Career change lessons from the pandemic

In the US, in 2021, a staggering 47 million people quit their jobs.  It became knows as the Great Resignation but in reality, with a few blips for covid the quit rate for people resigning from their jobs had been on the rise for a while.

In your 40s, social researchers show you reach the low-point of the U-curve of unhappiness.   In the most simplistic terms this period coincides with your peak child-caring responsibilities, where your work status is no longer advancing as rapidly as it used to and it’s a point where we can start to regret choices made, especially made easy by people we knew at school on social media living their best life (always).

Harvard Business Review looked at five factors, that were made worse by the pandemic but are seen as responsible for the dislocation of the Great Resignation and if you’re on the “right hand side” of the U-curve of unhappiness then these have interesting implications for you and your future career.

Up first – retirement, re-defined

In many western economies the retirement age is rising along with increased life expectancy.  If you’re in the US or the UK it may be well north of 65 already.   But that’s not all that’s changing.  Alongside better health in older age, our attitudes to what constitutes retirement is also on the move.  

Flexible working, first introduced arguably to bring mothers back in to the workplace, has now been expanded in many territories to encompass a more lifestyle oriented flexibility that takes into account caring responsibilities for younger and older relatives as well as partners and spouses.  

The next logical step with flexible working for organisations is flexi-retirement where organisations seek to hang on to the essential DNA of people who understand their organisation really well to be able to pass this on to another generation.   So retirement may no longer be something that is a final – the curtain falls moment and then it’s armchair and daytime TV for you.

Retirement may be a process over many years, reducing hours for one employer, picking up some consultancy even guest lecturing at your local college.  Or maybe picking up a spot as a non-executive board member either on a for profit company or charitable organisation. 

The point is once you’re north of fifty you have thirty years of experience under your belt and that in itself is a marketable commodity if you know where the buyers are looking right now.

Next up in the big five is relocation

During the pandemic lots of people moved out of big cities and into the country.  That trend has to a degree reversed but the differential cost for example in the UK of commuting into a big city like London or if you’re in the US living in California or New York versus somewhere in the south or the Midwest is profound.

The salaries and the opportunities may be where the most expensive cost of living is but many people who relocated during the pandemic discovered a quality of life that money can’t buy in the big cities.   There’s no denying in many countries the biggest companies and mass employers congregate around the big cities but in the smaller rural or small town communities there are employers who are maybe big in their locality if not big on a national basis and they can struggle to find great people and experience because they can’t compete with the big city salaries.

But as you come towards the tail end of your mortgage and the kids are hopefully either in college or close to getting there or even out, then swapping the big city salary and big stressor of a commute for something a little quieter if less than stellar in cash terms may still be a good deal, particularly if downsizing or relocating from a housing perspective gets you more for your money outside the big cities.

Next is reconsidering

Exit interviews are showing an increasing trend of people resigning in order to seek and find a better work life balance.  In essence the role of work in their lives has changed during those weird times of the pandemic and it’s not coming back lightly.   The fragility of life in those darker moments of covid meant people wanted to, even if they weren’t permitted to spend more time with loved ones wherever they lived.  

Swapping a city role for something with a much shorter commute might be kind to the pocket but also great for your blood pressure – being able to be home between 5 and 6 so you can reliably take part in a club, a sport or a neighbourhood community activity like you used to during the pandemic sounds pretty attractive.

Then we have reshuffling   which is where people aren’t leaving the labour market entirely, instead they are picking up their mat and taking it into another industry with a better offer.  So you’ve killed it as an awesome finance director in the city even if your blood pressure and vital signs took a bit of a hit?   You may find taking those accounting skills into self-employment or for a smaller firm in your local town, or as a school bursar or even within a public service institution to be a good blend of using the inherent skills you have, but downsizing on the organisational stress.

This of course is not guaranteed and sometimes when things aren’t great in a small company, its smallness means everyone feels it in a way you don’t within a major corporate.  But localised switching between industry sectors is on the rise and for a mid life career change, it creates new interesting opportunities.

And finally we have the reluctance to return to the office and other in-person jobs.   The great turf war between bosses and workers still being played out in the UK, US and other territories.   Why pay for big offices if people are on teams calls all day?   It’s a good question to ask.  Unfortunately for bosses, we realised and companies were only too happy to indulge this when it suited, that we can get a lot of things done with people we never meet and will never meet.  After all that’s how lots of multinational companies kind of seem to be able to do things without having to fly everyday across vast oceans.

Once employers shifted to interviewing and hiring new candidates by video, then the cat was truly out of the bag and what that means is greater portability and flexibility for people wanting to shift between companies – turns out one teams call for a company as a style of working is not that different to another.  So this is bad news for employers because in effect one big thing that people cling on to and stops them from leaving – the sociable side of their co-workers, is really not the same when you only meet them on a video call and even if you leave, you’ll likely still stay in touch with those you really liked via social.

You may feel a change of career in mid-life is a bit scary and truly it is.  But around you people are doing this every day.   The notion that you’ll be seen as less of because of your disloyalty to a company is rather charming but it’s something that’s a little unique nowadays to Gen Y who are in their fifties and certainly not shared by the Millennials or GenZ.

If you want a way of easing yourself into the notion of working differently, consider how the pandemic panned out for you, what changed, how it changed and aside from the obvious pain that it brought to many, from a work and life and balance perspective how did that life suit you and which do you prefer – the reality of now or the prospect of getting some of that life back, minus the face masks?