You, Relaunched: Advice for re-entering the workforce

Yesterday, Carol Fishman Cohen shared her story about relaunching a career at Bain Capital after 11–11!–years out of the workforce. Whether you’re thinking of ditching the patent law job you hate to explore the world and want to know what to do to make sure you can find a job when you get back, or you’re a stay-at-home parent looking to brush off that resume and hop back into the workforce–this interview is for you.

What are some of the best strategies for individuals who are trying to get back into the workforce after voluntary time away?

Figure out the “what”–what it is you want to do, before you think about the “where” and the “how.” You need to decide how your interests and skills have changed or have not changed during the time you have been away from the workforce. It is a process of looking at each of your past, significant, work and volunteer experiences, and breaking them into components, identifying which of those components you love doing and are best at. Extract them and put them into a pile. Then you can build up a new career path for yourself (or find that you want to go back to exactly what you left, or a permutation of your old career).

Practice talking about yourself:  You need to get good at talking about what you are interested in doing and why you are a great person to be doing whatever that is. Sounding articulate when talking about yourself takes practice. Talk first to your non-judgmental friends and family. After you get comfortable with that group, branch out and speak to people you don’t know as well. Remember these informal conversations essentially function as interview rehearsals, so the more of them you have, the better you will sound when it counts, in the interview itself.

Network and network some more; and persevere . We found that successfully returning to work after a career break is less a function of age or number of years out, than focus, determination, and ability to get out there and pound the pavement. We talk about networking in terms of contact pools – people from your past, people from your present, and people from your future. In Back on the Career Track we have lists of people in each of these categories. For example, under people from your past, consider junior people. Junior people may be people you mentored, people who reported to you or people who you just knew. Remember that these junior people have been moving up while you were on career break and are often in a position to open a door for you. Because of your prior junior/senior relationship they may be more receptive than most than helping you out with an introduction or advice.

What kind of advice do you have for Gen Y? (For some reason, I originally asked Cohen for her advice to Gen Y women, undercutting my own belief that career breaks and relaunches are fair game for both men and women. Still, I think most of her advice applies to all Gen Yers.)

Pay your dues: Try to work 3-5 years at one company or at least in one industry so you can make your mark (assuming you like your work and want to continue in that field). Pay your dues and establish a track record of excellent work. Companies are more likely to accommodate employees who have proven themselves and who they want to keep as that employee goes through various life stages.

Ask: If you have worked for a company for a while and want to stay working there but need some sort of change in employment status such as needing to work from home part of the week or reduced hours, ASK for it by making the business case why it can work for the company and for you. Don’t assume the company will say no.

Leave at the right time: If you have to leave, leave at the top of your game with your work reputation intact. Don’t let a situation develop where you are overcommitted outside of work and your work quality slips. Quit before that happens. THEN stay in touch with your network. Email colleagues about an article in your field, offer to cover maternity leaves at work, offer to do the occasional consulting project for your old boss, ask to go with someone at work to an industry event, get involved with your professional association organizing speaking events for experts in your field. You will meet these experts in the context of organizing the event, as opposed to the more opportunistic situation of meeting to ask them for a job. That can come later.

Don’t wait to have kids: It’s never a good time and you can rationalize away 10 years of higher fertility by just waiting until you get the next promotion. Have the kids and your work life will adjust around them.

Don’t “make arrangement”: I heard some great advice from Jackie Reses, a partner at private equity firm Apax Partners. She said that women get too hung up on “making arrangements” where men don’t. For example, if a man has to leave early on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons in the spring to coach his kid’s Little League team, he does not feel compelled to make formal arrangements with his employer to do this. He just leaves and makes up the work later in the day. Women on the other hand feel compelled to make some formal arrangement for a similar absence. As much as women under compensate when asking for and negotiating raises (they don’t ask, where men do), women tend to overcompensate when it comes to making arrangements for these types of non-work obligations. So don’t.

You may or may not be on the right career path from the beginning: Understand that some people fall into the perfect career for themselves right from the get-go but most people don’t. People who have taken career breaks say the career break was a gift – it gave them the opportunity to reflect on the fact they were not in the right career in the first place. If they had kept working they would have been so caught up in their work they might never have realized they would have been better off changing directions. Remember you are making career choices at a very young age so expect that over time you may discover you have been ignoring a signal from yourself that you should be doing something else. Know when to recognize that signal and to act on it.

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Need more advice or to meet some employers? Check out the The Career Relaunch Forum. The first one will be held March 11th at UC Irvine.