What Job Should She Target with Career Change?

You’ve kind of gotten the job-searching process backwards. You shouldn’t look for a new job based on your previous experience unless you are interested in simply advancing to the next level in that career path.

If you are simply looking to advance to the next level within your current career, I suggest conducting a little career research and possibly conducting a few informational interviews. Talk to your current boss or someone in the human resources department to discuss career paths. But don’t limit yourself to career paths within your own company. Use the resources of the professional organization for your career. And consider conducting information interviews — not job interviews — with people who are much farther along in their careers and use the opportunity to pick their brains about the best paths for advancement in your career.

If you are looking to make a switch from your current career, please remember that previous work experience doesn’t dictate or limit your job-search potential. Just about any job-seeker can identify what we call transferable skills, sometimes referred to as portable skills. Transferable skills are skills you have acquired during any activity in your life — jobs, classes, projects, parenting, hobbies, sports, virtually anything — that are transferable and applicable to what you want to do in your next job. Transferable skills are usually divided into five broad categories:

• Communication
• Research and planning
• Human relations
• Organization, management, and leadership
• Work survival

Take the time to analyze and develop your transferable skills. Then determine the types of skills you most enjoy using. And then research careers that utilize those skills. And, again, informational interviews can help you in your research.

Learn more in the Transferable Skills section of Quintessential Careers.

And find out more about the power of informational interviews in the Quintessential Careers Informational Interview Tutorial.