Career Change: Why Should You Do it With Others? A Business Psychology Podcast Episode.

A lot of us think about career transitions and career changes during our working lives and especially towards the end and start of a new year. We consider what we want for the year ahead, where we want to be and what changes we want to make to our careers. This isn’t unique to psychology careers because everyone considers changes. Yet career changes are scary, intimidating and this fear can stop us from taking good opportunities and exploring what the job market has to offer us. Therefore, in this business psychology podcast episode, you’ll understand why is career change scary, what are the benefits of career transitioning with others and why social groups are critical during career changes. If you enjoy learning about careers, organisational psychology and social psychology, then you’ll love today’s episode.

Today’s psychology podcast has been sponsored by Careers In Psychology: A Guide To Careers in Clinical Psychology, Forensic Psychology and More. Available from all major eBook retailers and you can order the paperback and hardback copies from Amazon, your local bookstore and local library, if you request it. Also available as an AI-narrated audiobook from selected audiobook platforms and library systems. For example, Kobo, Spotify, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, Overdrive, Baker and Taylor and Bibliotheca.

Brief Introduction To Career Changes

I haven’t met a single person who hasn’t transitioned or changed career at some point in their life. My mum was a dental nurse for a few years and she loved it, then she changed her career when the rules changed and she’s been working in insurance for decades. My older brother started off in carpentry then he changed to something in construction and now he works for Southern Water maintaining the water system. Career change is simply part of life and that is hardly a bad thing.

This is even more common and important for aspiring and qualified psychologists, because we all know the all-important assistant psychologist roles are next to impossible to get. This means the majority of aspiring psychologists need to start in a different career, build up their experience and then hopefully transition to the psychology career they’ve always wanted. For example, I am currently a teaching assistant at a special needs school but I have no intention of staying there for the long term. I want to be there for about a year, get a year of experience under me and hopefully transition to a different mental health career.

I recently went to my graduation for my MSc in clinical psychology and from the conversations I had with other graduates, I am not alone in starting in non-psychology careers and hoping to transition over time.

However, when we’re in the middle of a career change, it can be really disorienting, confusing and it can feel like we’re wandering through a dense forest without a map. This has a wide range of negative impacts on us that I’ll talk about later in this podcast episode. Yet it doesn’t matter if you’re switching industries, returning to the workforce after a long break or you’re stepping into an entirely new role. You are probably going to feel alone or doubt yourself.

I know when I started my position as a teaching assistant, I doubted that I would be any good at it, I felt like a failure because this wasn’t the psychology career I wanted and I felt like everyone else was having amazing psychology jobs. And I was simply being left behind. On the other hand, as I found out at my graduation two days ago, whilst there are a good amount of people who somehow managed to land some psychology-related jobs, there are plenty more that didn’t.

I was talking to a brilliant young woman who was working construction with her dad and brother. Another woman was working as a wellbeing practitioner and someone else was working as a neuro-something trainer. Some people are doing very well and other people are still struggling to find a psychology-related job, and that’s okay.

Building upon this, when we’re in the middle of a career change, we tend to question and ask ourselves whether we’re the only person who feels unsure of their career change and whether we actually have the ability to make it to the other side.

As an aspiring psychologist, this is definitely something that I’m concerned about. I really, really want a psychology job in the future because I love clinical psychology, I want to help people and I want to work in this amazing profession. And yes, I do acknowledge the profession has a lot of flaws but I want to work in clinical psychology regardless. Yet I do question whether I have the skills, the ability and the experience to ever break into this guarded profession that seems to be reserved for middle-class women.

On the other hand, at the time of writing, I don’t really have any feelings of being unsure about a future career change from a teaching assistant to another role. I remember on my first day at the school, I was sitting in the staff room, the hard white plastic chair was making me a little uncomfortable and I was a little unsure of myself. Staff rooms are very cliquey, no one talks to each other and staff rooms are not nice places. Yet I remember listening to a group of women behind me and they were explaining how they just wanted out of this school.

Throughout the course of my first day, I heard 5 people say how they just wanted out of this special needs school. As well as even a few days later, the brilliant teacher of my class said to me do not plan to stay in education for too long. Everyone wants to leave special education and after everyone I’ve experienced in my first four weeks, I don’t really blame them.

Not at all.

However, I know a lot of people can experience fear of failure, fear of judgment and fear of the unknown when it comes to a career change. This is normal, understandable and it’s okay that someone is feeling like this.

On the whole, considering that our workplace culture celebrates self-reliance, we typically feel like we need to have all the answers. This is even more true if you come from a toxic workplace where any workplace mistake is seen as incompetence and you’re berated for it. I’ve heard a few horror stories like that over the years, especially from women. Therefore, one solution found by researchers is that we all might benefit from being able to ask for help as well as navigating career changes with other people.

Why Do Career Changes Make Us Uncertain of Who We Are?

Whenever we normally think about the challenges of career changes, we typically think about how they’ll impact our routines. I know as an author, podcaster and a million other things, any sort of career change will challenge my time and organisation even more. This is also true if you’re a parent, a carer or you do additional things outside of work (which I highly recommend you do. Your work being your life isn’t healthy). Yet career changes can also challenge our sense of self because according to Bridges’ model of transition published in 1991, career changes make it difficult to distinguish between internal transitions and external change. This means the “neutral zone” is psychologically challenging for us. This is the psychologically vulnerable period where our old identity has been removed and our new identity has yet to fully emerge.

This is something I experienced shortly after leaving university and being a student ambassador. For six brilliant years, my identity was being a psychology student, researcher and a student ambassador. That identity got shredded after my last Outreach shift and because I was unemployed and didn’t have a clue what job I was going to get, my mental health dipped a little. I was unsure of who I was and what my identity would morph into because my new identity as a teaching assistant hadn’t emerged yet.

In addition, during this psychologically vulnerable time, we can experience self-doubt, symptoms of depression and anxiety as well as uncertainty according to Goodman et al. (2006). This is even more common for people who experience layoffs, unemployment or they need to undergo a career change because of caring responsibilities. Also, according to Ibarra and Barbulescu (2010) identity discontinuity, when your current role doesn’t align with your sense of self, can continue to negatively impact your motivation and self-esteem.

This is why group support can be so important during career changes.

Why Can Groups Improve Your Confidence During Career Changes?

Building upon what I mentioned earlier in the episode, one reason why I feel more confident about undergoing a career change in future is because I know lots of people don’t want to be a teaching assistant or work in special education for the long term. I unofficially say that there are only really three reasons why people work at my special needs school. Like me, they have been screwed over by the job market and cannot get another job regardless of their degrees. They are approaching retirement and simply want some pocket money. Or they like special education and are stuck in it, and they want other people to escape because they couldn’t.

My point is that social groups give us a sense of normalisation, and this is especially true when it comes to career changes. In many healthy workplace environments, there is already a sense of “we’re in this together” and this can be applied to career changes too. I know that I am not the only teaching assistant wanting an out, looking for another job and will jump ship in the future. This helps to lessen my feeling of fear, like I am making a massive mistake and people will think less of me because of it.

In addition, because social groups provide us with a sense of “we’re in this together”, this potentially creates a safe space for us to express the same fears about a career change that all of us have been secretly holding onto. For example, fears about whether we’re good enough, whether artificial intelligence will replace our skills so they aren’t relevant anymore, and whether you should go back to what you were doing before or try something new.

We all have these fears and it is perfectly okay, understandable and healthy to express them. This is why undergoing a career change with other people can be useful because you can undergo this journey together.

Building upon this, this is where co-regulation can come in because you and your fellow career-changers can create a safe, supportive group that allows you all to co-regulate. This is when your nervous system can stay calm because you’re with other people according to Porges (2011). Also, co-regulation allows you to stop only seeing yourself through the lens of self-doubt but through the strengths, insights as well as potential that other people see in you.

Personally, I remember when I was feeling lost between me finishing my Masters and me finding my teaching assistant job. I was filled with self-doubt because I was getting assistant psychologist interviews, I was getting great feedback and lots of job rejections. I thought I couldn’t do this, I was a failure and I was never going to get a job. Yet everyone kept saying that I was good, I was kind, compassionate and clearly loved psychology. So I kept talking with university friends and family members, I focused and eventually I thankfully found a job.

Forming supportive groups with other psychologists, graduates and friends can be a great idea. Especially, because you and your friends and peers can hype up each other and when someone has confidence in us, it’s so much easier for us to have confidence in ourselves.

Why is Group Support A Protective Factor During A Career Change?

A protective factor is something that acts as a buffer against stress as well as it helps us to cope more effectively, and research shows that group support is an effective protective factor during disruptive times (Cohen & Wills, 1985). I definitely think a career change, finishing university or becoming unemployed counts as a life disruption. This is why social groups are so important. Also, research, like Taylor (2011), shows that when people have supportive communities to rely on during major life changes, they report less psychological distress as well as greater wellbeing.

This is why peer mentoring can be so effective, because Ensher et al. (2001) found that peer monitoring increases self-efficacy, opens more opportunities and provides emotional validation to employees. And being a part of a group with shared intentions can increase collective resilience and momentum. For example, Moen et al. (2008) found during a longitudinal study that women who were returning to work after caregiving and when they took part in a group-based re-entry programme reported stronger career identities and higher confidence compared to women who didn’t have these programmes.

This applies to career changes because if you undergo a career change alone then your bouts of self-doubt, negative thoughts and fear will likely increase. Since you won’t have anyone to hype you up, no one to believe in you and no one will be able to spur you into action. Yet if you, your friends and maybe your peers want to undergo a career change at the same time then you can form a supportive group that can hype you up, inspire confidence when you have none and you can hold each other accountable.

Personally, I definitely find the idea of being accountable to be flat out critical through the job hunt. When I was applying for jobs after my Masters, I will fully admit that I didn’t want to do it. I might have had rent, council tax and bills to pay on a house I wasn’t even living in (that’s a whole other story) so I needed the money, but the job hunt was just depressing. It was draining, I hated the job rejections and I hated feeling like I was nothing but a failure. Yet because my parents occasionally asked about jobs and they held me accountable because I lovingly wanted them off my back, they gave me the momentum to apply for jobs.

If you and your friends form a supportive group, you can do the same for each other.

And considering how hard finding a job is after university, I would really recommend towards the end of your BSc or MSc that you sit down with your friends, talk about wanting to form a supportive job-hunting group and you do it. I think this would have improved my mental health, my outlook and my confidence during my job hunt because I would have known I wasn’t alone.

What Kinds of Groups Work To Support A Career Change?

Throughout this podcast episode, I’ve mainly focused on the idea of a group of friends or peers coming together and forming a supportive community where they can support you, increase your confidence and you can check in with them from time to time. Yet there are other social groups too that might be useful during a career change. For example, a parent re-entry group so you can support each other in your return to work after caregiving, a one-off therapy support group, class or a focused retreat as well as a career transition circle for people changing careers.

The most important things when it comes to social support during a career change are that the people come together with shared intentions, mutual respect and consistency. Since when we know we aren’t alone, it makes the prospect of finding a new job or changing careers a lot less scary.

Business Psychology Conclusion

As I mentioned near the beginning of the psychology podcast episode, at some point in our lives, all of us will want to change careers. Whilst traditional wisdom in the Western world would tell us to do everything by ourselves because the job market is competitive and by helping others we might allow them to succeed at the cost of our own, this isn’t true. We can only really change once we realise we need help and support from other people and that’s okay.

Massive changes, like changing careers, are not meant to be done alone.

This is why regardless of whether you’re changing careers, you’re re-entering the workforce after some timeout for whatever reason or if you’re starting up your own business, joining a group of likeminded people might be more useful, valuable and insightful than you could ever think of. Not only because you’re receiving support but because you’re supporting others too and that is wonderfully rewarding in its own right.

I know sometimes in the race to become an assistant psychologist, a mental health professional or whatever psychology-related career we’re all striving for, we sometimes forget why we want it in the first place. We’re all so busy trying to write perfect cover letters, practice for interviews and more that we forget.

However, seeing someone else, like a peer or friend, follow us in our psychology journey and see their excitement and delight when they get some success and they explain why they love clinical psychology or whatever area of psychology in a mock interview, it can be a powerful reminder of why we, ourselves, love this amazing, infuriating and sometimes elitist profession.

And why we work hard every day to make our dreams of becoming a psychologist, a reality.

I really hope you enjoyed today’s business psychology podcast episode.

If you want to learn more, please check out:

FREE 8 PSYCHOLOGY BOOK BOXSET

Careers In Psychology: A Guide To Careers in Clinical Psychology, Forensic Psychology and More. Available from all major eBook retailers and you can order the paperback and hardback copies from Amazon, your local bookstore and local library, if you request it. Also available as an AI-narrated audiobook from selected audiobook platforms and library systems. For example, Kobo, Spotify, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, Overdrive, Baker and Taylor and Bibliotheca.

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Have a great day.

Business Psychology References and Further Reading

Applegate, J. M., & Janssen, M. A. (2022). Job mobility and wealth inequality. Computational Economics, 59(1), 1-25.

Bhargava, A., Bester, M., & Bolton, L. (2021). Employees’ perceptions of the implementation of robotics, artificial intelligence, and automation (RAIA) on job satisfaction, job security, and employability. Journal of Technology in Behavioral Science, 6(1), 106-113.

Bridges, W. (1991). Managing transitions: Making the most of change. Perseus Books.

Chao, G. T. (2009). Formal mentoring: Lessons learned from past practice. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 40(3), 314–320. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0012658

Cohen, S., & Wills, T. A. (1985). Stress, social support, and the buffering hypothesis. Psychological Bulletin, 98(2), 310–357. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.98.2.310

Ensher, E. A., Thomas, C., & Murphy, S. E. (2001). Comparison of traditional, step-ahead, and peer mentoring on protégés’ support, satisfaction, and perceptions of career success. Journal of Business and Psychology, 15(3), 419–438. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007870600459

Ghosh, R., & Reio, T. G. (2013). Career benefits associated with mentoring for mentors: A meta-analysis. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 83(1), 106–116. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2013.03.011

Goodman, J., Schlossberg, N. K., & Anderson, M. L. (2006). Counseling adults in transition: Linking practice with theory (3rd ed.). Springer.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/upward-spiral/202504/career-in-transition-heres-why-not-to-go-it-alone

Ibarra, H. (2023). Working identity, updated edition, with a new preface: Unconventional strategies for reinventing your career. Harvard Business Press.

Ibarra, H., & Barbulescu, R. (2010). Identity as narrative: Prevalence, effectiveness, and consequences of narrative identity work in macro work role transitions. Academy of Management Review, 35(1), 135–154. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.35.1.zok135

Moen, P., Kelly, E. L., & Huang, R. (2008). Fit inside the work–family black box: An ecology of the life course, cycles of control reframing. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 81(3), 411–433. https://doi.org/10.1348/096317908X325450

Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton & Company.

Rachmad, Y. E. (2022). Career Development Theory.

Taylor, S. E. (2011). Social support: A review. In H. S. Friedman (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of health psychology (pp. 189–214). Oxford University Press.

van Hooft, E. A., Kammeyer-Mueller, J. D., Wanberg, C. R., Kanfer, R., & Basbug, G. (2021). Job search and employment success: A quantitative review and future research agenda. Journal of Applied Psychology, 106(5), 674.

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