Financial Advice On Career Change

Practical Steps You Can Take To Overcome the ‘Money Problem’

If you are looking for financial advice on career change, then read on.

This section of the How To Change Careers website looks specifically at some of the practical steps you can take towards making your career change a reality by dealing with the financial challenges you may be facing.

Yes, changing careers can have a big financial impact. You may have to accept a short term drop in salary or you may need to save up to pay for some kind of re-training.

But don’t let money issues be a reason not to make the career change you know you need. If you plan carefully and follow my financial advice on career change you can make the sums add up.

Short term financial cut backs can lead to long term career satisfaction.

Below you will find my top tips to help you get the money side of the equation right.

Plan, plan plan!

Well, you know what they say – failing to plan means you are planning to fail. This applies to many things in life. It is relevant to career change in general and certainly applies to the financial aspects of career change.

Commit now to setting up a plan to manage your money more effectively and to saving to pay for your escape route.

Monitor your spending

Money can slip through your fingers so easily, so commit to making a complete and accurate record of exactly where your money goes. This should ideally be for a whole month. You can download an example expenditure record sheet here.

The easiest way is to keep a daily record sheet tucked in your diary. Or set up a notes page on your phone or personal organiser. Use the headings on the monthly expenditure sheet to keep track of where the money goes. Then tot up your spending at the end of each week and at the end of a month.

If you do this accurately, you will be amazed to see how much money gets frittered on things which are not absolutely essential.

Reflect on what makes you spend on inessential items. Is it to comfort yourself? Is it a reaction against the tight control that your parents encouraged? Take a look at the beliefs that may lie behind how you deal with money.

Review & re-prioritise your typical expenditure

Any financial advice on career change will suggest a careful review of your financial priorities.

Once you know where your money is going, divide your expenditure into

essential

important

optional

The optional items can be dropped.

Simplify your life and before you spend, always ask:

‘Do I really need this?’

How far can you reduce your bottom line expenditure? I bet you can survive on less than you think!

Get support and advice

Talk to the people close to you about your intention to save and explain why. In the case of family members, ask them where they would be prepared to make cuts – don’t make assumptions about what they will and will not be prepared to do without.

Tell your friends too, so that they don’t encourage you to spend unnecessarily.

And if you are struggling with debts, make sure you face up to this and seek professional advice. I recommend DebtSteps as a great starting point.

Review your savings

Maybe you have got some money saved up, but you have excluded it from you career change planning because it is ‘for a rainy day’.

What kind of rainy day?

If you are feeling seriously frustrated by your job, is this not the rainy day you have been waiting for? You have worked hard to save this money. Is now the moment when you allow yourself to use your savings to create a happier life for yourself?

These savings together with a more frugal lifestyle can probably last you for quite a while as you establish yourself in your new line of work.

Consider alternative sources of income

If you are in full time employment, it may take a bit of a switch of mindset to realise that you can have money coming in from several places at once.

But taking my financial advice on career change does not mean doing two full time jobs!

You can easily explore ways of generating a little income from small ventures that run alongside your current job.

With easy access to the internet, you can start by looking at the possibilities this opens up for you such as network marketing schemes. Proceed with a little caution, however and make sure you talk to people who are already making a success of any programme before you sign up.

Setting up a website does not need to be a major enterprise these days and there are many possibilities which would allow you to create a small income stream using internet marketing strategies.

If you want to know more about affiliate marketing before you dive in, then take a look at this free e-book, the Affiliate Masters course which really gives you the full story – for no cost at all.

And of course, I am happy to recommend SiteBuildIt, which is how I have built this website and you could build one too around your own interests and passions that will bring you another source of income. Why not try it?

Change your work pattern

In many ways it is easier to change your work pattern now than it has been in the past.

Part-time, flexi-time, home working, 4 day weeks, portfolio careers, day release for training all make it possible to make space for new sources of income.

My financial advice on career change for clients always includes an review of working patterns as a way of freeing up time for other sources of income. Why not discuss these ideas with your boss?

Start saving now

Maybe saving is not something that has come easily to you in the past. But ask yourself:

• How important it is for you to get out of the job that is driving you mad?
• How strong is your desire to switch to this new line of work or set up your own business?

If these two are strong enough, then saving is possible.

Here are three ways to begin:

1. Stop buying your daily cappuccino or latte and put that money aside. While you are at it, make a sandwich for your lunch and save the money you would have paid on expensive deli sandwiches.
2. Set up a savings account and arrange with your payroll department that a certain amount of your pay goes directly to that account each month. Out of sight, out of mind. You’ll be surprised how quickly it can grow.
3. Arrange for ALL your salary to go directly to a savings account and work out a monthly ‘pay’ that you will give yourself based on the near minimum that you can survive on. Withdraw only this amount as your monthly living expenses. The rest stays and grows in your savings account.

Assess and manage your debts

Most of us have debts to juggle, some more than others.

It is time to be honest about what you owe and put in place plans to manage the debt you are carrying.

Seek out more some specialist financial advice before career change. Contact a consumer credit counselling services and explore ways that you can consolidate your debts to manage them more easily.

If you want to use online help, one of the best debt management websites around is Debtsteps

Remember you always have a choice

When you are feeling tempted to spend, just remember that you always have a choice. It is your choices regarding money and with your life in general that lead you to the results you get.

So will you buy that new handbag or mobile phone? Do you really need them? Will not having them be a total disaster in your life?

It’s your decision.

Which choice will be the most helpful for you as part of your career change plans?

Take your time, but take action

Do not assume that there is a magic way that will allow you to solve your money issues overnight. Any financial advice on career change will include the points I have made above. As I said at the beginning, plan, plan, plan.

As long as you put a plan in place and follow it consistently, taking small steps at a time, your financial situation will improve and make your career change possible.

And if you think you have tried all these tactics before and they haven’t worked, then maybe it is the underlying beliefs you have about money that are getting in the way. Read more about these beliefs and how to tackle them here.