What Business Leaders Should Know About Career Change Management

Forbes

08-08-2025

Philip Samson is the founder of Spherycle Thinking; a One Earth One Chance board member; and a mentor, coach and regeneration evangelist.
Career aspirations and journeys can be as unique as a fingerprint, the difference being that the former evolves.
Many of us know with certainty, at an early age, what we want to do with our lives and the kind of career we will pursue. Others sometimes drift—whether because of choices or circumstances—and embark on a career journey that may feel less than ideal at the beginning.
As for myself, I've been on several changes over my forty-five-year career, from working in leadership in the social sciences to rising to leadership roles in information and communication technology to currently working in coaching and mentoring.
Each of those career stages was a period of personal and professional growth made possible by continuously planning for, training for and stepping up to take on new or greater scope and responsibility.
Regardless of how one's career journey begins or what stage it's at, having a strategy for managing changes along the way is vital to ensure career sustainability, progress and success.
Why Preparation Is Key For Career Change Management
Don't wait for an uncontrollable event or unexpected opportunity to have a career change management plan. Career change management is an important area to continuously focus on, no matter if you're at the beginning of your career or you have already reached a leadership position.
Always have a big-picture road map that fits with your qualifications, experience and passion. To do this, it's important to plan key milestones. For example, you might tell yourself that you want to transition to a management role in three to five years and to secure an executive-level position in seven to 10 years.
Then seek out ways to achieve these goals. For instance, when companies I've worked for were acquired, having volunteered to take on added operational responsibilities—including significant budgets or new geographic areas—helped me gain the skills to move from one leadership role to another.
How To Manage Voluntary And Involuntary Career Changes
Based on my experience, career changes essentially fall into two categories: voluntary and involuntary.
Both scenarios require advanced scenario planning, flexibility and resilience along with the ability to leap out of one's comfort zone, whether it be within or across corporations or verticals. Here is how to manage either situation:
To establish my mentoring company, I planned the transition for about five years before separating from corporate employment. Much of that preparation included intensive networking and volunteering to mentor university students in STEM education.
This is one of the best ways to prepare for voluntary transitions: having a skill that is relevant to a broad range of roles and companies. My mentoring experience gave me much-needed insights that I could apply to coaching everyone from high school students to start-up executives.
In the tech industry, one area of focus that has broad application is cybersecurity. There is virtually no technical aspect of business that is untouched by cyber threats.
When managing voluntary career changes, allow for several degrees of freedom, whether that be in terms of a timeline, scope change or level change. Unexpected opportunities can arise that call for quick rethinking of one's original plan.
While a certain degree of "stick-to-itiveness" is prudent, re-charting your course should never be ruled out, particularly if new options provide for acceleration in personal growth, future proofing of one's career or greater self-fulfillment.
Involuntary career changes are, needless to say, tougher to manage. These career changes can be caused by macroeconomic shifts, technology disruptions, industry boom-and-bust cycles and social upheavals. (Consider the Covid-19 pandemic.)
To navigate unpredictable events, future-proofing your career becomes essential. This involves maintaining constant vigilance, cultivating mental resilience and being open to redefining your professional identity.
I experienced this firsthand during the downturn of the telephony industry. When my employer filed for bankruptcy, I was working in the booming 3G wireless side of the business. As the company was broken up and sold, my organization became part of a successful acquisition by a larger firm.
This was an anxiety-inducing period, but it taught me an important lesson: Pause and reassess your goals during times of upheaval. For me, that meant focusing on integration within the new company. By first understanding the new environment, I was able to build strong relationships and gradually earn opportunities to lead operations—from local to regional, then national and eventually global.
Developing a strong multidisciplinary professional network can also be particularly useful. This can be a gateway to opportunities that might not have fit within the original career plan, offering a valuable safety net in the event of involuntary career changes.
Redefining Retirement
Conventional thinking and social norms can create a preconceived notion that career planning is mutually exclusive from retirement planning.
Retirement planning is typically focused on factors like age, financial security, health and lifestyle changes. However, what it often overlooks is the opportunity to blend a lifetime of experience with ongoing learning—to give back through mentoring and coaching the next generation.
Managing and extending one's career plan to incorporate this stage can be very rewarding. It can also enhance younger, less experienced lives and one's self-realization.
Every career plan needs a placeholder for this "R" stage, where the R for "Retired/Retrenched" is replaced with several R-states of mind that serve to make life more Rewarding: Resilience, Re-invention, Re-learning, Re-wiring and, last but not least, Re-connecting.
Preparing for and managing this transition needs to be done as thoughtfully as every other inflection point in one's career roadmap, including the possibility of a complete shift in priorities of purpose.
When a career change hits, having an effective career change management plan minimizes self-doubt, confusion, inflexibility and resistance to changes, all of which drive toward smoother career transitions and outcomes.
Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?