Be the Sorcerer of Your Career in the New Work World

By Mary Ann Faremouth, CPC

Halloween reminds us that we can step into another identity for a night. We put on a costume, take on a new character, and for a few hours, we get to imagine ourselves as someone completely different.

But what if we took that same willingness to imagine something different and applied it to our careers?

You don’t need a wand, crystal ball, or magic potion to change the direction of your professional life. You do, however, need curiosity, preparation, and the willingness to take action. In the New Work World, waiting for the perfect opportunity to find you may not be enough. Sometimes, you have to create the opportunity yourself.

As George Eliot said, “It is never too late to be what you might have been.”

That idea is especially relevant when considering your career. The skills, experiences, interests, and abilities you already possess can become the ingredients for something entirely new.

In my consulting practice, I use the Faremouth Method to help people better understand their professional strengths and identify opportunities that align with who they are. These five steps can help you take a more active role in creating your own career path.

Step 1: Do a Self-Inventory

Before deciding where you want to go, take a good look at what you already have.

Think beyond your job title. What skills have you developed? What accomplishments are you proud of? What activities seem to come naturally to you? What do other people regularly come to you for help with?

Perhaps you are an excellent organizer, a creative thinker, a natural communicator, or someone who can remain calm when everyone else is overwhelmed.

Your career history contains clues about your strengths. Pay attention to the tasks that energize you and the accomplishments that make you think, “I was really good at that.”

You cannot create a new career direction without first understanding the tools you already have.

Step 2: Ask Better Questions

Sometimes the quality of the questions we ask ourselves determines the quality of the answers we find.

Instead of asking, “What job can I get?” consider asking, “What kind of work would make me excited to show up?” or “Where could my strengths make the greatest contribution?”

I often ask clients to imagine that limitations such as job titles, previous experience, or fear of failure have temporarily disappeared. If you could design your professional life from the ground up, what would you choose?

Their answers often reveal passions and interests they had pushed aside while concentrating on what they thought was practical or possible.

Better questions can uncover possibilities that ordinary questions never reveal.

Step 3: Step Out of Your Comfort Zone

Career growth rarely happens when we repeatedly do exactly what we have always done.

Trying something unfamiliar can expose us to new people, ideas, industries, and even talents we did not realize we possessed.

A few years ago, I traveled to my father’s homeland of Malta for the first time. The experience took me outside my normal environment and ultimately inspired me to write a short story in a genre I had never attempted. That story was eventually published.

The lesson for me was simple: sometimes an unexpected experience can unlock an unexpected part of ourselves.

You don’t have to make a dramatic change overnight. Take a class. Attend an event. Talk to someone in an industry that interests you. Volunteer for a project. Explore something you have always wondered about.

You never know what door may open when you are willing to walk somewhere new.

Step 4: Take Time to Do It Right

Creating a new career direction is not a race.

Preparation matters. If you are interested in pursuing a new position, practice your interview skills. Strengthen your networking abilities. Update your resume. Learn about the industry. Identify where your current skills could transfer.

And give yourself permission to learn.

We sometimes assume that people who appear confident simply have a natural ability that we lack. More often, confidence comes from preparation and repetition.

If you find yourself struggling to see the next step, consider seeking guidance from a mentor, counselor, coach, or other trusted professional. Sometimes another perspective can help you recognize possibilities that are difficult to see on your own.

Step 5: Be a Hunter

Once you know what you bring to the table and where you want to go, you have to actively pursue it.

Be a hunter, not a bystander.

Look for opportunities. Build relationships. Ask questions. Follow leads. Put yourself in rooms where possibilities exist.

This doesn’t mean saying yes to every opportunity. It means becoming intentional about identifying opportunities that could move you toward the professional life you want.

The New Work World needs people who can recognize their own value and communicate how they can contribute. There is a significant difference between approaching an opportunity with “I don’t know if I can do this” and approaching it with “Here is what I can bring to the table, and here is what I am ready to learn.”

You don’t need a magic wand to change your career.

You need to know yourself, ask better questions, be willing to explore, prepare for the opportunities you want, and actively pursue them.

This Halloween, instead of simply dressing like a sorcerer, consider becoming one in your own professional life. The power to shape what comes next may already be in your hands.