You may be looking for some down-to-earth suggestions to accelerate you on your career and work-life path.  You want to explore and are committed to staying “On-Purpose.” Okay, so let’s get some things out of the way so you can focus and steps that will move you forward—no matter where you are today.

These are my 3 Top Tips and 2 More Resources to Help You Prepare to Leave That Job:

1. Let Go of Self-Doubt

It doesn’t matter WHY you want or need to leave.
The pandemic or a company merger or closure may have forced your change.  Or, you may:
  • Have a great idea that you’d love to devote your time and energy to getting off the ground.
  • Feel your company environment is no longer a vibrant or creative match for you at this next stage.
  • Need to design a whole-life, not just a work-life.
  • Know you’ve changed. Your work is your life but right now it’s not a reflection of “you.”
  • Just be bored; It’s just time and something has to change.
  • Not be willing to wake up 3 or 5 or 10 years from now and feel regret.
If the change has been forced on you, it can be unsettling and scary. You may feel the urge to take any opportunity presented, and that may be necessary. If it’s not what you really want, however, think of it as a transition job or position while you continue to focus on what you really want to do.
Forced on you, or chosen, your future path depends on you creating it. So pay attention to the urges and create a little time, space so you can take action steps that will lead to your next life and work stage.

2. Get Support so You Slow Down to Speed Up

I know it sounds counter-intuitive. Especially if you are unhappy, bored or are worried about making ends meet. Yet it’s not a time to be impulsive. Impulsivity or reactivity may just derail or detour you. If possible, work with a good coach to clarify that future you want. Someone who can help you then back out the steps that can get you toward that goal.
This is how I work with my coaching clients. We work with a focus on your big picture goal—even if not fully clarified it will become clearer as we partner together. Then we review your immediate needs and responsibilities. From that there are action steps we identify together. Sometimes it’s clearing clutter, sometimes it’s exploring other options you hadn’t thought of in the past.
      As you take identified action steps, experimenting and exploring
with a safety net of guidance and support,
     a path to the work and life you want to create begins to naturally emerge, other connections and opportunities become clear.
     You organically transition into the future you desire.

Any “things” in your way, any of the “whys” about leaving—be they internal, emotional or external—will also emerge if you allow yourself to follow this integrated approach to discovering and creating the work and life you really want. You will have grounding, guidance and support to also face any stumbling blocks so your path into the next phase is uncluttered. As you face what previously looked like obstacles to your desires, you’ll develop confidence in both what you want and your ability to achieve it.

3. Dove-Tail Your Endings and Beginning

These are some of the activities you can dovetail as you both END and BEGIN your next career and life stage.

In the beginning, it can alternately feel exciting, terrifying and messy. Even self-chosen transitions are exciting, terrifying and messy. However random it may be at first, if you continuously make a bit of time to focus on these items, you’ll create a system that’s like building blocks, the foundation for a new business and life.

What’s most important is that you

  • Actively engage with your idea, dream or desire
  • Not over-rush the process
  • Get the right support
  • Take action steps—day-dreaming won’t help you figure it out

This is an opportunity to fully embrace what’s important to you in your life and work. It’s about molding your future; creating a new company or career path that embodies your values and is an expression of you and your way of creating in the world. Along with that goes catalyzing all the relationships that fully “see” and support you.

As you tackle the suggested action steps, I recommend you do so in a way that does not threaten your income or stability, make you totally freeze up with fear or impulsively do things you’ll regret later. Approach this as the fully mature professional person you are and are growing into, because how you approach it will inform the future you create.

Allow grace and dignity, openness to right relationships,
full self-expression and aliveness to become beacons
as you walk this path creating your next life adventure.

A Checklist of Things To Do When Ending Your Current Job

In the next article How to Create Security When Itching to Leave Your Job,  I’ll give you a checklist of ways to focus on beginning the new venture.

_____ Select an exit date. It will focus you. (This is between you and your outside advisors and supporters only. Do not write it in stone or announce it yet. It is your date to aim for so you get yourself ready to leave and prepared for next steps. You may need some flexibility, but not too much.)
_____ Complete all projects. Make a list of yours to complete and those you need to pass on by this end date.
_____ Delegate. Train. Wean. If you manage or lead, begin to strategize ways to delegate, train and wean others—because when you announce your leave-taking it would be nice if they miss you, but even better if they have the skills to carry on without you.
_____ Plan to inform. Plan how you will inform your superiors and co-workers, people you manage and any others about your leave-taking and reasons for doing so. Don’t leave it to others. How you “frame it” will be how they will see it. Include your plan for handling everything that is of value to them as you exit.
_____ Tidy up little things. In conjunction with announcing your departure and—unless your company is the kind to pack up your office on the spot, which you also need to prepare for—create a list of how you want to handle the 2 week to one-month closing out the job time frame. Sometimes a transition may even be longer, say 3 months if it provides you and your company stability. Either way, try to have most major projects wound down so you can focus on tidying up little things that will arise.
_____ Set limits for closure. Carefully think through what you will and won’t do on a daily basis. Do not give away any more expertise – simply train, delegate, pass on and wean them. Be generous and kind, but save your expertise for your new venture.

­­ Love them and leave them empowered.

Save the friendships that are valuable, the relates that are important.
_____ Remain professional. Remember my “Grace and dignity” mantra.
_____ No bridge-burning. No matter where you are it’s a “small town” or close industry and your reputation follows you. Even if it is simply perception—not truth or the facts—negatively perceived deeds are remembered far longer than good deeds.
_____ Say goodbye. As the time draws near, I recommend that you also plan the kind of goodbye party, happy hour, coffee and donuts or lunch that is appropriate for saying goodbye to these people and this company. Take charge of doing something, but make sure it fits the level of connection you have to these people or this job. But do something. Just because. It’s professional. And, it’s human.

career coaching resources

Additional Resources \

How to Create Security When Itching to Leave Your Job

Dr. Jan Hoistad
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