Episode 121: Will I have to take a pay cut? Fear and loss when changing your career – with Carol Parker Walsh

You’re fed up with your current career, but you fear what you might lose if you decide to make a change.  Will you have to take a pay cut?  Will you be throwing away years of experience?  And what will friends and family think?

In this interview, Carol Parker Walsh explains how to overcome the fears that are holding you back from making a career change and how to evaluate the transferable skills you’ve acquired which you can take into your future career.

Today’s guest

Carol Parker Walsh

Website: Carol Parker Walsh

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Dr. Carol Parker Walsh is an advocate for professional women in their midlife, helping them to maximize their potential, showcase their brilliance and achieve success on their terms.

As a career and personal brand strategist and executive and mindset coach, she serves as a catalyst for transformational growth, unstoppable confidence, and professional development. She jokingly calls herself “over-educated” having earned two doctorates, two masters, and certificates from Harvard, Oxford and Dartmouth.  After a near-fatal car accident that left her in a wheelchair for six months, Carol stepped into her purpose by leveraging an extensive career in law, corporate and academic leadership.  She utilised her training in applied and social psychology, organisational systems and human development to create a custom and holistic methodological approach to career development and liberation.

Carol is a TEDx speaker, three-time Amazon best-selling author, international keynote and award-winning consultant, member of Forbes Coaches Council and Newsweek’s Expert Forum (writing articles for both), has a monthly career and branding segment on her local morning

TV show, and has been the “go-to” coach for Grammy award winners, Paralympic gold medalists, Fortune 500 executives, and 6-7 figure successful driven professionals and entrepreneurs.  If she wasn’t empowering women to take control of their lives, she’d be on stages around the world singing arias utilising her training from the Chicago Conservatory of Music.

What you’ll learn in this episode

  • [01:28] Carol talks about the Paralympians that she has coached.
  • [03:43] How brand strategy directly links to understanding yourself.
  • [06:41] Carol talks about the common fears when people are changing careers.
  • [07:55] Carol discusses her car accident.
  • [10:50] Looking at the fear of losing the income and status associated with your career.
  • [13:53] How to deal with the worries of making less money if you make a change to your career.
  • [19:12] Negotiating your current position to change where you’re currently at.
  • [20:54] How to approach interactions with friends when you are thinking of changing careers.
  • [23:00] Dealing with your immediate family’s concerns about the choice you are planning to make.
  • [24:50] Carol discusses how she coaches clients that are concerned about “wasting” their job experience and education by switching careers.
  • [27:42] Using your skills and experience in a different way.
  • [29:41] Tools and exercises to help you understand the value of your transferable skills.

Resources mentioned in this episode

Please note that some of these are affiliate links and we may get a small commission in the event that you make a purchase.  This helps us to cover our expenses and is at no additional cost to you.

To see the resources recommended by all our guests, visit the Resources page.

Episode 121: Will I have to take a pay cut? Fear and loss when changing your career - with Carol Parker Walsh

Jeremy Cline 0:00
What are you afraid of losing if you're thinking about changing jobs? Are you afraid of losing income, status, the respect of family and friends? Maybe you fear throwing away all of your previous hard work and experience. If any of these fears are holding you back, then this is the episode for you. I'm Jeremy Cline and this is Change Work Life.

Jeremy Cline 0:35
Hello, and welcome to Change Work Life, the show that's all about beating the Sunday evening blues and enjoying Mondays again. One of the biggest struggles I've been trying to deal with as I contemplate my own career change is how to overcome the fear of losing something. If I change career, what do I risk losing? Income? Status? Am I going to be throwing away 20 years of professional experience? It's that fear of loss which we're going to cover in this week's episode, and I'm delighted to be joined by Carol Parker Walsh. Carol is the founder of the Career Rebel Academy, and she's an award winning career and personal brand strategist who has coached, among others, Grammy Award winners and Paralympic gold medallists. Carol, welcome to the podcast.

Carol Parker Walsh 1:19
Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Jeremy Cline 1:22
I've got to start by asking about the Paralympic gold medallists. Who were you coaching, and what were you helping them with?

Carol Parker Walsh 1:28
Yeah, well, her name was Roni Sasaki, she was a downhill skier, I'm probably saying it wrong, gold medallist. Years ago, she has one leg, she lost one of her legs, and she never let it stop her, and she went on to learn how to ski, and then win, actually, a couple of gold medals in the Paralympics. And when she came to work with me, we were working specifically around brand strategy. So, she wanted to start writing her story, telling her story, she was getting ready to write a book about her journey and wanted to use it as a way to do motivational speaking and to kind of get out there in the world. So, she really needed to have an idea of how to brand herself, so that people would really want her to come and speak, because you know, she's not the only Paralympic gold medallist out there, so how could she differentiate herself and really put her story out there in such a way that would really want people to invite her to come and speak at their conferences and the like. And so, that's what we worked on. And what she said to me was that she had really kind of lost her way, it had been years, she had got married, had kids, and so, she kind of lost her mojo, if you will, a little bit over the years. And so, we did a lot of work on reconnecting with who she was at that time, getting her confidence back, and really bringing out her unique value proposition that she brought forth from her own journey and her own story, and created a narrative and started getting that out there. And very soon thereafter, she did get her book published, and she started to get speaking gigs and offers and things of that nature. And so, she's on my website, if you go to my first page, you'll see Roni Sasaki on there, and what she had to say about it. But that's what I worked with her on.

Jeremy Cline 3:28
That's really interesting, because I was going to ask you about sort of where brands strategy and career coaching kind of link together, but it sounds like it's all part of the getting to know yourself first before you put that out there.

Carol Parker Walsh 3:43
Absolutely. In fact, when I started my career, when I started my business, actually, I started doing brand work, I started really focusing on helping people to find their voice and find their authentic proposition that they had to put out there, how they could distinguish them from other people and the like, and what I found in those conversations, when I would ask them, 'So, answer those questions, tell me why are you doing what you're doing, who's your target, what's your message, what do you want to get across, what's the vision and purpose of what you're doing', a lot of people were confused and couldn't answer those questions. And so, they just knew that they needed to do brand strategy, but they hadn't really thought about what that meant. And I think, in their minds, they thought, 'Well, I'll just come to you, and you'll tell me who I am and what I should say and what I should be.' And I had to explain to them that your brand is really being your authentic self, it's who you are and what you bring to the table. And I realised that people weren't asking themselves those deeper questions, that they had been very much on autopilot or all they could really recite was maybe their job title or what they did, but in terms of who they really are, what their message is, what their purpose or value or strengths or the stamp that they want to put on the world, they really weren't able to answer those questions. And so, I started to start taking a step back, and part of my doctoral research, actually, was all around identity development, and particularly how women define who they are, and antithesis of all the messages that we get. So, I kind of reached back into that research and that work that I've done before and start asking these deeper questions, and realising that I needed to start there before we could get into the branding and, ultimately, helping them position themselves to get what they want. So, even in the work that I do around career and career shift and career change, that's where we start. We start with this discovery process to really get clear on who you are and what you have to offer, and then, we work on building that brand narrative, that message, using strategic storytelling, and then, create an action plan for them to actually go after and get what they want. And so, it was through beginning that work, and Roni was one of my first initial clients, early on in my business, and that led me to get into what I'm actually doing right now.

Jeremy Cline 6:13
Awesome. That's amazing. So, let's go on to the topic in hand and fears around career change. And let's start with a very open question. What, in your experience, and with working with your clients, have you seen to be the biggest fears that people have around changing career to something completely different? So, we're not talking about just changing job, we're talking about moving to something, which on the face of it, seems entirely unrelated.

Carol Parker Walsh 6:40
Yeah. Well, I think it's a common fear, which is the fear of the unknown. I think that's a baseline. It's 'I don't know what the other thing has to offer'. And so, there's that underlying fear there. But then, there's also the fear of making the wrong choice. There's the fear of, if I do make this choice, what am I going to give up, and then, am I getting something better? And there's also the fear of, can I be good at that? After I've been sitting in this career, doing this work for so long, can I really be just as good and just as successful in this other thing? So, there's a lot of these kind of underlying narratives that are playing in the back of people's minds, that are keeping them from moving forward. And honestly, this really comes down to managing your mind, right? You know, anytime your brain experiences something that's scary, it screams, 'Stranger danger!', in your mind, and it tells you, 'Don't do that, don't go there', because that's scary or uncomfortable, and we don't know where that's going to lead. And so, if we're not careful to really think about that process and what's happening, we'll give in to that fear, and just stay in the status quo. For me, it started, that became crystallised for me when I had my car accident. I think we talked about, and I was driving home, I was on a two-lane road, car lights were coming at me, and I really thought that was going to be it, and I heard a voice that said, 'Turn now!' So, I turned, but at the time, I remember I'm on this two-lane hill, and on the one side was a drop off to a ravine, and the other side was a side of the hill and oncoming traffic. And I remember in a split second, I thought, 'Turn where?' Like, which way am I going to go? Because neither option seemed great. But I turned. I still got hit and had to have multiple surgeries. I was in the hospital and wheelchair for six months, but I survived. But the point that really resonated for me was that, so often, when we hear a voice, or we have an inkling or a whisper or a desire to say, 'I want to do something different', the options don't always seem clear, we have no idea what the outcome is going to be if we take option A or B, like when I was in that car that day, but so what we do is we just stay the course because it's comfortable, it's known, we've been there, done that, we know we can do it, we know what to expect from it. But for me, what became clear is that, I know that day in that car, had I not turned and stayed the course, I would have been hit head on and not be here. So, in my mind what happened is that, that message to make that shift, even though it's scary, and we don't know what's happening on the other side of it, in a lot of ways, it doesn't lead to your death, even though we think it does, actually, sometimes. But it can lead to an emotional and spiritual and mental demise, because you just kind of waste away. You lose yourself, you don't have joy or fulfilment in your life, because you're not doing work that really inspires you, because everything in you says, 'Make the turn!' But fear of all of these unknowns that may or may not happen, that your brain is building up to say, 'Stranger danger, stay away from it', that becomes our guiding factor, and we just kind of stay put. So, there's a number of things, you know, I'm too old, or I'm not going to be good at it, or I'm going to lose everything, or I just don't know what's on the other side of it, are usually the things that keep people from moving forward.

Jeremy Cline 10:33
That point about losing something, I mean, I mentioned at the top a couple of things that certainly have occurred to me, so loss of income, loss of status, throwing away experience, are there any others, other things that people fear losing, if they make this sort of change?

Carol Parker Walsh 10:51
Well, you know, they fear, I think those are the big things, they fear of losing the money, right? What we like to call the golden handcuffs, you know, that income, that status, everything that comes with that. I remember, when I was a lawyer and decided that I didn't want to practice anymore, I mean, that's a pretty big status symbol to be an attorney, and the income that I was making from it was pretty significant. And I had a lot of people who were also telling me that that was foolish, after all, I had done extra years of school and got my law degree, and I've been working in the profession for quite a bit of time. But I also know I wasn't fulfilled, and I stayed at it longer than I probably should have, for that very reason. Because of all the naysayers and all the people telling me I shouldn't do that, and what I thought I was going to lose as a result. And so, it was really challenging. And I made a couple of shifts like that, where I was in something significant, and then dropped out to do something that was much more meaningful for me. But I also think that it's important for people to think about, to really sit down and think about what it is they're actually losing, and also, think about what it is they're actually gaining, and weigh the two. We get so tied up in this idea of status and money and what friends are going to say, but those are external things that we chase after, and that have convinced us that they're important. And what we need to start doing is that internal work of really trying to find those intrinsic values of what really matters for you, and let that be your kind of North Star, as opposed to all the other potential fears of unknowns and the things that you're going to lose.

Jeremy Cline 12:40
Getting down to the brass tacks a bit on the money side, because I know that people have this thing, you shouldn't talk about money, but it is a big issue, especially, when you're contemplating a career change. And it's not just that people value their own worth by what they might earn, but it's the lifestyles that they've become used to, and also the fears around providing for your family. A good example of conversation I had very recently with a friend, who says, 'Yeah, I'm not all that happy in my job', but then, he mentioned, 'But you know, we're in a nice house, which comes with a nice mortgage.' He's got a son who's showing some sporting aptitude, so he'd like him to have lessons. And you know, they come at a cost. They're considering whether they might send their kids to a private school, so there's school fees. And you know, his fears around changing career are that, is he going to lose the income that would enable him to provide for all that, which at the moment, he would be able to, so help him out.

Carol Parker Walsh 13:54
Yeah, well, you know, first of all, let me say that I went through the same thing. I was the main breadwinner in my family, I had kids about to go to college, actually, when I decided to walk away and start my own business, making significantly less than what I was making, with the hope that something would come out the other end. And let me say that, the first thing I'm going to say is, leaving where you are or shifting careers does not mean that you will not make a similar or significant income. Right? It takes a little bit of work and research to find something comparable. And if money is the driving force for you, if you need a certain number, a certain salary, then there's two things I would say. First of all, look for something comparable, where that money is at least in line with that. But the other thing, too, is to also take a look at what you're making, what you're spending, and really evaluate your finances in a way to see what can you sustain within your family. And when I tell people that you may want to think about making a career change, I don't suggest that you wake up tomorrow and quit your job and leave. So, that's never the thing that I'm saying to do. So, if you're thinking about it, don't say, 'Well, I can't do it, therefore, I'm not even going to explore it.' Take some time and explore what you do want, what is out there, what is comparable, what you can afford, do a little check in your own finances and budgets to see what you can afford. And then, put some things in place and situation and make your move then. It may take you a year before you make that move. Maybe during that time, while you're in your position, you start adjusting your finances, you start saving your money, you start creating buffers for you to support you to make the move. So, just because you're thinking about doing a change, it doesn't mean you have to get rid of it, because you're just assuming it's not going to work. There are actually a lot of things you can do, in terms of really setting up your finances, talking with your family, saving your money, shifting how you're spending things, having some conversations about what the expenses are going to be. And then, look for things that are comparable. The other thing, too, is that, negotiating your salary, even when I changed positions, I've always negotiated well above whatever they were offering me at the time. I don't think there's been one time I've taken a position that has been whatever they have offered. I've always been a strong negotiator, and I've always been able to do that. And if you understand what the market bears, you understand what the position itself or what the industry holds for the type of job that you want, or the position you're looking for, do that research, so that you can ask and get what you want. But the other thing, too, is that you have to feel confident in what you're bringing to the table and know that you can make the contribution to be able to have those negotiations. So, just because you want to change, it doesn't mean you have to leave your job right now and walk away from everything you have. You can definitely put some things into place before you actually make that move. Like I said, I did that, and it was significant, I was the breadwinner, and my son was starting college, my daughter was a sophomore, and they both wanted to go not to state schools. And so, we had to have a big conversation about what that looked like, and we had to make some adjustments as I started my business. Now, I'm now since, thankfully, making well more than what I was making in my salary, at my position, but it definitely was a compromise that we had to make. But I also made the compromise because it was something that I love to do. I knew this was work that I wanted to do, and because I knew that, I was okay with consciously making the choice to make some adjustments financially in my family, in order to accommodate my dream and what it is that I really wanted to do. And my family was happy to compromise as well, even though my daughter, I remember her asking me, when I told her we were doing this, were we going to be poor now. And I'm sure that's what a lot of people think. But I had to reassure her, we weren't going to lose the house and things of that nature, and we will be able to get through it. But yeah, that's scary, it took me a long time to come to that decision for that very reason. We get faced with these things and the practicalities and the responsibilities of adulthood and of life, and that it seems foolish to go after our dreams and to go after something that we want, and that we passed our prime and we've had our turn. So, you know, let's just deal with it and focus on the future for our children. So, we have those conversations as well in our mind, and so, we just like say, 'Yeah, you know, maybe when I retire, I can actually do something I love or move in that direction.' And so, I'm a huge advocate of not compromising. We only get one bite at the apple, this is the only time we have here. And so, I'm a big advocate for not wasting time unhappy, when you can actually take some active steps toward making the adjustments to get what you want. The other thing too, I just want to say as well, is that sometimes where we are can be negotiated into a better place. Maybe we're in the wrong department, and we can move to a different department. Or maybe we're just not doing the right work, but we're in the right company. And so, it just takes a shift, maybe in how either we're thinking or what we're doing or some conversations we can have, to maybe make where we're at tolerable and acceptable while we're in this process of transitioning to something that we want to do differently.

Jeremy Cline 19:45
You touched on something I want to cover, which is the fears around the reactions of other people. And I guess they kind of fall into two categories. One is friends, work colleagues, people who aren't necessarily overly invested in you, but you like them, and you respect their opinions, and they go, 'Jeremy, what the heck are you doing!? Are you mad!? You've been doing this for 20 years, you're well respected, you're on a good track. What on earth are you doing changing that?' So, there's those people. But then, there's, as you were saying, the family, the people who are relying on you, and who themselves might have, what you said, how your daughter expressed concerns about whether you will lose the house. So, how do you advise clients to approach interactions with those people? I mean, maybe we start with the friends, because I suspect that that one's easier to deal with, and then, go on to the family, which I suspect is probably the knottier conversation to have.

Carol Parker Walsh 20:55
Yeah, it is. Okay, so my advice may not be easy for everyone, but I always came from the mindset that you do not live in my house, and you are not paying any of my bills, so your opinion is none of my business. So, it was easier for me to ignore external people who had questions about what I was doing. And I practiced law for 10 years. But also, it's been 20 years since I practice law, and since that time, I went on, like I said, got my doctorate, I started moving into academia, and when I left academia, I was an associate dean. And in both cases, I had colleagues, when I left law, thinking, 'Are you crazy?', although people in law, because a lot of us leave, because we realise we don't like it, so a lot of my colleagues who were practising were giving me high fives, and were like, 'Show me the way out, too.' But people around weren't understanding and thought, 'What are you doing after all that education and money and ta-da-da-da?' And even when I left academia, my colleagues, professors and other deans, they were more adamant about me being absolutely insane for wanting to walk away from it, and not being realistic, and that I would regret it and things of that nature. And so, I just have a knack for not listening to people who have no say over my bank account or my lifestyle. So, it was easy for me to say, 'That's your opinion, and that means nothing to me.' And that's really what it is, it's an opinion. Although, you know, we're pack animals by nature, so we do like to not be ostracised from the pack by doing something that maybe makes people stay away from us. But for me, it was just, I'm just going to prove you wrong, I'm going to show you that I'm making the better choice. And truthfully, as time goes on, and has gone on, they've come back and changed their mind, because they watched how I've done. So, for me, it was a challenge. But yeah, for people that are close to you, people who are depending on you and are going to be impacted by the decision you make, that's a different story. And again, to me, that goes back to really having those strong conversations, talking it out, calming any kind of fears or doubts, and a lot of that comes by doing some of the practical things of talking to your financial advisor, talking to your accountant, tightening up the budget, making some changes, letting them know this is why we're going to be doing things, letting them know what they can expect, maybe if you take multiple family trips a year, that we're only going to get down to one family trip a year, right? So, you just let people know, so that alleviates their fear. Once I told my daughter we were going to be okay, and that she wasn't going to suffer, and that she wasn't going to not get her car, or those types of things, she was fine. And so, I think alleviating their fears in any kind of way that you can, it actually helps bolster your decision, and it bolsters your faith and confidence in what you're doing, when you can have those conversations with people around you. But you know, if you are doing that work yourself, then it'll help to alleviate the fears of those around you.

Jeremy Cline 24:24
Another of the big fears is the throwing it all away. So, you mentioned having practiced law for 10 years, I've been in the game now for my own 20 years. And you kind of look behind you at what you've done and think, if I change career radically, does that not mean that I'm just throwing away all those years of experience that I've gotten? So, how do you coach clients around that?

Carol Parker Walsh 24:50
Yeah, that's a good one. I always say, you never throw anything away, you just use it differently. Right? And this requires us to take the blinders off of our skill sets and of what we do. This is why I try to break this idea of career identity and even thinking of ourselves as, or even myself, if I just thought of myself as a lawyer, then nothing becomes available to me. Then, the only thing I think I can ever do is to be a lawyer or be some type of lawyer or be a lawyer in some other place. But if I take a step back and start looking at all of my gifts, talents and experiences that I developed through that process, the fact that I can negotiate, I can mediate, I understand contracts, I can work well with other people, I'm a good team player, whatever it is, like you make the list of the things, then you realise that, oh, these skills aren't just related to law. These actual skills and talents can be applied to a number of different things. So, what happens is, you start with a very narrow idea of what's possible, because you're stuck with this idea that, well, this is what I went to school for, this is what I did, and that's it, and you start leveraging and looking at those skills and expanding your lens around what actually those skills can be applied to. And then, the world becomes open to you. I was having a conversation with someone who asked me a similar question about, well, what if you've been at home, you've been a homemaker for the last 10 years, and you're trying to re-enter the workforce, right? How do you translate that skill into a position? Or if I've moved across country, I think she said one of the things that she did was she moved across country with a 10-month-old. And I'm thinking, 'Do you know what that takes?' What kind of planning and organising and patience and logistic planning that that takes to do something like that? And even someone who's been at home, to manage a home, do you know what kind of finances you have to be able to deal with and a lot of attitudes of children, and you probably were managing a team basically, and you were organising, and the amount of tenacity and agility and adaptability and critical thinking skills and leadership skills. I mean, we have a breadth and depth of talents and skills that we don't see or look at, because we compartmentalise them to think they're only applicable in one way or one industry, when in truth, they are the perfect skills to be utilised in so many other places. But in between law and before I went into academia, I became an organisational consultant, management consultant, and did a lot of executive coaching and team development. Well, it was because I was a lawyer and saw the other end, because I was an employment and labour attorney, on the other end of seeing all of those cases of bad managers doing bad things in organisations, I was better equipped to go into an organisation and tell them what not to do, and to teach and coach and train people inside of the organisation to create spaces that wouldn't cause them to be sued later on. So, seeing those skill sets, actually helped me to transition beautifully into doing a whole different skill set and a whole different profession, to the naked eye, it seems like it's totally different, but for me, it was more of the same, just on the other end of the spectrum. So, you never throw away that education and those degrees and that experience, you never throw it away. You just learn how to use it differently. You learn how to use it more expansively, and probably, learn how to use it in ways that maybe are more enjoyable for you, than even for me, as a lawyer, I am not an adversarial person by nature, so I didn't like the fight, I loved when I could mediate or negotiate a settlement or that people would agree to get along better with other people. You know, I mean, I have it in me to fight, but I would rather not. And so, it was nice for me to take those skills and use them in an environment where I felt like I could be more help and do more good, than just being on an adversarial basis and fighting it out on the back end of all the problems.

Jeremy Cline 29:24
So, for someone who's got this somewhat blinkered view of the skills and experience they have, can you give an example of maybe some exercises that they can do to help them realise that the skills they've got are wider and more transferable than they think they are?

Carol Parker Walsh 29:42
Yes. One of the things that I have my clients do is create a career story. And what that involves is going through looking at the course of their life, I tell them to do it in like chunks of 10 years, and just write down everything you've done, just don't look at just the jobs that you've held, but what are the things that you've done, what are the things that you've accomplished? Maybe you volunteered, or maybe you were on the PTA, or maybe it was a particular job you held, or maybe there was some work-study position you held when you were in college that you really enjoyed doing. And so, really look at, you know, take it by 10-year chunks, write out all the things that you've done, and you really enjoyed doing. And then map, what are the skill sets that you utilised to do that. You know, were you good at working with people? Did you have good relationship skills? Were you good at executing and getting things done? Were you detail-oriented? Were you really strategic in how you thought about things? Did you have a lot of critical thinking skills? Were you always the one in charge and leading everything? You were the one that they always put in charge, because they knew you could solve it and get it done. Right? So, first, look at, outline all those things that you've done over the course of these chunks of 10, and then, map against those all of the skills and all of the talents and the gifts and the things that you did that allowed you to actually do that work and to be successful at that, or things that you really loved doing. And then, what you'll begin to see are this whole plethora of things that you didn't even think about were important or valuable skill sets, that actually make up who you are, and all the best of what you bring to the table. And then, once you get all of those skill sets, then really just go through them, and then start to identify, which were the skill sets that I absolutely loved doing. Because we develop skill sets that we would maybe never want to do ever again in life. I know that's true for me. And so, really go through and figure out, well, which ones do I love and would love to do more of, and which ones I would never like to see again in the light of day, and then start leaning into, well, if I look at those skill sets that I really love to do, what would that translate to, in terms of the work that I can see myself doing. You know, then we start adding to that, well, I love to work with people or I don't like to work with people. I love to work in big organisations where there's a lot going on, or I like to work in small places or places that are more non-profit, or they are doing something for a cause or for a purpose. I love working remotely, or I love to be on a schedule, right? So, all of that becomes revealed as you go through that process, that gives you much deeper clarity on all of what you have to offer, and it starts to bring out a little bit of maybe what you want to do, that maybe you haven't even thought of before. And so, that, I call it like an archaeological dig, because that's really what it is. Because we often forget all the things we bring to the table, more so than we remember the key things that people keep identifying, or that we even identify ourselves, thinking that this is the only thing that I could potentially do.

Jeremy Cline 33:04
I love the way that you extended that. So, it's not just the skills you've acquired, but also the skills that you actually enjoyed using. Because I can certainly think of situations or things I've done in the past, where I did them, I got experience, I was okay at them. Would I want to do it again? No, not really. That's an absolutely key part, I think.

Carol Parker Walsh 33:31
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's the thing that constantly gets people trapped in positions that they don't love, is that they look at the skills that they have, thinking, 'Well, this is all I can do.' And that's not true. And so, they constantly stay in the cycle of doing the same old thing, because they're either good at it, or people say they're good at it, they know they can get paid well for it. But it's really not the thing that they want to do. But when you do this dig into looking at the breadth and depth of everything you bring to the table and the other skills you have, then you'll, one, discover some new things, but you also may find that, what you were doing, if a little bit of a tweak, or a little bit of different perspective, like for me with law, instead of suing people, actually consulting and supporting people was a better use of my knowledge and skill sets, than it was in the way that I was using it.

Jeremy Cline 34:22
Awesome. Carol, this has been absolutely fantastic. Do you have any tools, books, blogs, websites, which you routinely recommend to clients, or which have helped you particularly in your own career transition, which you can recommend the listeners take a look at?

Carol Parker Walsh 34:41
Yeah, I love the book Switchers. And I am blanking on the author's title name right now. But the book is called Switchers. And it's a great book, because it talks about the process that we go through, and it actually gives you some really good tools and tips in the book and exercises that you can use, if you're thinking about making a switch, or you're making a transition. So, that's a really good book that I recommend. I will say the other one that I also recommend is Carol Dweck's book, which is Mindset. And I think a lot of people know that book already. But the reason that I recommend that book is because I always say that career switch, transition, change or development, it is an inner and an outer game, meaning it is just as much as your mindset work as it is the tactics and tips and strategies that it takes to make the difference. And like we opened up talking about, a lot of the fears of changing is really a lot of mindset management that needs to happen in the process, and I think reading that book would help to see maybe some of the blocks and limitations that we have in our mind that we need to overcome. And then, Switchers gives you some really good tips and strategies to be able to make that happen. Oh, and I'll give you one more, The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks. Now, they're rolling out of me.

Jeremy Cline 35:59
Fantastic. And where should people go if they want to find you?

Carol Parker Walsh 36:03
You can always go to my website, which is www.carolparkerwalsh.com. And you can learn about me, you can learn about my programmes, and what I have to offer. And you can also, through there, find me on social media, if you want to check out with what I'm doing on a daily basis.

Jeremy Cline 36:21
Brilliant. Links to all of those will be in the show notes. Carol, thank you so much for coming on the podcast.

Carol Parker Walsh 36:27
Thank you for having me. This has been great.

Jeremy Cline 36:30
Okay, I hope you enjoyed the interview with Carol Parker Walsh. I was really glad that we were able to deal with the practical money side of things, because this is one of those very real concerns that I'm sure lots of you face when thinking about changing career. It's not just that you're well paid, it's that you've got all these obligations, be it the mortgage, the school fees, or whatever. So, if it's fears of not being able to meet those expenses, those obligations, that's holding you back, then I hope that what Carol had to say was helpful for you. And if it was something that you'd like me to dive in deeper in future episodes of the podcast, then do let me know. Full show notes for this episode are at changeworklife.com/121. That's changeworklife.com/121. And there's the usual transcript and links to all the resources mentioned.

Jeremy Cline 37:19
So, it's the start of 2022. And I would love to hear from you what would you like me to cover this year in the podcast. I mentioned in last week's episode that, for 2022, I'm planning to release one episode every fortnight, rather than one episode a week. And I'm doing that just because I need a bit more time to pursue some other projects, which I will talk about on the podcast in the future. But I really want to make sure that every episode is valuable to you. So, if there's a topic which you'd particularly like me to cover, if there's something which I've done previously, which you'd like me to go over in more detail, if you have suggestions for particular guests that you'd like me to interview, then do please get in touch. If you get to changeworklife.com/contact, that's changeworklife.com/contact, then there's a form there where you can get in touch with me. 2021 was definitely an improvement on the shocker that was 2020. So, let's hope that 2022 is even better, both for the world in general, and for you personally. There'll be another great interview coming your way in two weeks' time. So, if you haven't subscribed to the show already, make sure that you do, and I can't wait to see you next time. Cheers. Bye.

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