Midlife Career Change Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Your career choice impacts your quality of life, standard of living, personal identity, and much more. By the time you hit middle age, career changes are far from easy, but many people feel a mismatch with the career that they had selected earlier in life and want to at least explore the possibility of pursuing a new career. Are you one of these people? If so, this collection of posts is written specifically for you.

Author Susan Crandell says it best:

"...it may seem surprising that at midlife so many of us are dumping career number one and moving on to career number two. Of course, some of this migration can be credited to restlessness: Even in a fulfilling profession, twenty years on the job can ignite a craving for something new. But many of the career changers I’ve spoken with tell me that their first profession simply never thrilled them.

Problem was, back in our twenties when we were starting out, a lot of us just didn’t know how to find work that works for us.

Statisticians will tell you to expect to have 3 careers in your life (a number that life coaches says is really 4 to 7 as the concept of corporate loyalty recedes into history and technology drives constantly evolving skill sets). This section (which is a work-in-progress) is aimed at providing information to those already considering a career change in middle age (even went some experts advise against it). Also understand that it will take time and effort. Career coaches will tell clients that it can take 2 to 6 years to successfully implement a midlife career transition during which you will be engaging in a number of career-change activities including research, networking, interviewing people to gather ideas, studying, trying out jobs, and possibly even returning to school.

What particular issues unique to middle age are relevant to career changes?
Prelude for middle age career changes
Midlife Career Transition Myths
Facts about unemployment in middle age

What to do first when contemplating a midlife career change?
Midlife Career Planning
Assessing yourself and your next career
Overcome career inertia due to 'fear of change'
Consider these ways of easing the pain of midlife career changes
Changing jobs or careers? Top 10 Reasons People Quit Jobs
But I don’t know what I want to do?

Tips for midlife career changes?
Tips from the Washington Post
Tips from WSJ's Career Journal
More Tips from WSJ's Career Journal
Netwok-Network-Network
Advice for mature jobseekers

Resources for midlife career changes?
Job search engine for 50+
CareerBuilder's self-assessment for career change

What about alternate career paths?
Middle age entrepreneurship
"Telecommuting"
Take a 'Vocation Vacation'
Most satisfying careers

What about career coaches?
Start by being your own coach
Three Step Process of Hiring a Career Coach

LifeTwo has plenty of additional information and news about midlife career issues. Try these keywords (aka "tags"):

Careers
Career Change
Career Satisfaction
Job Change
Job Loss
Retirement
Work-Life Balance

Visit the LifeTwo homepage, where you can find posts about midlife issues such as health, memory, and aging. The menu bar across the top of this and every other page can show you how we organize the site by section, topic, and -- most importantly, "tag" or keyword. Give it a try. Our index also shows you what we cover.

Is it you or your career that needs changing?
Are you a workaholic? [Workaholic quiz]

Join a Discussion

One of our goals for LifeTwo is for it to grow into a community where problems get solved. You can participate in the discussions (also reachable from the homepage or the "Discussions" section including this forum for midlife career transition stories), and you can also engage people in questions and debate in the comments section of almost every page on the site.

Check out these books
Midlife career book recommendations selected by Greg Yorke
"Encore: Finding Work That Matters In the Second Half of Life" by Marc Freedman
"Thinking About Tomorrow" by Susan Crandell
"Never Eat Alone" by Kieth Ferrazzi
"One Person Multiple Careers" by Marci Alboher
"What Should I Do With My Life?" by Po Bronson
"The World is Flat" by Thomas L. Friedman
"Test Drive Your Dream Job" by Brian Kurth

Is there another question you'd like to see answered?

Let us know by adding a comment at the bottom of this page. Let us know what you think we should look into!