Career Change with No Experience

Congratulations because you are already about halfway to a successful career change. So many job-seekers know they want to change careers but have no idea what they want to change into — and you have already looked at your interests and determined that event planning is the new career for you.

The next step has to be for you to gather more information about the field, to build your network of contacts, assess your skills and accomplishments (to see how many will transfer from your current career to event-planning), consider additional training/career development, and gain experience.

There are numerous print and online resources to gather information about event-planning, but the best method (once you have a basic understanding of the field) is conducting informational interviews with people working in jobs you want to have. And not only will you learn vital inside information from these interviews, you will also be establishing a network in your new career field.

You’ll need to read about transferable skills — those skills that are universally used — to see what skills carry over from your current career. From your informational interviews, you may also discover you need additional training/professional development.

Finally, you’ll need to gain experience. I suggest — if you are currently employed — volunteering with a few caterers and event planners in your area. You’ll learn the ropes while gaining valuable experience and more network contacts. You could also spread the word to your personal network of friends and family that you are now an event planner and ready to tackle any job, regardless of how small.