February 25th, 2008
Overcome Your Fear of Career Change - Pt 4
Are you afraid to change careers or change jobs within your field? If so, you are not alone. Just about everyone who embarks on career change experiences fear and anxiety at some point during the process.
Any big change we face in life will bring a whole host of fears to the surface. And, fear can be a good thing. Really! It means you’re moving towards something big.
In order to make a successful career change, you have to effectively manage your fears. If you don’t get you’re fears under control, they will eventually completely stall your progress. A success strategy you can use here is what I call “get over your fear of disappointing others
The fear of disappointing others can be very powerful. In fact, many women let it completely paralyze them.
A lot of women are concerned about letting their current boss down. Even though they may be unhappy in their job, they still don’t want to hurt their manager’s feelings by moving on. Feeling this way is of course completely human, especially if you have a particularly close relationship with your supervisor.
For many employees, the workplace provides a surrogate family structure. Managers take on an almost parental role. So, as a natural consequence, some workers feel reluctant to leave their jobs because they do not want to disrupt this family dynamic.
However, you do need to put yourself and your needs first. You wouldn’t expect other people to base their major career decisions on how you feel, would you? You work at the pleasure of your employer. You could be let go at any time for any reason. Do you want to choose a lifetime of career dissatisfaction because you want to avoid potentially hurting someone else’s feelings?
It is natural to feel that you don’t want to let your manager down. However, you are not responsible for her feelings. Also, there are ways to break the news to her gently and make the transition as easy as possible on her. What’s more, a lot of times when my clients give notice to their manager that they are moving on, something very interesting happens. The boss reveals she is also planning her exit strategy! The same thing often happens with her colleagues, who start coming out of the woodwork to confidentially tell her they are looking for a new job too.
Of course, you can still maintain the relationships you have with your current co-workers after you move on. In fact, in many cases these friendships will be enriched and deepened after you no longer work together. You’ll find you can discuss things you couldn’t when you were direct colleagues.
With a little bit of effort, you won’t lose these important relationships. And actually, you’ll gain an extended network of professional friends and colleagues to support you as you move forward in your career.
Until next month…
Warmly,
Maret
