What's a good career path for an ex-Sales & Marketing professional coming back from maternity?
I have been on maternity for nearly 2 years and looking for a new career that can keep me fulfilled, but allows me some flexibility.
I have bridged the last three years with teaching (a necessary - though not ideal - career change as we moved countries for personal reasons), but my career has been in the business development / sales & marketing fields in London and Dubai.
I am very good with managing projects / numbers and data, but I don't have a business degree per se (BA Sociology / MA Marketing).
Any recommendations where I could focus my efforts, where I am not just seen as a 40-something mom? Sounds terrible but I feel like that is what employers see now! :(
Replies11
- I just wanted to take a minute to wish everyone a wonderful festive season and a very happy successful and healthy new year! THANK YOU all so much for all your support and advice, I was in a bit of a slump and you guys'n'gals pulled me right out of it! (I have started learning SQL - turns out I'd already used some of it without knowing it - and I'm loving it! #nerdalert, right?Anyhow ... MERRY CHRISTMAS and enjoy the eggnog ;)
- @Scott Morrison thanks Scott, I have started checking them out already - looks really good!! Fingers crossed ...!
- Hi KatjaContact Creative Equals as they run a brilliant programme aimed at women coming back from maternity leave.There are lots of practical elements to it and mentors/speakers that help hone your skills and mindset.I’ve been involved with it for a few years.Stay Boom!S
- @Ekaterina Fes thank you so much, that's really useful feedback - you're right, I should probably think of "tech" in broader terms.My husband is a programmer, so I know that programming is not for me (much as he disagrees, haha). The commercial world makes more sense to me but if I add some skills in that direction it'll be useful for sure. Again, thank you for the advice and also the encouragement!
- @Katja Saldanha I have teachers in my family so I can definitely understand the sentiment :DI'd definitely encourage you to think about 'tech' much more broadly - there's actually ample opportunity to use your past experience. Many businesses that you might not think of as 'tech' actually are, in terms of the way they work. An e-shop that sells beauty products online is a 'tech' company, but you can leverage experience in health and beauty. An online course platform such as Coursera is a 'tech' company but experience in education is generally an advantage, etc.The other thing to keep in mind is, there's more than enough work to do at such companies that doesn't involve having to do programming - if you're not that into coding there's absolutely no need to despair :)Regarding data analysis in particular - I want to be careful to not give inaccurate information here as I'm based in the UK, and the sort of background that employers look for can vary by country. For what it's worth though, from my experience and observation it's more common that analysts come from psychology, economics, sociology, statistics, mathematics, sometimes finance-related fields academically (in no particular order) - than outright from IT/Computer Science. More technical skills can be learnt through shorter online courses as Brandon suggests - and then honed and perfected on the job :)
- @Brandon Airihenbuwa This sounds really good - thank you so much for your advice. I have spent some time working on databases in the past and have really enjoyed cramming round the backend to amend reports and get new data out of it. My husband has been nudging me in that direction as well for a while. I have been scared off it because we live in Germany right now and man alive, the amount of IT graduates kicking about it scary and I feel like I would be way out of my depth.But it is always good to learn something new and I will take your advice and get cracking on some SQL course - THANK YOU! Sometimes a girl just needs a kick up the backside ;-)
- @Vikki Ross I will definitely check this out, that you!!I haven't worked in the business world for 3 years - and not at all here in Germany, where we currently live - I feel like I am returning after a decade away!
- @Ekaterina Fes Thank you so much for your response and encouragement! I have spent a lot of time recently thinking about what I want - good observation on your part! - and honestly, after spending some time teaching secondary school, all my brain keeps shouting is "I want to work with adults and proper professionals again!!" :PBut it's a good point; I'd actually considered going into HR as well, although I think that going down the data / tech route would give me more flexibility. I had considered data analysis - I'm not sure if I would get a break into that though over here (we are currently based in Germany and there are more IT graduates than sand on a beach). What's your experience with regards to that?My experience is in Health & Beauty; so I must admit that tech scares me a little although I probably would get my head around it for sure. My husband works in tech and keeps encouraging me to give it a try - I will check out the webinars you suggested, thank you so much (again)!!
- Hey there!Project managers and product managers are also somewhat in-demand in the tech industry and something you may want to consider. A lot of your skills sound like they transfer well to this area - and my sense is that these are roles where common sense and life experience that come with being 'a 40-something mom' are an asset not a weakness :) You may find some of that sociology background useful as well, particularly in product.That aside - what I find interesting is that you frame your ask almost exclusively in terms of what you're good at and you haven't said a lot about what you would *want* to do more of in the future :) Example: you may be good at numbers and data which would make me think data analysis is a good path, but how would you feel about extracting, transforming and analysing data being 80% of your role?Less philosophical and more practical: General Assembly regularly do 'Free Intro to X' webinars for a variety of roles in tech - these could be a good place to look what some of these roles look like in practice and what skills are needed. 'Free Intro to Product Management' next week and 'A Day in the Life of a Data Analyst' in early Jan are just a couple that could be of interest, but there are many more...https://generalassemb.ly/education/free-intro-to-product-management-class-online/online/168660https://generalassemb.ly/education/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-data-analyst/online/169276Best of luck on your journey!!
- Do you know of Creative Equals? They run a comeback programme that might be of interest:https://www.creativeequals.org/creative-comeback-london
- Hi Katja, I think Information Analyst or BI analyst will be a good place to start. It's a career path that has progression and used in different industries. With your experience you can go into the industry you already know which will give you understanding of the data you will be analysing. Also, you can do a simple course on Udemy to gain SQL knowledge or BI technical knowledge which will give you an added advantage with your previous experience. I think you can do it, rooting for you.
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