Job Change
  

A. Nine elementary questions:

1. Why do you want to work in the first place? (beside "to earn a living")
2. How would you evaluate the work you’ve done so far in your life
3. What would you want to do differently?
4. Why are you thinking about making a change in your career/business?
5. How does your work relate to your non-work priorities?
6. How do you build meaning into your work?
7. What things are most important in your life and how can your choices of work support these?
8. What don’t you like about work generally? What’s important to you about it?
9. What did you dislike most about each of your jobs so far? What’s important to you about each of these? How did they become an issue for you?

(These are questions that relate to your work values. You may not want to answer these. So what? Stretch yourself beyond your comfort zone and think about your answers to these. Career planning does not motivate you. It helps you to work with what is already inside, to get in touch with what drives you. When you answer questions about your root values, you stir the energy you will use throughout your career development).

B. Three basic questions:

1. What do you want to do?

1. What are some of the best things you’ve ever done?
2. What do these suggest you need to do next?
3. How has your work been different from what you’ve wanted it to be?
4. What have you not yet done in your life that you really must do?
5. Who are you as compared to who you think you are?
6. What kinds of work feed your sense of purpose?
    

2. What is stopping you from doing it?

1. What are your "yes buts"?
2. Half the battle is defining these…
3. The other half is deciding what to do about them…

3. What are you doing about it?

1. How accurate is your perception of the problem? (reality testing)
2. Can you get better data?
3. If you have less skill than you need, what can you do to improve your situation, to begin overcoming the obstacle?

Strengths Questions

1. Think of a personal, off-the-job accomplishment you have enjoyed over the past year or so and feel especially good about, or feel has been particularly meaningful to you.
2. What about this accomplishment makes you feel especially good?
3. What special strengths do you feel might have played a key role in helping you achieve this result?
4. What special insights are you gaining about your strengths from thinking about these first three questions?
5. What if you were truly talented? What is your response to this possibility? Do you feel excitement and interest or fear and resistance?
6. What, in your mind, are your strengths and talents?
7. What have you been told by others are your strengths? Your talents? Your gifts?
8. How did you feel when you were told? Did you believe it?
9. Pick four significant people in your life, such as a partner, boss, colleague or parent. In your mind, ask "What do I think each one would perceive to be my strengths/talents?" Ask yourself and hear what answers come to you. When you feel up to it, go and ask those people to tell you. Listen, and take not of what they say. How do their answers match your own feelings.

Start to value what comes naturally and easily to you, as to have your gifts go unexpressed is one of the most terrible forms of poverty. Celebrate your individual abilities and choices, based on your individual inner and outer needs, and it is unique for each of us.

Always give your wishes a try-out because:

1. you can find out better through first-hand experience – reality testing is always available if you look hard enough (you can get lots of different experiences by offering to work for free: Bob Weinstein – I’ll Work for Free (Henry Holt, 1994) provides reasons why nonpaid work is a first-rate career strategy – it allows you to make judgments from your direct experiences)
2. in most cases you just don’t know how much you are capable of doing until you allow yourself a fair trial
3. you learn more about yourself by failing and then deciding how you are going to respond to those setbacks – reality tests do not assure success but give you ways to take constructive action toward your goals
4. often when you seek one goal you find another – by working toward one desirable goal you may find a related goal that appeals to you.

Here are yet more questions to help you clarify your thoughts and feelings:

	What are my dominant interests (major areas where I'd like to spend my time)
	What qualities do I admire most in my role models and mentors (who would I like to invite to dinner if I could invite anyone)
	What are my strongest character qualities?
	What skills do I most enjoy using?
	Thinking back to a time when I was in my element and really enjoying myself, what was I  doing? (Note: this is not accomplishments but what was really satisfying)
	What was in those experiences that was so satisfying? What did they bring me? What else did they bring me? (What satisfaction/feelings did I get from them?
	Thinking back some more to those moments when I lose track of time - what was I  doing then? (Think carefully about, then write down in detail, exactly what kinds of abilities you were using at those times; what kinds of knowledge, materials or people; the circumstances – problems, needs results – and environment that turned you on; how you were working with others (if at all); and what you wanted to happen.)
	What is the gift or talent I have that I would feel great about orienting my life around? (You will have at least an idea what this probably is because people will have mentioned it from time to time throughout your life.)
	If all jobs paid a million a year, what job would I have?
	If I had all the money I needed, how would I spend my time?
	What key phrases describe the kind of life I would like to have?
	What would my ideal lifestyle include?
	What non-working activities are important to me?
	Where would I live?
	How much time would I devote to working?
	What would I like to earn?
	What rewards, other than money, would I want to receive from my work?
	What type of people would I ideally spend time with when working? (Who do you want in your world? Who do you want to play with? Where are the places you would find these people (where do these people go and how can you get connected with them)?)
	What personal goals have I neglected that I would like to make a priority again?
	How would I express my values through my work?
	What about my current life would I eliminate immediately?
	How can I incorporate more positive experiences into my life now?

First give yourself permission to talk or write about those very tentative thoughts that you have inside you. Then shape the problems that you feel stand in your way. Finally learn how big or small those problems really are and how much energy you want to devote to overcoming them. This process allows you to take full responsibility for your career decisions.