Category Archives: career change

Failing in a New Role or Career Change

Many of us have failed… I will even go so far as to say that all mortal humans have failed. Maybe even the word “fail” sends shivers down your spine just from hearing the word. Or perhaps you remember the moment after you realized the consequences of your failure…?

Photo by Nathan Cowley from Pexels

Failing is NOT fun, however, failing can produce growth if we pay attention to the lesson(s) from the failure. When I switched from my background in English to a STEM field, I failed ALL the time. So how did I get back up on my feet after failing so many times? Well, it all started with a Google search…

Photo by Nathana Rebouças on Unsplash

Before jumping into learning a new field, I did what everyone else does when learning something new…I searched the web. I was trying to see if anyone else had made the switch from the BA side of the pool to the BS side. The first person I stumbled across was Barbara Oakley. She has a plethora of books to read and a course I took that was super helpful with learning techniques. Here is the link to that course on Coursera: http://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn. Why is Barbara Oakley a good source of motivation? Well, not only did she produce a boatload of content on the subject of how to excel in a STEM field and learning in general, but she also has been on this journey herself. She went from a “B.A. in Slavic Languages and Literature” to “B.S. in Electrical Engineering” (barabaraoakley.com/about-me). After reading her brief bio, I hope you feel as motivated to accomplish great things on your journey towards your new career as I did when I first dipped my toes in the new career waters myself.

Photo by Kaique Rocha from Pexels

Well, what if I am not smart enough? This is where the “grit” factor comes into play, and the specialist on the subject, Angela Duckworth. In her book The Power and Passion of Perseverance, Duckworth speaks on the power of grit and the secret to doing well in a subject. She gives personal anecdotal evidence as well as scientific evidence from studies she has performed herself as well as other reputable studies. She goes into much more depth than I could here (I listened to the Library audiobook which makes it harder to quote her awesome book :-/ ).

These two individuals should be more than enough to get you through any failures you experience. Remember that you can learn from past experiences and you are human, so mistakes and errors are bound to happen; what you do with those experiences is what matters the most.

The New Role: Complete Career Change

I am going to start writing more frequently, so I can hopefully encourage others to do the same in their journey to learn more, and also to hopefully get feedback about how to improve my posts or personal knowledge base. I am always open to learning something new.

So why wait till now to start writing? Well, I started my new role, and I simply love it, however, I haven’t been writing much because of how content I am with the team and the things I get to work on and learn. 

Photo by Immo Wegmann on Unsplash

Hold on pause! BACK IT UP!

Okay, here is some context. I was working in the Sales department with a great team of people, however, the work was unrelated to what I wanted to do long term, which is, to work with databases, and eventually, work as a Data Scientist!

Photo by Myriam Jessier on Unsplash

So far things have been going great in my new role, but getting to where I am now was not the easiest thing for me to do. I had to put together a plan because attending classes is not enough if you are going through a complete career change like I was. Let me give you the rundown of the different roles I have held over the years.

career_journey <- c('Paraprofessional at Roberts Academy','English Teacher in Japan','Long Term English Substitute Teacher for Finneytown Highschool','Kroger IT Support Analyst','Sales Underwriting Assistant','Business Intelligence Developer')
summary(career_journey)
career_journey <- data.frame(career_journey)
The Various Jobs I have held on my Arbitrary Path Towards My Career
career_journey
Paraprofessional at Roberts Academy
English Teacher in Japan
Long Term English Substitute Teacher for Finneytown Highschool
Kroger IT Support Analyst
Sales Underwriting Assistant
Business Intelligence Developer

I graduated from school wanting to be a teacher helping students learn the English language through literature, well, that was fun while it lasted, but proved to be not the right career move for me. I was scared of moving into something related to computers, however, when I jumped in and realized how fun and rewarding working with data can be, I felt like I had found my mate for life…data. Hence the blog name and image…

Maybe you find yourself in a similar situation, where your current career goals…

1. seem to not be working out the way you thought

2. have become a lie you tell yourself to get through the day

3. you are finding that the thing you loved the most about your career is getting replaced or overrun by something else (this is the category I fell into).

Don’t give in! Explore your options and never doubt yourself! Your brain is a powerful tool that can be reconfigured to whatever you set your mind to. As cliché as that sounds, it’s true. The only limit is what you put into action. For me, this was a Data Analytics Program, a ton of self-study (SQL phone apps, Quizlet for vocab, R phone apps, and practice on my PC), and a determination to succeed.

If you are thinking about switching careers you probably have a long laundry list of things you think will be holding you back. One of mine was having my first kid! Can you believe that? I actually thought an incredible innocent little creature was going to “hold me back,” but guess what, she became another motivating factor for me to work harder if anything else, because now my daughter was apart of my journey, and I couldn’t let myself, my wife, and my daughter down!!! There were quite a number of mornings at 5 am where my daughter would only fall asleep in the carrier which I would strap on and start rocking her to sleep while also typing SQL queries, and SAS or R code on my computer for my class projects (Rest assured, if I were to put her into her crib, she would be back up in a heartbeat 😉 , so the carrier was the best option for her and myself).

So what if I am just not as amazing as you? This question assumes that I am some degree of “amazing” by myself, but the truth is the most important ingredient to your success is the team of people you have behind you whole love and support you.

I hope you found this piece encouraging! I want to help those who wish to move into a different career but feel trapped. You can do it! It takes a lot of hard work, but you can do it!

I am going to more regularly blog tips and tricks I have picked up that have proven to be helpful for me. I also want to post some different projects I complete.

Thank you for reading!