FIVE important questions for the mid-life career switcher wanting to work in sustainability

When making a move into the climate and sustainability space, ask yourself the following five questions to help you focus, identify the help you need and make sure you are effectively using your time

1️⃣What is your motivation?
Do you want to leave what you are doing and so are motivated to find almost anything else? The boring work, the workplace culture, the “this work is empty” feeling.

Do you want to make a difference and are emotionally motivated to do the work to make a change; you want to make the world a better place, you are fired up by the injustices you see, you want to be “using your powers for good not evil”

Most often it is a bit of both, but knowing which is stronger is useful to keep you moving forward when you get stuck. Write down your reasons and keep them visible.

2️⃣How big a change are you willing to make?
Somewhere on the scale of becoming a full time activist, making a hard shift into an entirely new area of work, finding a new organisation to help with your existing skills and adding a sustainability element to your existing role in your existing organisation.

Each has life implications and agreeing with yourself and those that surround you on what your appetite for change is helps reduce the overwhelming choice of options ahead of you.

Are your expectations and time frame realistic and aligned?

3️⃣What is realistic in the timeframe you believe you have?
Yes we all want to help, yes it is urgent, no it is not likely you can leave your marketing job and be the Chief Sustainability Officer of a global company tomorrow.

Right now the sustainability job market is still nascent so the rate of progression can be dizzingly fast, but it is still progression. So picture your shift to be a six month transition as part of a three year plan.

4️⃣What do you have, what is missing, how do you fill the gap
Being competent is half the game, the other half is signalling your competence. Peacocks are the way they are for a reason. Consider your plumage. What short, discrete projects can you complete that build your competence AND leave you with something demonstrable?
Curating content into a series of articles, project based volunteer work, shadow delivery of a materiality assessment for small local business?

5️⃣Who do you know that can help?
Not just from a network perspective but from a support team perspective. This journey is hard, which are your friends are going to back you, who do you know who might mentor you through this, do you know someone who might coach you to help over come your obstacles and hold a mirror to your actions. Ahem, I do… see link below in comments🙂

Want help in making this year the year you ACTUALLY do something about your feelings of wanting to do more than take your own coffee cup to Starbucks in the face of a world on fire.... Lets chat. Grab a free virtual coffee