How To Start A Second Career

If your current career is fading or leaves you unsatisfied, there is no reason to feel stuck. There are plenty of ways to start a second career no matter what your age is. And the good news is you can be creative and make some serious cabbage at the same time.

Set Your Sights Right

Don’t make the mistake of underestimating the importance of bringing in even a small amount of extra dough. Depending on your situation $1500 a month or less can make all the difference. Think about it. $1500 a month is $18,000 a year. You’d have to invest $500,000 in an investment account and earn 3.6% to withdraw that kind of money safely. And if you do take a job with even modest earnings it might help you delay taking Social Security for a couple of years. And that can lead to a higher retirement benefit once you do make your claim. Sweet.

Do you see what I’m saying here? You don’t have to find a super highly compensated position in order to significantly enhance your retirement security.   You can even begin your encore career before you leave your first job.  “Es Verdad!”

Cool Sites For Great Ideas, Careers and Businesses

At this point, I’ll assume you’re convinced that it’s possible to get something going but you may not know where to start. Here are a few resources I recommend you check out.

The first is pivotplanet.com. This is a site that connects people who are interested in making a career change with successful professionals. There are some nominal fees to get mentored but it might be worth it. If nothing else, browse the “find an advisor” page for neato business ideas.

The next site is bizstarters.com. This resource is structured for over-50 entrepreneurs. The site gives you insights and tips about how to open your shop without making the mistakes. The only downside is that there are some costs involved in using their service. If it were me, I’d pursue the site to at least get a sense of what to look for. It’s quite possible that you can obtain the same services they offer for a fraction of the price using guru.com or elance.

Another site I strongly encourage you to investigate is Craigslist.com. Take a peek at what other small business people are doing and consider “borrowing” some of those ideas for yourself. I’ve written a detailed post on how to use Craigslist to find a job or start a business. If the idea appeals to you, please check it out.

You can also use LinkedIn and Facebook to launch your next career. You have to be strategic and thoughtful. These are both great resources but they can be huge timewasters. Before you start using social media, I suggest you have a pretty good idea of what you want to do and then use these sites as networking tools. Here’s a detailed post on using LinkedIn that might really help.

In order to find your second career, you have to be very proactive and be willing to get out of your comfort zone. First, use some of the resources named above to gather ideas and ask questions. Once you decide on what you want to do, aggressively pursue your goal on a daily basis. My guess is you’ll have fantastic results if you put in just one hour a day for the next 60 days.

What are you doing to find your next career? What is working best? What has been a big time waster?