It can feel like you’re starting over when you’re making a career switch. Perhaps you’re thinking that you’ll for sure have to take a pay cut to switch industries or professions. This is a common assumption for women.

Here to set us straight is Anna McDonnell Dowling, the CEO and co-founder of the f school, an online platform that teaches women the life skills that are not taught in school. Her mission: to equip women with tools they need to live more empowered lives. One of these tools is salary negotiation. 

In this episode, Anna explains the 3 biggest mistakes women tend to make when negotiating a starting salary as part of a career switch.  She teaches us how to prepare both verbally and physically for the negotiation, how to counteroffer that initial starting salary, and how to handle common roadblocks, such as, “It’s not in the budget.”  She also tells us about her free online class on salary negotiation, where you can get even more help. To date, the f school has taught close to 1,500 people in over 50 countries!


Free online class for women: How to Negotiate a Higher Salary Without the Fear of Hearing ‘No’
www.thefschool.com/salary

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Are you thinking about working with a career coach to help with your career change? Bella Holzkenner worked with two career coaches to decide her next move after being in asset management for more than 20 years. One of them was certified career and life coach Deirdre Taylor, who was featured in our last episode about how to figure out your career switch when you’re lost.

Bella tells us about the work she did with her coaches and how Deirdre’s support helped her make the decision to become a mental health counselor—something she resisted at first. She also explains how volunteering and taking on a neutral perspective, which she learned from Deirdre, played an important role in making her career switch.


Learn more about Bottomless Closet at bottomlesscloset.org.

Find volunteer opportunities at volunteermatch.org, unitedway.org,  volunteer.gov.

Want to hear more about Deirdre's career coaching? Listen to Episode 7, "Lost with what career change to make?"

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Do you want to make a career change, but don’t know what to pursue? You’re not alone. So many people are struggling to figure out their career switch as shown on Facebook groups for career changers. The most common post on these groups goes something like this, “I’m so unhappy doing what I do right now at my job, but I don’t know what else to do with my career!” 

Here to the rescue is certified life and career coach Deirdre Taylor. Deirdre helps her clients discover their passion and purpose, and prepare for success in their careers. In this episode, she offers some direction on how to look past simply what you do (or did) on the job to figure out what career switch to make when you’re lost.

Episode Highlights:

• Designing the life you want
• How to figure out what you’re best at vs what you enjoy doing
• Determining the market demand
• Consider what you want in your next job at this stage in your life
• Using the power of loose connections
• Talking to others who’ve made a career change for ideas and support
• How to answer the question, “What do you want to do?” when networking with new people in new industries
• How to use AIR (Advice, Information and Referrals) to figure out what to pursue next 

Find Deirdre Taylor at deirdretaylorcoaching.com.

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

After almost 20 years as a structural engineer, Patricia Rodriguez reached a point where her career had gotten somewhat stagnant and she was ready for a change. She jumpstarted her next chapter by teaching and founding her own firm and teaching—the dream combo she had imagined in graduate school.

Patricia shares how she opened new doors for herself as a woman-and-minority-owned small business and how her long standing relationships in her industry helped her land her first clients as well as a teaching position. She recalls the ups and downs of starting her own business, which included learning new skills to run her firm, PAR Engineering, in New York City.

Find PAR Engineering at par-eng.com. 

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Making a career change can take time. And not knowing if it'll turn out the way you want and when it’ll actually happen, can be very stressful. 

Are you working on your career switch and constantly worried? Are you feeling discouraged as the weeks or months go by? Life coach Allison Carmen, author of The Gift of Maybe: Finding Hope and Possibility in Uncertain Times, offers 3 tools to handle uncertainty while changing careers.

Episode Highlights:

• Why you have a hard time with uncertainty
• Dealing with fear of the unknown
• What are the stories you tell yourself?
• Things are neither good or bad.
• Challenging your thoughts
• The concept of “maybe” where anything is possible
• Getting unstuck from certainty
• If you want your life to change, it happens in the unknown.
• Not knowing = possibilities 
• How “maybe” statements can help with your career switch
• Living in the moment/being in the present
• How to deal with stress
• There are many ways to be ok.
• Uncertainty brings good things, too.
• Letting go 
• Being grateful opens you up to new opportunities.
• How to incorporate “maybe” every day while making a career switch

Find Allison Carmen at www.allisoncarmen.com

Allison's book: The Gift of Maybe: Finding Hope and Possibility in Uncertain Times

Allison's podcast: 10 Minutes to Less Suffering

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Errol Griffiths spent decades in ad sales until he was aged out. Unsure of what to pursue next, he explored a few options that didn’t work out. He shares how he figured out his career switch at over age 50, and made his way into financial advising, where his age is now an asset with his clients and he can work as many more years as he wants.

Episode Highlights

• Be honest with yourself
• How to figure out what to pursue next
• Talk to people about what they do
• Rule out what you don’t want to do
• Ask people for what they see in you
• Applying your skill set to a new industry
• Going back to school at over age 50
• How being over 50 can be an asset in a new industry or profession
• The benefits of being a mature professional
• Choosing an industry where you won’t be aged out
• Advice for making a career switch at over age 50

Articles for a career switch over 50:

Flexjobs: 6 Tips for Starting a New Career at 50

AARP: Identifying Shortage Occupations and the Skills 50+ Workers Will Need, 2017-2020

LearnHowToBecome.org: The Complete Guide to Career Change After 50

TheBalanceCareers.com:  Top 10 Best Jobs for Women Over 50

TheMuse.com: 7 Tips to Help You Change Careers at (or After) Age 50


More episodes for making a career change after age 50:
Ep 16: Starting a new career after 50
Ep 18: The pros and cons of being a full-time author
Ep 21: A side hustle results in a career switch
Ep 23: How being bilingual helps your new career
Ep 32: How to make a career change after 50
Ep 41: Pursuing your passion at any age

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Which key features on your LinkedIn profile should you update NOW for your career change? And which ones can get you noticed by your target companies? Is it always better to have more LinkedIn connections? 

Here to tell us is LinkedIn expert Louise Brogan, host of the weekly podcast, “LinkedIn with Louise”, where she shares her best tips and advice for using LinkedIn to make a career switch. 


Find Louise Brogan at: 

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/louisebrogan

Podcast: www.louisebrogan.com/podcast

Twitter: www.twitter.com/louisebrogan_

YouTube: www.youtube.com/c/socialbeeni

For a free download on how to use LinkedIn, go to: www.louisebrogan.com/download 

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Self-declared Type A personality Christina Martin Pendleton shares how she overcame her fear of failure to start her non-profit, LiKen, in spring 2020 at the beginning of the pandemic.

LiKen is an organization in the Boston metro area that helps adolescents, who are displaced due to their parents' struggles with substance use disorders. It provides comfort items to these at-risk kids in real time to encourage self-care and healthy coping strategies.

Learn more about LiKen at www.likenkids.org.

Ways to donate to LiKen:

Amazon Smile: https://smile.amazon.com/ch/85-1321939. 

Give Box: https://givebox.com/helpbreakthecycle. 

PayPal: paypal.me/likenkids. 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LiKenKids/. 

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Career coach Win Sheffield tells us how the pandemic* has changed the job market. Networking virtually is now the norm and Win shares how to reach out and connect with people online when you're trying to switch industries or professions. 

Episode Highlights:
•  How to network virtually
•  How to use LinkedIn
•  How to connect with new people
•  The 3 groups of people who can help you
•  The #1 question to ask when looking to change careers

* This episode was recorded in March 2021 at the height of the pandemic. The original title has been changed with a focus on networking. 


Find Win Sheffield at:

Website: www.winsheffield.com

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/winsheffield

Facebook: www.facebook.com/WinSheffieldCareerCoach

Register for Win's online Stories Workshop: Conveying Your Value 

Mondays at 4:30 pm EST

https://www.winsheffield.com/events-2/

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Lixandra Urresta, executive producer and host, on why she started Career Switch Podcast.

Music credit: TimMoor from Pixabay

Podcast info:
What's your career switch? What do you think about this episode and the show? Tell us at careerswitchpod.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.