Discover How to Successfully Make Work and Life Transitions After 50
Many women after 50 feel burnt out, stressed, tired of the external pressures, and ready to make a change. But, they’re uncertain how to make work and life transitions at this age. Successful transitions are possible. Reset your mindset, to view them for what they are - exciting. You’re never too old to dream big and take the steps necessary to achieve your goals.
“Tell me what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life.”
Mary Oliver
Life is full of transitions — kids going off to college, parents needing care and support, relationships ending, or careers evolving — especially after 50.
Many women after 50 feel burnt out, stressed, tired of the external pressures, and ready to make a change. But instead of retiring, they are exploring opportunities for an encore career. An encore career is work in the second half of life that combines engagement, steady income, greater personal meaning, and social impact. Other women are building portfolio careers — combining multiple paid and unpaid roles. It's a great way to indulge the various interests that you have.
How do you successfully make these transitions?
After witnessing people in the workforce who were in unfulfilling jobs or careers and who weren’t happy, Nancy Burke and Marg Penn, Ph.D., started their business, Future After 50, to help people make life transitions fun, more rewarding, and fulfilling. They began their business in their 60s, after years in corporate America. As a result, they have helped many men and women navigate life transitions successfully and feel more inspired than ever.
On February 11, Nancy and Marg spoke to a group of Rumblings’ women and offered the following advice and wisdom for managing life transitions successfully to flourish after 50.
Identify Your Skills and Experiences
Change is inevitable. Transitions require you to recognize your current skills and experiences. Understanding how to package and align your background with the skills needed for what you want to do will help you be successful.
Nancy and Marg told a story and encouraged us to think of this process as “following the breadcrumbs.” They recommended approaching transitions with a learning mindset and talking to many different people about jobs, careers, volunteer opportunities, board positions, etc., that interest you. You don’t have to know what you’re looking for in the beginning. Just do the work and learn along the way — picking up bread crumbs. They’ve seen when women go out and explore, they find answers for themselves at the end of the breadcrumb trail.
For most women, career and life satisfaction after 50 is not about the money, it's about having a sense of purpose and meaning, or in some cases finding something to be passionate about.
Women over 50 have a wealth of life experience, whether it's work, family, volunteering, civic engagement, personal friendships, experiences with other women, etc. And, with this experience comes wisdom. However, midlife women often don't share their wisdom unsolicited; they need an invitation. Don’t wait for the invitation.
Midlife women bring a more comprehensive skill set than people who are a lot younger. We also have so many more resources than a 20-year-old. Younger people don't have a robust network. For example, they haven't developed all the skills and perspectives that we have at our stage of life.
It’s essential to recognize the expertise and experience you bring to the table. However, it’s also important to realize that younger people may be better in many skill areas, so enter this process with humility and a learning mindset.
Adopt a Learning Mindset
Ensure you’re up to speed on the technology and terminology of the fields you’re interested in pursuing. Technology and terminology continually change. It’s critical to stay on top of the changes. Take classes and learn about different industries if you’ve been out of the workforce for a while. Research to understand what is happening in the field(s) you may want to pursue.
You also need to prepare yourself to describe your skills in language that resonates with a potential employer. Each industry has its vocabulary. For example, skills are transferable, but the nonprofit world doesn't talk about some skills the same way the corporate world does, so learning the terminology is essential for selling yourself. Suppose you haven't been in the workforce for a while. You must start to pull together some of the skills you used during the time you've been out. That means if you've done significant volunteer work, pull out the competencies from those experiences. Women often minimize those experiences, particularly if it's been volunteer work. Finally, package your experience in the vocabulary used in the field you plan to pursue.
Employers are not bothered by women who have been home if they can see relevant experience. An employer wants to know that you can solve their problems and provide the kinds of skills that will help them accomplish the organization’s objectives.
It is possible to get into the trap of thinking too narrowly, and it is tough to get out of it. For example, you may think you’ve held a certain role for so long you believe you don't have the skills to do anything else. Or you may be limiting what you bring to the table because that’s the way you’ve always done things.
It's hard to think that way. If you recognize this in yourself, you may need to take a step back and reinvent yourself. Start almost as a beginner, which means learning from people who are maybe as young as your children or more youthful. Reset your mindset to think you have as much to learn from them as they can learn from your experience.
Adopting a learning mindset can open up your thinking and help you navigate transitions.
Create Clarity
If you don't know where you're going, it's going to be hard to get there. Start by doing personal assessment work. There are tools available to help you review your career history, lifetime achievements, and skills. This type of assessment process aims to review the skills you have from your work and volunteer experiences that you can take into a new opportunity. Often, transitions require us to package our expertise in different ways. Resumes need revisions so that a new employer can see how your skills transfer to a new opportunity.
Clarity doesn't come in a day or a week; it takes a little bit of time. Even when you're clear about where you want to go, it's not always easy to take action. Sometimes you need help to figure out what's holding you back from taking action and getting closer to what you want to do. It could be loyalty to your boss or your employer, fear of stepping out into the unknown, not wanting to take a pay cut even when it’s financially doable, or a job title that’s holding you back.
Get clarity for yourself and understand what's keeping you from pursuing your dream. Talk to friends, family, colleagues, employers, mentors, or a coach to help you work through the process. You need to get a feel for what you're good at and what you love. It’s extremely difficult to do this from reading a book.
Be Courageous
Unfortunately, the work world that we have been in was not well designed for women over 50, and as a result, we’ve had to put up with a lot in our careers. Around the time we turn 50, women often realize it’s not worth it anymore, and we start seeking a more fulfilling way to contribute. It’s similar for women who haven't been working outside the home. We know we have more to contribute now that our children are launched.
It takes courage to navigate transitions. After 50, you’ve got to embrace change and become good at making transitions. Now is the time to be courageous and step into your desires.
Be Confident
Unfortunately, women often lack the confidence to jump into something new. Nancy and Marg don’t see it as jumping. It’s waiting patiently, learning, and realigning.
The goal is to figure out some of the roles you could pursue, the organizations where those roles might exist, and which organizations are appealing enough to check out. Then do research. You can do a lot of that research on the Internet. There's so much information available, but often the most valuable insight is gained by talking with people, which involves setting up conversations. Networking requires confidence. Many people don't want to bother the person to have a conversation. First of all, most people are willing to chat and share information. That's what a networking meeting is all about. How can I learn? How can I find out about what kinds of organizations are out there? What's the culture like with this organization? Understand you’ve got things to offer. Usually, it takes about 20 conversations, maybe more, to see an opportunity emerge that you'd be interested in pursuing. Confidence is a critical ingredient for successful transitions.
Making a change is not a leap from one thing to something entirely different. If you've been out of the work world for a while, you may wonder if you can compete or if you have skills that anybody wants. Jumping into a transition is often a two-step or more process, so it may mean that you are working in one thing and you do a side gig off in another and then make that develop into something that will pay the bills. Or you may take a job that's a transition job to give you the experience you need or time in a company to get to the ultimate role you want.
Job cycles —hiring booms and valleys — can create fear and uncertainty about job security after 50. The pandemic and impact on the economy have resulted in people in their 50s and 60s losing their jobs which has amplified that fear. The reality is the economy’s ups and downs will always be there, and it is a macroeconomic issue. Don’t look at these statistics. You don’t have control over them. The statistics create unnecessary fear that there are no jobs in a down cycle or I am a loser if I don’t have a job in an upcycle.
The reality is that you can get a job at any time. Remember that getting a job is a microeconomic issue for you and one employer. You have control over your skills and your mindset. For example, during the pandemic, there are many healthcare startups, and they're looking for people who have deep experience because they want to scale. People with deep expertise are in their 50s and 60s. Organizations need an infusion of people with extensive experience, as well those new in their career.
There is age bias in the workplace. It's a small part of what people over 50 face. However, it could feel insurmountable if you start thinking that age bias is a big issue for you. Approximately 20% of age bias in the marketplace is reality, and about 80% is imagined. Most other people are not focused on your age. For everybody who has a bias against somebody over 50, there's somebody who has a bias against millennials or Generation Z. So, if you hold age as a barrier in your mind, it will get in your way. But if you can start focusing on the skills and value you bring to employers and forget your limiting beliefs around age, you will find it becomes much less of an issue.
It’s easy to get pigeonholed by your past experiences. If you want to make a change, it's sometimes difficult to see beyond our personal experiences. Be confident.
Lift Up Other Women
On your way to mastering your transition, think about how you can lift up other women as well. One way to do that is by amplifying their skills, expertise, and contributions in a conversation, at a meeting, in an email, or through social media.
Acknowledging the contributions of women around you — younger or older — goes a long way. Not only do you highlight their contributions to more people, but they’ll also appreciate what you’re doing and be more willing to listen to you.
Successful transitions are possible. Reset your mindset, to view them for what they are - exciting. The message is you’re never too old to dream big and take the steps necessary to achieve your goals. Identify your skills and experience. Adopt a learning mindset. Seek clarity. Be courageous. Be confident. And lift up other women along the way. Together we Rumble and flourish!
“You are never too old to set another goal or to dream another dream.”
C.S. Lewis