What do you do if you want to make a career change, but your current job sucks up all your energy? đ
Itâs a bind, right?
The reason you want to shift is also the reason you feel you canât!
Either work is hijacking your time or is sapping any willpower you may have had, so you find it hard to take even small steps in a new direction.
In this situation, a âbridge jobâ can be a great strategy. A recent article in the Huff Post defined it as the jobs you take âwhen you are burned out and need time to decompress.â
There really is no shame in taking a bridge job â one that may not be the final goal, but that gets you out of your current work situation and into a new environment.
Iâve even done it myself, when I took a job managing a co-working space for a few years. I knew it wasnât my âforever careerâ (if such a thing even exists). It involved a lot of toilet cleaning and replacing broke teapots (see photo evidence) and it was a big pay cut, but it was a LOT of fun and helped me rebuild my confidence that had taken a hit from being in work that wasnât right for me.
For someone contemplating a career change, a bridge job can play a number of very useful roles. It can help you:
đ§ââď¸ Recover after a period of burnout. Taking a less stressful role, or at least one with different pressures from your current one, can give you a chance to re-set and have the headspace and energy to focus on your career change.
đ Diversify your skills and experience, so that your CV looks more interesting and varied - so you have more collateral when applying for different roles in the future. Choosing a role that will allow you to focus more on the skills you enjoy using will mean it's likely to be useful in the future â even if you donât yet know where youâre headed.
đĄ Fuel creativity. Bringing experience from more diverse environments and a varied skillset will mean youâre better equipped to cross-pollinate ideas and come up with innovative solutions. See Emilie Wapnickâs work on âmulti-potentialitesâ for more on this.
đŁ Side-step into a new industry. If thereâs a new area youâre drawn to, but you donât yet have any related experience, taking a role that allows you to use your existing skills - but in an exciting new area - can be a great way to sneak in through the back door. Once youâre in, you can find ways to help out teams or colleagues who do the work thatâs more interesting to you and even potentially apply internally for a different role.
đ° Fund your start-up idea or training. Taking a job that pays alright and wonât be too stressful means you can focus on saving money for retraining or to support you while you launch a business. Sometimes just a change of scenery can be enough of a refresh to keep things ticking over while you work on your bigger game-plan.
If any of this appeals, and you want to explore what a bridge role might look like for you, feel free to get in touchâŚ
Photo by Charles Postiaux on Unsplash