Beyond Bits and Bytes: The Art of Pivoting Away from Tech

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Is it time to Pivot to another Industry?

First question we must ask what do when pivoting in another industry? The short answer is choicing to leave the an industry because of no success or too many people are trying to get for the same types of jobs. It is sometimes even scary and uncertain to most people because it is something that you have never done. This is where it can be challenging and new to most people. The other questions I usually get from people and from myself when asking this question is “Where do I start at and what areas am I good at that would get me a job?”  These are the questions that I would be asking myself while thinking about pivoting away from the current Technology industry and I am sure I am not the only one when it comes to this idea or thoughts.

Have you recognized the Signs?

The real question is, why has it been so hard to find a job in the tech industry that you want to find a new job that might work for you to bring in the money that you might need to keep paying those bills.   The underlying questions is usually how many applications have you applied for and got turned down?  Has this been something that seems to be a repeatively being turned down for getting those interviews.  The ultimate signs you could need to pivot is burnout of applying for jobs to a lack of passion to keep applying for those types that seem to not even be interested in your skill set.   We may need to acknowledge that we may not have enough experience or that there are too many people trying to get the same job to even have a chance to land a job to bring in the money we may need to pay bills.

What is the Motiviation behind this?

Ultimately the main motivation is probably to keep food on the table and be able to pay the bills that much is what everyone is wanting to do in the end.  We need to identify other motiviations that you might been considering as you are considering changing directions.   Is because you like People, or are you looking for new challenges that may interest you.   Knowing what your motivation might be will help you know how well you will do when you pivot.   Clarifying your strong motiviations and knowing what you are good at will help you to identify which industries you might be able to pivot to help you get those jobs that might be interested in applying for.  While you consider your motivations, go ahead and consider your transferrable skills that you might also have to use in other industries and that might help you identify where you might be good at.  Write these skills down and start considering who might need them and you will be better off finding area’s to apply for.  Leverage those skills while you modify your resume to help show the potential employer that you are good fit can bring even more jobs and job offers.   I am sure that knowing these skills will help you get that job you probably are wanting and needing in this uncertain time.

Can you Embrace the Journey?

You should embrace the journey as you transistion from Technology industry to another industry where you can learn new talents and learn things to bring you on your journey to better you.   Nothing is set in stone and that much is where we need to learn from the life.   Resiliencey is key to this journey you might be considering and you should have a support system available to help encourage you and show you even mroe skills you might be able to bring to any jobs.  Seek people who might have gotten jobs like the ones you are looking to apply for and have them mentor you in what it might be like to learn even more about if this would be a good fit for you.   You will need to learn new skills but while learning them you might find that the job is more enjoyable than you thought it would be.

Finally, I could talk even more about this but I thought we should at least consider the idea of maybe people needing to move away from the technology sector and find other jobs to help support their needs to pay off bills while they can still use the time to look for jobs in the industry.  It is much easier to have a job to find a job then to be unemployed and looking for a job.  Either way you can be sure whatever you decide to do will help guide you.   You should sit down with friends and family and discuss this as much as possible to help you understand the potential pro’s and con’s of the industry and be open to listening to their thoughts on the subject.  They might be able to help identify where you should apply to get that job.   You aren’t alone in this like everyone else this is a journey for sure.

Why the Unemployment rate is Wrong and why you should care!

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The Unemployment is at 3.7% for January(2024)!

Now that isn’t bad for the economy if this was actually true. I know that there are even more people searching for a job than you can imagine. Is the unemployment rate wrong?  I suspect it is way higher than what the US government knows about due to the fact that most of the jobs that people got let go from were less than 6 months contracts or some probably even have money in their account to survive for a while unemployed. I am one of those who have enough money right now to have 3 or 4 months off and not have to worry about anything. I don’t have any major debt and I have no loans out that would be cause for me to have to make payments on those things. So the real question we need to ask is what is correct percentage of people who are unemployed. I think it would be more like 5 to 6% right now if everyone would file for unemployment. I think some worry that if the unemployment rate goes to high then it will cause problems in finding a job even more.

Understanding the Unemployment Rate

It can be quite difficult to figure out what the unemployment rate is actually but I do think we have to at least consider that it’s higher than we thought it is and we may be in a form of recession / Depression scenario.  I saw a video that I’ll share with you and you can see how this might be viable to what is happening now.   I encourage to watch all of it and decide for yourselves if this is even a possibility.  I however know that the ones I have talked to have not filled unemployed for one reason or another.

Now after watching this video, I am sure you have some questions that you might want to ask. One of the obvious questions I came up with myself is this relevant to what is happening now. I would say yes it is due to the fact that I am seeing this more and more the last few weeks with people struggling to keep a job and applying to jobs in general. We aren’t going to get out of this real quickly and I even think we will have more aggressive layoffs in the future just by looking at the spike of layoffs we’ve already had in the January.

chart from layoffs.fyi

Since most companies only worry about Quarterly earnings the next quarter starts in April and as such it would seem that companies will downsize even more either March or April. It would be a good guess that it would be likely in April after the earnings report for each company is looked at and examined by the stock holders and CEO. They will execute a decision to layoff more people to keep the projected earnings reports from impacting their bottom dollar. It will also keep the stock holders happy that they don’t see any layoffs that month before hand. It doesn’t look good to the stock when layoffs happen right when the earnings report becomes available to them.

Unemployed people are just burned out!

The reason why the unemployment numbers a re wrong is that most of those who have been trying to find a job ever since they have been laid off is they are just burned out and are tired of getting those rejection letters and companies that say they are hiring but looks to just be phishing for the right person and not really looking to hire people that could fill the spot they are advertising about.  So that being said, they haven’t even filed for unemployment and that is why you haven’t seen the unemployment rate getting higher and people thinking we aren’t in a recession or even a Depression due to that the Government doesn’t know they are looking for a job.  I know that most of the people want a job but they either pivoted to work where ever they can or created other ways to earn income right now without having to file for unemployment benefits.  I would bet they either took part time jobs or they have other ways to bring in the money to help them survive.

Did you apply for unemployment or did you find ways to bring in income without having to work at an office job for the time?  why not leave a comment and let people know what you’ve done to keep bringing money in so you can let others know how they can earn money even in this trying time.

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