Who dares, wins

Since I last posted, several people have written to tell me that they, too, are engaged in a career change – or at least are thinking about it. Many of them are terrified by the prospect.

I get it. If you have worked in a single field or discipline all your life, if you have studied and trained and taken courses to make yourself better at that one thing, and more valuable to your employer, the prospect of doing something else is truly appalling. It’s how I felt when I left the Royal Marines in 2005, and it’s how I felt stepping away from journalism last year. But no-one knows more how this feels than my friend Tess Vigeland. Public radio was her life. For her, leaving it was like tearing off a limb.

She documents her journey in her excellent book, Leap. To anyone thinking about a career change, particularly if they’re in mid-career, this is a great read. Tess is an inspiring person. She has truly transformed her life, in almost every aspect. She has a new career, a new home, and a new outlook. I saw her recently, and she was a completely different person to the one I knew in the workplace. Fortunately, I like this new Tess just as much as I did the old!

P.S. My apologies to anyone who thought this post was going to be about the SAS.