The starting point for changing my career happened when I was working at Sense Worldwide - an innovation and insights agency. One dark, gloomy February afternoon the CEO announced that he would be offering a new employee benefit: a budget of £1,000 that each person in the team could spend on whatever learning activities or cultural experiences they wanted. The thinking behind this was twofold: firstly, it would help keep the team happy and therefore would help retain valuable employees - and secondly, as an agency that relied on the creative, cultural and strategic thinking of employees it would help bring fresh thinking into the business. One of my colleagues spent his budget going to a new dance music festival in Eastern Europe. Another spent her budget learning to practice yoga. I spent my £1,000 budget on a ticket to South by Southwest (SXSW) - an innovation conference in the US, and a 10-week watercolour class at Chelsea College of Arts. It was this class that would reignite my interest in art and ultimately change my life. Over the years prior to attending the watercolour class, the amount of art I created had been dwindling to practically nothing. The desire to be creative had been satisfied through my career: for example - co-founding and running businesses (such as Zest Innovation - the first Service Design Consultancy in the North of England) and designing and delivering workplace courses such as ‘Doodle Club’ - to encourage better creative thinking in the workplace. Although these were outlets for my creativity, they were ‘clean’ creative activities. I missed getting my hands dirty and seeing what I could craft given the time and freedom. Fast forward to my course at Chelsea. It started at an unearthly hour on Saturday mornings and required a weekly pilgrimage each way of 1.5 hours. The people attending the class were all pensioners - I was the youngest by at least 35 years. They were old money, but didn’t have much money. They were at the point in their life where they didn’t care much about anything - except having fun. They were both old school and open-minded - and exuded the type of confidence and ‘so what’ behaviour that comes along with that. The women smelt of perfume that had probably seen the height of its popularity in the 1960s. They had painted faces and wore bright red or pink lipstick, usually smeared enthusiastically past the edges of their mouths. The guys came laden with freshly made cheese and pickle sandwiches. I was immersed into another world and I loved it. So I opened the door. I took baby steps at first: practicing and learning how to paint again in my spare time. Visiting galleries and art shows whenever possible and taking a 3 month sabbatical from work to travel around and live in Oaxaca - one of the most beautiful creative hubs in Mexico. I spent my time writing, painting and immersing myself in the local culture. Painting set-up from my sabattical in Oaxaca, Mexico Over the next few years I gained confidence in my artistic abilities - I developed a technique of painting with inks and bleach, started to understand the world of art and learnt how to navigate some of the commercial challenges in promoting and selling my work.
It's amazing how much my life has changed since - I quit my job and started contracting, so I could go back to art college and focus more time and attention on my art practice. Sometimes making a huge change in life it can feel scary - especially if it's completely different from what you’ve been doing and have always done. BUT, there are also a lot of advantages to changing career, especially if you've got a few years career experience under your belt. As the saying goes ‘when one door closes another one opens’ - and you can always choose to go back to what you were doing before - it's never a failure. So here’s 3 pieces of advice to anyone thinking of trying something completely new, or changing career: 1. Don't think too hard about the decision - sometimes the ability to choose well isn't about comparing the logical pros and cons about the changes, instead it can be about listening to your gut. Naivety is a great asset at this stage - embrace it. Decision anxiety can cause paralysis and allow your fears to bubble up to the surface and grow. If you’re driven to make a change in your life there’s nothing more destructive and frustrating than being paralysed enough by fear to end up doing nothing at all. 2. Create networks of support: you'll need it! Friends, family, mentors, colleagues and clients can all provide you with advice and support. Build whatever you need into your life that will help you to remain sane: it’s important to share your successes and laugh about your failures with others - this can help relieve the anxiety that comes with doing something new. 3. Trust yourself - resilience and belief in your abilities is critical if you’re going to navigate the ups and downs of doing something new. 4. Bonus extra! Take small steps: great things can happen from trying something new. What have you got to lose? |