Dusseldorf At this point, we regularly present you with a question about your job, salary or career – with an answer from one of our renowned experts. If you also have a question for the Handelsblatt career coach, send us an email at [email protected] – We will forward your question anonymously to our experts.
Martina F. has been working in the public sector for ten years. Her job is secure, but her tasks are increasingly stressful. In the past few years, she has trained several times and even completed a distance-learning university degree.
What makes you feel insecure about your professional reorientation: age. “The year I was born in 1964 is not very attractive on the job market.” The mother of two adult sons asks the Handelsblatt career coach whether she shouldn’t just be content with her job in her mid-50s – or whether she should try to start all over again. And if so: “How could my application process look like?”
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Career coach Michael Alznauer answers:
Dear Ms. F., first about your age: The chances on the job market decrease in your mid-50s, as the statistics show. However, please don’t let that impress you. I will show you how you can significantly increase your chances of success through a clever application strategy.
Basically, your situation sounds like a real dichotomy. Obviously, on the one hand, you have potential and ambition that would like to be lived out. On the other hand, you suspect that at some point the time will come to make peace with what you have achieved.
I can well imagine that you have been illuminating your question from different perspectives for a long time. And you probably got more pondered than closer to a solution – didn’t you?
This is because we humans allow too many details to paralyze us in our decisions. Thinking about it in even more differentiated ways doesn’t help, of course. What does that mean in practice?
My tip: change your perspective
You seem to be used to concentrating on goals and plans, working through them in a disciplined manner, and then seeing whether they have made you happier. In this way, you have acquired an impressive collection of skills. However, apparently not yet found what you are really looking for.
In this section, readers can ask their questions about jobs and careers – this time management coach Michael Alznauer provided the answer.
So first treat yourself to a conversation with someone you trust. Don’t ask yourself “What should I do next?” But rather “What is important to me and why?”.
When you understand your motivations better, your vision will expand: There are many more ways to meet our needs than we initially think.
But let’s assume that changing jobs would actually make you happiest: What could a meaningful application process look like for you?
Step 1: Think of yourself as a problem solver
Neither for your self-confidence nor as a basis for a job change is useful to consider which aspects could possibly speak against you, such as your age. The addressee of your application does not wonder why they are you not should take. Rather, your future employer has a serious problem and is looking for someone to solve it for him.
Once you understand that, there are just two questions left:
- “Which problems can I demonstrably solve very well?”
- And: “Which employer has such problems?”
Step 2: sharpen your profile
Carefully scour your life path for problems that you have already solved in your (professional) life. Don’t limit yourself to major challenges or subject-specific topics. It is best to write down all of the practical examples where someone was happy with your valuable contribution.
As a rule, a pattern can be identified from such a collection: You have talent, the right personality and the corresponding skills for a certain type of problem. But: resist the temptation to position yourself as a “multifunctional tool”.
To motivate yourself and to provide more clarity, please add the following sentence: “I am a specialist in __________ problems!”
Now write down to what extent all of your specific experiences, training courses and titles make you even more valuable for these types of problems.
Step 3: Inform your target group about your offer
Forget about applying for traditional job advertisements! Group structures, authorities and formalized processes do not do justice to your particularities. Rather, think about which medium-sized employers keep coming up with the kind of problems that you are demonstrably predestined to solve.
Collect their addresses and research which person would be your contact person for an application. Send them a so-called short target group application (maximum one and a half pages).
First, explain here why you assume that your particular qualities might be in demand in this case. Then take a few paragraphs to demonstrate your problem-solving specialty.
End your letter with a sentence in which you briefly formulate your own expectations (such as part-time work or salary expectations). Follow up on the phone three days later.
Dear Ms. F., such a path is often productive, especially for disciplined, committed people like you. Age often hardly plays a role. I would be very happy if you found not only the success you deserve, but also satisfaction in this way.
That’s the expert
Michael Alznauer from Bonn is a leadership specialist, management consultant and evolutionary psychologist. The partner of career advice LEAD2gether is the author of the guidebook “The evolutionary leadership model. Seven core tasks for a successful and efficient manager ”.
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