When age prevents career advancement: The joys of working for yourself
After struggling to land the right job, some women over 50 are taking their careers into their own hands and finding professional gratification on a new level.
By Amy Gesenhues
Ten years ago, I made a major career transition. After spending nearly two decades in marketing, I left my director-level role to accept a writing position on an editorial team that covered the digital marketing space. Instead of “doing” marketing, I wrote about it.
It was a dream come true and remains one of the best career moves of my professional life — topped only by my decision to quit that dream job seven years later. …
When your dream job turns into a nightmare
Fast-forward to pre-pandemic, and I struggled in my “dream job” as a writer. After a series of leadership changes, I found myself, at 46, reporting to a new hire who quickly turned my dream job into a nightmare. I spent all of 2019 interviewing for new jobs, but couldn’t land a role to save my life. It was the most exhausting, demoralizing, and outright maddening year of my career.
By the start of 2020, I’d decided my best option was to formulate a plan that would allow me to take my career into my own hands as a freelance writer. I worked with a career coach. I saved enough money to cover at least three months of bills. I even landed my first client while still employed, and gave myself an April deadline to quit my job and go out on my own.
But then COVID-19 erupted and turned our lives upside down. With all the unknowns we faced, I hit the pause button on my freelance plans. Four months into the pandemic, not only was I still miserable at work, I was managing all the added pressures that came with the pandemic. I was a mess.
Finally, midway through 2020 and a month out from my 47th birthday, I decided that it was all too much. The one thing I had control over was my career, so I quit my full-time job.
A whole new level of career satisfaction
Within two weeks of leaving my full-time job, I landed enough freelance client work to earn nearly double what I earned as a full-time employee. I was in control of my schedule. I got to choose who I worked with and, more importantly, who I wasn’t going to work with. The best part was that my clients trusted my opinions and valued my work.
I couldn’t believe it — quitting my job had unlocked a whole new level of career satisfaction. How was I able to build an entire freelance business that was financially stable within a month? I attribute my success to the fact that I had garnered a deep knowledge of the topics I covered, built a trusted network of professional peers, was a strong writer, and worked well with clients.
The question I still can’t answer: Why were my talents and professional experience not enough to land me a full-time role the year I spent searching for a new job?
This is just the beginning. Read more here on the-midst.com.
Amy Gesenhues is a content strategist focused on the martech industry. She lives in Southern Indiana along with her husband, two kids, two cats, and a dog named Burt Reynolds (because he’s the most handsome dog there ever was).
In her spare time, she writes essays and is working on her first novel. Sometimes she blogs, even though nobody blogs any more. FYI, it’s pronounced gay-zen-house.
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