Sometimes our professions or jobs cause problems that affect not only our working hours but our personal lives. The need to consider a career change is often manifested in job burnout and job stress.

To find a cure for a work-related problem, you need to identify the symptoms and the cause. Here are only some of the possible signs or causes.

• Overwork: working late or on weekends, taking work home, postponing vacations
• Rumors or reports of impending layoffs or reassignments
• Recognition that you’re in the wrong career
• Conflict with your boss or co-workers
• Continuing lack of interest in your work
• Reluctance to face the new workday
• Factors to Consider in a Career Change

If these symptoms, signs or causes become severe enough, you have probably reached a Turning Point in your life and may need to consider a career change. Some professions – law, surgery, journalism, industrial management – are especially subject to job stress and a desire for career change.

A career change should not be made lightly, impulsively or without careful consideration of eight separate factors which have been identified by The Highlands Company as vital to your choice of careers:

• Your hard-wired or natural abilities
• Your skills
• Your personal style (how you relate to others)
• Your interests
• Your values
• Your goals
• Your family background

You can learn more about these factors, which we call personal vision factors, here. 

Based on what you know now, are you ready for a career change?