Video Transcript
I have been thinking a lot about just career changes have been seeing a lot of questions about it. I’ve been dealing with my young adults. They’re at the age where they’re thinking about what they want to do with their future. So thinking about that and just thinking about the careers I wanted to have when I was younger. Interior designer; Computer developer; Any job at a Video Game company. I will say that it is never too late to make a career change. Yes, it’s much easier to do it when you’re young, don’t have any kids, don’t have any bills, and you’re able to just go and try this and try that. Experiment, and eventually, you will figure out what you want to do. That is what I did. I have been working since I was 15. The majority of the jobs that I had, I hated. I’ve done telemarketing; worked in a call center; been a system administrator, help desk, technical writer, and analyst, and I am now a program manager.
I’m trying to say that I have been in many jobs, I’ve worked nights, I’ve worked weekends, and I’ve worked daytime. And I decided through all those jobs, what I loved, and that helped me understand what type of jobs I would want to take. So just try anything if you’re young and don’t have any responsibilities.
If you are already working in a career field, you can always volunteer. And that is what I did as well. I did a lot of grants for smaller non-profits. I did proposals and even resumes. As you can tell, I have done a lot, but it helped me realize what I wanted in a career and company. Try working nights, try working weekends, try working during the day, try working different hours, and see what actually appeals to you.
For me, I realized I like working daytime. I don’t enjoy working nights and weekends. Yes, I do that for my side hustle. I work nights and weekends. But that is a passion that I have for just a full-time job that isn’t really something that I’m 100% passionate about. So daytime is good for me. I can then clock out and focus on what I want, like my family, side hustle, or anything else. But there are other people my son has said that he prefers working nights. So he should probably look for professions that mainly work odd hours or work more in the evenings and nights.
I also realized that I don’t really like working in business-to-consumer model companies. Like I don’t like working retail. I hated working fast food. I had one person at McDonald’s be so rude and hurtful. This happened when I was 16. This customer was upset about some stupid thing, and then he had the nerve to tell me that that is why I’m working at McDonald’s. “I make more money than you.” The way some people treat retail workers and people in the food industry is disgusting. I don’t have the patience for that.
So I knew that I couldn’t do that. I love working B2B, which is business to business. Or working with more professional people, people with a certain career path or thinking of transitioning, but they’re a little more educated. Also, working on technical solutions and products. I love working on different solutions trying to understand a client’s needs. And that was something that I wanted to do.
Do I want to work with everyday consumers? Do I want to work more with businesses? Write down who your ideal customer would be. Then, think about what type of careers tailor to those customers because they are the ones you will be working with. You don’t want to work with people who will piss you off most of the time.
The other thing that I realized was I wanted to have flexibility. I did not want to sit there and get out of bed and go into an office. Yes, in during the early ages. You know, I’ve been working since the 90s. We didn’t have the technology that we have now. But I knew that it would be the first industry to work from home more flexibly. So that was very important to me. Probably if after I had my kids, I didn’t even want to work, I’ll be honest with you. I wanted to stay home with them. So for me, I wanted to be in an industry where I would have that flexibility to have a full-time career because I needed that as a single parent and be able to be there for my kids.
The other thing was I needed flexibility. I wanted to be in positions where I could take off for doctor’s appointments without being penalized for doing so. I remember some companies in my early workdays would do that. You could even take an hour off without having to use your PTO. It was ridiculous. I knew that I wanted to have a lot of vacation time. That was very important to me as well.
I wanted to be in an industry and a career that I could continue to grow. Even though I think that when you’re in a management position, a project manager can be, you can work for any industry. Even if that is true, you still want to understand the technologies.
Right now, a lot of the projects I’m on are on cloud technologies. I got my Azure Fundamentals certification, and I decided to get the Azure Administrator certification. I want to do that because now we’re starting to talk about in-depth conversations. And I want to understand what my architects and cloud engineers are talking about and not sit there shaking my head and not knowing what the hell they’re doing. So for me, it’s important to continue to grow in that way.
I will say that mainly for the younger generation and people thinking of transitioning careers, it’s never too late. I will also add the Late Starters people. I’ll be honest, my son is one of them. I am not seeing any motivation to find a career path. He’s almost 21, And it’s frustrating to me as a parent. So I have been advising him to explore and really think about what you want to do. Go on YouTube, Google, social media and see what people are posting in the career paths you’re interested in. It’s never too late to change careers or start one. But you have to be motivated to do that. You don’t want to wake up at 30 years old, sleeping in your parents’ basement, not doing anything but playing video games, and then wondering why you can’t get a date with a quality person.
I will say that you should never feel like it’s too late. You can always change careers. Do your research by talking to people in the professions you’re interested in. If you’re in a bigger company, start shadowing the departments you’re interested in. See the type of work the people are doing, ask them questions on how they got into their careers. People usually will not mind helping you out.
Volunteering is a great way to stay on your current career path to get paid, but then you also start doing the work for the career you want to transition to. So that is a lot of the ways that I did that. When I started, I was doing a lot of help desk and system administrator types of work. I wanted to be a technical writer, so I started volunteering. As I said, I worked with a bunch of smaller non-profits. That helped me tremendously get the experience, put it on my resume, and eventually become a technical writer, which was very important to me. You should consider volunteering. Not sure if it’s everywhere, but VolunteerMatch.com. You can go on there and begin just volunteering, especially for smaller non-profits who can’t afford an in-house team to do all the work. Additionally, they might not even be able to afford a bunch of freelancers to do the job. Find smaller non-profits, volunteer, and get the experience that way.
But that’s what I wanted to talk about: really think about what kind of career you want. It is never too late to make those changes. But you can’t sit idle and expect it to happen to you. You have to make it happen.
I would love to hear what you have to say. Please connect with me on Instagram. As I said, I post many different stats and motivational types of poses. I would love to connect with you there.
I will talk to you soon and hope you have a wonderful weekend. Bye!
