Should You Really Be Changing Careers? [QUIZ]
Many women of color are unhappy – to some extent – when it comes to their career. Most of us are overworked and underpaid. Many of us crave meaning in our work that’s sorely lacking. On top of that, having to work in White- and/or male-dominated workplaces and industries comes with a plethora of added challenges, burdens, and pain.
It’s no surprise that many of us see ourselves switching careers to do something else.
But maybe we could also see ourselves staying in our field and just changing jobs or employers. Not everyone who thinks they should change careers should actually change careers. How do we know if we should or shouldn’t?
Well, shit, I don’t know. There’s obviously no prescriptive answer I can give you in a sentence or two. Only you can answer that question for yourself by taking a real, hard, honest look at what is happening in your life. But I’m here to help! I can offer you two preliminary “tests” to help you get some answers. Let’s start with a little temperature check.
Jot down a few thoughts in response to each of these questions:
What are your top priorities for this stage of your life?
What’s going well in your current work situation?
What’s not going well?
What does your intuition tell you about whether you should change careers?
You might find these questions a little confronting. Hopefully they don’t stir up feelings of doubt or anxiety in you or deter you from considering a big change – this is only the first test! And, on a personal note, I love seeing a woman of color throw caution to the wind to chase after a dream and Make. It. Happen. I love seeing someone boldly go where their gut and intuition told them to.
I fully believe that if we don’t take charge of our lives, external factors will take charge of us.
Clearly my own career trajectory favors mixing things up, going against the grain, and trying many different things in life.
That said, I know everyone isn’t like me. A path like mine isn’t for everyone. Although we’re all women of color, we each have unique:
professional landscapes;
financial situations;
family circumstances;
talents and skill sets;
career goals; and
personality traits.
Everyone has their own vantage point given where they’ve been, who they are, and what they’ve done.
We each bring a unique set of personality traits, which should not be ignored when making a big decision like this.
So let’s take a quiz to quantify your situation a little better:
