.
Does this mean taking a more junior role?
Not necessarily. If you can’t find the senior role you want, that might be an option. You’d have to sell this to a prospective recruiter to see if they like the idea of having someone more senior for a short amount of time. But it could also be a mini-pivot - working in an element of the role you’ve done before. Ideally, you want your RFRN role to be connected to your ‘dream job’ so that you build the right network and skills.
What will it give me?
Money (woohoo!), experience, practice at managing the juggle, a new network, skills update, tech update, something new for your CV, a recent reference…
What won’t it give me?
It might not tick the ‘meaningful work’ box, the ultimate salary that you want and deserve and a long-term plan.
Won’t that look bad on my CV?
If you work in a traditional industry, with traditional recruiters or processes, then you might want to be careful here. You know who you are. For the majority of you, it’s not going to make a negative difference and look at all the positive stuff. Then look at it again!
Are you up for a right-for-right-now role? Need some help? Grab a Career Coaching Burst (1-hour coaching blitz) and let’s get that job!
Your Personal Brand is how you promote yourself and the image that people see of you. It's the unique telling of your story which could include your skills, experience, passions and interests. It's also a reflection of your personality, attitudes, behaviour and spoken/unspoken words.
You can use your personal branding to differentiate yourself from other people, creating your own USP.
Here are five considerations for your personal brand.
Your CV and LinkedIn profile are essential tools when job searching, but should they be the same or different?
The simple answer is that they should be different.
Your CV and LinkedIn profile are designed to showcase your professional expertise and attract the opportunities you are looking for. However, there are some fundamental differences in the way they should be written and structured.
Nobody enjoys looking for work. The Internet makes it easier in some ways, accessibility for instance, but it sucks you in and takes up a lot of time. You can easily spend hours searching for jobs and feel like you’ve worked hard on your job search but actually have zero concrete possibilities.
Shiny things draw you in. Shiny things are easy and attractive. When you’re worn down by online job search they become more alluring.
Shiny things might be similar jobs to ones you’ve done before. You had decided to pivot or do something different, but it would be so ‘easy’ to fall back into these roles. “I can do all that!”, you yell at an inanimate list of job requirements. However, there’s a reason why you want to make a change. What you did wasn’t working!
Shiny things might be retraining into something new. It’s often a bit random and unrelated but in a moment of madness, you think “Yes, why not?! I’m sure I’d be great at shampooing puppies!”. Or you hate Facebook and Instagram but Social Media Management is so flexible! Those opportunities will work fine for some people but random retraining rarely aligns with your values, qualifications and experience.
Shiny things might be super-flexible, like buying a franchise. For a fee, you have an instant business that practically runs itself whilst you take care of all your other responsibilities and watch the money roll in. If only. Franchise owners do well out of this arrangement!
The simple solution to avoiding shiny things is focus. When you take the scattergun approach (looking at lots of things) to job search your attention wanders. When you sort out your non-negotiables (must-haves) for your next role and get really clear on your career, your job search becomes aligned and efficient. And your CV, LinkedIn profile and Elevator Pitch follow suit so you can really sell yourself. Is it time to refocus your job search?
What next?
Super-charge your focus! Book in for a free, 20-minute Discovery call and discuss your career project with us.
When you’re considering your next career step, which aspects are important to you? Good salary? Fair enough! Learning opportunities? Absolutely. Otherwise, you’ll stagnate in the role. Flexible hours? Most of you have other commitments, so this is crucial. Hybrid? Easily attainable. Remote? Still tricky to find a quality role. Term-time only? You’ll be fighting for it. Handbags at dawn. Meaningful work? Hmm.
A portfolio career essentially means that you have several part-time jobs rather than one single job. If you enjoy variety in your work, a freelance portfolio career could be for you.
A portfolio career can be anything you want it to be. It's about utilising your skills, passions and interests to make a freelance living. This can seem like the holy grail, but there are some considerations to reflect on:
We enter the world of work, often eager to learn and develop. We explore different roles and build our skills, knowledge and expertise. We then start to establish ourselves in our careers.
Many women hit that mid-career point when they take time out to raise a family. Work-life priorities can change at this stage and we reassess what’s important to us and how we would like to work. This stage can be a shock to the system, there is little preparation and we are often blissfully unaware of how our lives will change and careers may change.
This is where life gets complicated for anyone who takes time out. You may hit pause for a year or two and return to work gently. You may hit pause for longer and your career may take off when you’re in your forties or fifties. Alternatively, you may side-step, pivot or change careers completely or develop a career portfolio and that’s all ok. You’ll have fixed ideas (rules) about what you/they/people ought to do (and so will your partner, mum, Auntie May and your hairdresser) but if the rules don’t work for you then you might just have to break them! Here are four simple ways of thinking about that:
1 Duck under Ladders
You don’t have to climb any ladders if you don’t want to. It’s ok to do what’s right for you and your family, even if you end up temporarily under-employed (essentially being overqualified and underpaid for what you do) but happy, less stressed and paid, you have betrayed no one and nothing if it’s the right thing for you. You can still get a seat on the Board, climb a mountain, become an MP, save whales - but you don’t have to do it in the next 18 months if it’s going to have a detrimental effect on your mental health or your happiness.
2 See everything as a phase
It may help to see things in phases (like the toddler ones) and what you do now doesn’t have to be what you do in a years’ time or 2 years’ time. On your CV, you can put less weight on some things than others or you can use a hybrid CV to showcase your skills and achievements rather than your career history.
3 Define your own achievements
Think about what you want and need from work. It could be time for you, intellectual stimulation, human interaction, meaningful work or being ‘more than mum’ or carer. This can be achieved in so many ways in your career and outside of it. We’re not all the same. We all have different priorities. What are yours?
4 Identify your money ‘needs’ rather than ‘wants’
Be honest with yourself about how you feel about money. You may want your financial independence back or you may want to able to contribute to bills. However, if your self-worth is tied up with a certain figure even when you look at the other achievements above then negotiate for that because that is a ‘need’ too.
Getting clear on your career means that you start to take back control and that might mean tearing up the rulebook…
If your head is full of career spaghetti and you need some help with this, please book a free consultation:
What is going on with Flex? If you search online, there are many more hybrid opportunities but what about the rest? Let’s remind ourselves of the different forms flexible working can take and whether you can find or need to create opportunities for yourself…
Hybrid working - The hybrid offer is a definite improvement but the majority of roles offered are full time. This is great for those who want a traditional role. It means less commuting and therefore more personal time and retains the positive side of office working, the social and collaborative qualities. It also moves us closer, as a society, to outcome-based work i.e. achieving the aims of your role rather than working contracted hours. New versions have sprung up. We have Fixed Hybrid - set office days and Fluid Hybrid - choose your office days. LinkedIn Jobs now describes traditional working practices as ‘on-site’!
Where can you find this? Widely advertised on conventional job sites.
Part-time working - On the one hand, companies like Zurich Insurance declare that all their jobs are open to part-time working (hurrah!), on the other hand, the 2022 Timewise survey found that only 14% of jobs were advertised as part time last year and most of these were lower paid.
Where can you find this? Start with specialist agencies and job sites for flexible working and employers with good credentials e.g. The Times Best Places To Work, those participating in the Four Day Week experiment, Glassdoor reviews…
Four Day Week - More pay, fewer hours. Again better for traditional workers, as it doesn’t help parents manage the short school day or deal with regular responsibilities such as elder care. It could support parents with nursery-age children, allowing them to spend a day at home, without losing pay.
Where can you find this? Still relatively unusual but the Four Day Week global experiment comes to an end soon and the resulting publicity should help to make this more commonplace.
Remote working/Work From Anywhere - Employees work all of their working week at a location remote from the employer's workplace. Sometimes employers specify that this must be UK-based (Work From Anywhere - Remote with regular meetings), but not always (100% Remote).
Where can you find this? Start-ups and tech companies are good. Try Otta jobs and workinstartups.com. Footloose and fancy-free? Or perhaps the family needs a little adventure. How about working abroad then? Spain, Italy, Greece, Croatia and Portugal offer Digital Nomad visas allowing non-EU nationals to live and work there (for a limited period of time).
Networking/support opportunities: LinkedIn and Facebook groups. Search ‘remote working’ or ‘digital nomads’. Avoid anywhere that’s pushing MLM jobs (Younique etc.). You’re worth so much more!
Job sharing - A job share is where you divide a role between two people and it can be a great way to return to professional work on a flexible basis. It can provide genuine flexibility, which other flexible options may not. For instance, part-timers working a 4 day week may in fact find they are working a full-time 5 day job over fewer days. Great for mid-level roles and starting to be seen with higher-level roles too.
Where can you find this? Roleshare and Duome are online matching services. Job sharing is increasingly supported in Higher Education.
Compressed hours - Compressed working weeks (or fortnights) don't necessarily involve a reduction in total hours or any extension in individual choice over which hours are worked. The central feature is a reallocation of work into fewer and longer blocks during the week, usually full-time over fewer days.
Flexitime - Allows employees to choose, within certain set limits, when to begin and end work.
Annualised hours - the total number of hours to be worked over the year is fixed but there is variation over the year in the length of the working day and week. Employees may or may not have an element of choice over working patterns.
Where can you find these? Compressed hours, flexitime and annualised hours are occasionally advertised but more often or not you’ll need to request this at interview and make a business case for it.
Term time - a worker remains on a permanent contract but can take paid/unpaid leave during school holidays.
Where can you find this? Schools, obviously, but not everyone wants to work in a school office or as a TA. Think about targeting other organisations that are especially quiet in July and August e.g. commercial training companies, universities, law schools etc. You may still have to ask as these roles are advertised but they’re scarce.
There are advertised flexible opportunities beyond full-time hybrid roles, but you need to target your search and consider asking for what you want. If you’d like to talk about your specific career clarity or job search needs, please book a free career consultation.
The 4-day week pilot programme in the UK is just over halfway through. This is 6-month trial which is also taking place in the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Participants work 4 days but get paid for 5 days. It’s a way of combatting overwork and presenteeism, reducing stress and improving productivity. Initial results are very encouraging:
88% of respondents stated that the four-day week is working ‘well’ for their business at this stage in the trial; 46% of respondents say their business productivity has ‘maintained around the same level’, while 34% report that it has ‘improved slightly’, and 15% say it has ‘improved significantly. 86% of respondents stated that at this juncture in the trial, they would be ‘extremely likely’ and or ‘likely’ to consider retaining the four-day week policy after the trial period.
Is the 4-day week right for you? It depends on your responsibilities and what you want or need to get out of the working week. For parents with very young children, this may give an opportunity to keep a vital second income and/or keep building a career plus having a precious day at home to do toddler activities and just be a parent. For parents with school-age children it doesn’t solve the drop-off and pick-up timings, therefore part-time, flexitime or term time remains more attractive. However, it does relieve a little bit of the summer holiday headache, because it effectively means that you have extra 6 days when you’re home and still getting paid. It’s an extra day a week for Easter, Christmas and half term holidays too. Given the cost of childcare and activity camps, that is not to be sneezed at.
Generally, we perceive it as a move in the right direction because it is based on productivity rather than hours. Outcome-based jobs are a rarity but this highlights the waste of time and money spent commuting and in meetings.
In our Wednesday Webinar - 10 Ways to Find a Flex-Friendly Employer we mentioned the campaign as another way to locate the right sort of employer for you. The companies involved in the pilot are all named on the campaign website - https://www.4dayweek.com/. Why not take a look?
We don’t talk about money enough. Salary is important to our sense of self-worth and equal pay is still an issue but we don’t talk about it much. We all have a money mindset and your attitude to and relationship with money (probably inherited from your parents - sigh!) is a complicated one. Let’s talk about money…
POSITION:
Mother - may also be known as Mum / Mummy / Muma
JOB DESCRIPTION:
Full-time role, providing 24-hour care with minimal breaks. Flexible working hours to include evenings, weekends and all-night shifts. A hugely diverse role in which you will be required to love, nurture and care for small client(s).
A job share is where you divide a role between two people and it can be a great way to return to professional work on a flexible basis. It can provide genuine flexibility, which other flexible options may not. For instance, part-timers working a 4 day week may in fact find they are working a full-time 5 day job over less days.
Job sharers usually split their week, overlapping to share insights and updates. This way of working offers a supportive partnership where you are a team of two working collaboratively to deliver great performance. Returning to work can be daunting and job sharing provides a supportive way to return together in challenging and senior roles where flexibility is often scarce. Discover more on job sharing in this weeks blog.
You might be returning to work after a parental break, have recently been made redundant or perhaps the pandemic has given you some time to reflect on your long term goals and you would like to pivot, adapt or change careers.
Finding a new job can be daunting and you may have conflicting thoughts about what you want to do and where your priorities lay. Having a well thought out and strategic approach to your job search can help you feel in control and make the right decisions for the long term.
Here are some questions to ask yourself to kickstart your job search planning:
