Career Center Career Articles
When I first met Mary, she was despondent, to say the least. Her story was all too typical of those of us who are forced to shift direction in our careers at a time when many others are already thinking of retirement.
Mary and her husband had sold their cattle ranch in Montana after 30 years of hard work and sacrifice. They returned to the Midwest to retire near their children. Unfortunately, they quickly discovered that their retirement income was not enough to meet their needs. Mary, they decided, would have to find work.
Never having been in the workforce before, Mary earned a certification as a PC Specialist. Armed with new knowledge of word processing and spreadsheets, she hoped to land some sort of administrative job. But, sadly, she had only a vague idea of where she would fit in or how to go about marketing herself.
“Who’s going to hire me?” she lamented. “I can still only type 40-50 words per minute. And look at me: why should any employer in his right mind hire someone my age when they could hire someone younger, better looking, and with better skills and experience?”
Mary was unaware that she was struggling with three problems common to most older job seekers forced to find a new career. First, she didn’t have a clear understanding of her marketable skills. Second, she had no specific idea as to where she belonged in this new, somewhat intimidating job environment. And, finally, she was almost totally ignorant of how best to market herself.
Many of us, like Mary, are blind to our marketable, so-called “transferable skills.” It’s usually because we are too close to what it is that we do—we lack perspective. And, yet, upon examination, usually with the objective help of someone with more knowledge of jobs and job markets than we have, we realize that we do have many marketable skills!
A little questioning of Mary, for example, revealed that she had done all the bookkeeping, correspondence, and vendor relations for the ranch. She didn’t realize that that experience was more than enough for her to compete for better-paying Office Administration jobs.
But where would she fit in? And how should she best market herself? What she didn’t understand at first was that her background in ranching would be welcomed by many area meat distributors. Once she accepted that, it was just a matter of exposure, of directing her toward marketing channels that work. It wasn’t long before she landed a fine job as an Office Administrator in a packing plant.
Mary’s problem is found at every level in almost every career field for the older employee. Yet, from downsized Presidents and CEOs to burnt-out attorneys to retired military personnel to countless others, the solutions are much the same. First, identify your marketable skills, then determine where those skills are most marketable, and, finally, devise and execute a marketing action plan that makes sense. It works!
About the Author:
Pierre G. Daunic, Ph.D., CCM has been a Senior Services Consultant with R. L. Stevens & Associates, http://www.interviewing.com/, The nation's most successful privately-held career marketing firm for over 24 years, R.L. Stevens & Associates specializes in professionally-run executive career searches to generate quality interviews through both advertised and unadvertised channels.
