- "career change"
- "Stress at work"
- "work stress symptoms"
Are you considering a career change? If so, you’re not alone.
Up to 85% of people are dissatisfied with their job, according to recent surveys, and around a third of Americans under 40 have actively looked at changing jobs or even career since the pandemic.
There are lots of reasons you could be tired of your current career; long hours, bad pay, difficult clients, or just general stress at work, the list is endless. But how do you know if you’ve just had a bad day in the office or if you need to make a serious change?
It’s easy to feel trapped in your work - it puts food on the table and keeps a roof over your head after all - but when most people spend up to half of their waking hours at work it’s important to love (or at least like!) what you do.
More importantly you need to keep an eye out for common work stress symptoms which could be affecting your health and wellbeing. Maybe you could find a job with more flexible working hours, a shorter commute, or remote working options? These things could give you so much more opportunity to maximise your spare time and improve your life.
We’ve compiled a list of five common signs that you need to shake things up and take on a new challenge. How many are true for you?
You spend most of your day clock watching.
How do you spend your days at work? In a job that’s right for you, the time probably flies by (at least most days) as you’re stimulated and motivated by your work. When you’re in a job you don’t like, every day can drag as you spend hours watching the clock, doing the bare minimum to force the minutes by.
Finding your dream job, or just a new job and welcome change of scenery, could bring back some excitement. Nothing speeds up time like learning new skills, meeting new people and feeling like you’re making a positive change for yourself. Just moving on to a new place could alleviate the stress you feel at work, and you won’t be wishing the minutes away anymore.
Your career path lacks routes of progression.
Even if you like your job and love your co-workers, sometimes there is just no more room at the top. You’ve learned a lot and know your worth but it’s important to feel like you can move onwards and upwards to bigger and better things. A lack of motivation and feeling trapped is a common work stress symptom.
Not all workplaces offer equal opportunities for advancement and training so sometimes to get the most out of yourself and your career you need to move on.
Progression and advancement don’t need to be in your current sector. Have you got some amazing transferable skills like working with clients, on point organisation skills and fantastic time management? Maybe your route to progress isn’t straight up and you need a career change into a related industry or role which takes all the best of what you currently have and adds more!
It’s common to feel trapped in your job, this is a major factor in people feeling stress at work. It’s normal to want to know you’re working towards personal development and progression. If you feel like you’re stuck in a rut, finding a new role is a great way to change things up and refocus your career goals.
Your current role doesn’t match your personal interests
Just because you’re good at something, doesn’t mean you have to like it! It’s happened to millions of us. You got a job to pay the bills and now you’re a lynchpin for a company. You’ve upskilled and put in the work and you’re incredible at your job, but where is the space for you and your interests? Not having passion for what you do on a day-to-day basis is a recipe for stress at work.
Do you spend your office hours trawling the internet about your hobby just wishing for finishing time so you can get out there and really live your life. Finding it hard to concentrate is a common work stress symptom, a new role could alleviate this problem before it takes a toll on your wellbeing.
Maybe you can find a career that incorporates your personal interests or at least gives you more time to explore what you really want to be doing with your time.
You complain about work all the time.
Is your unhappiness with your work bleeding into other aspects of your life? Maybe you’re a little concerned you’re becoming ‘that person’, the one who’s always complaining about their job. It’s one thing to be obsessed with your job, it’s another thing all together to be obsessed with how much you hate it! It’s easily done when your work consumes so much of your time.
Maybe your family and friends have noticed an attitude shift in you. Maybe you get frustrated more easily, or get less excited about opportunities and events outside of work. Isolating yourself, acting more emotionally and feeling overwhelmed are familiar work stress symptoms and certainly something you want to avoid.
If the only topics you can muster when meeting up with mates is how frustrating your boss is or the most recent annoying rule change, it’s clearly time for a change.
Your work situation affecting your mental state and personality is a code red moment, which leads us to the final (and most conclusive) sign it’s time for a change.
You feel depressed
When work takes up half of your life, potentially more if you count the time you’re thinking about work and not even getting paid for it, you can be pretty sure that if you’re not happy in your work you are going to be unhappy generally.
There can be lots of reasons your job is causing you to slip into depression, maybe you feel like you have no control over your work, your job could be insecure, or you could have difficult co-workers.
The NHS conducted a survey in 2020 which found that “44 percent of staff report feeling unwell as a result of work related stress.” This growing issue can affect employees in any sector so it is important that you keen an eye out for common work stress symptoms. The Mayo Clinic and American healthcare non-profit has some fantastic resources which can help you be aware of common symptoms of work related stress and some strategies for coping..
It may be tempting to immediately look for a career change, but finding a new job, in the same industry but with different working hours, a change in priorities or more flexibility could be the boost you need. It could be that your work stress is not caused by the actual job you do but other factors that working for a different company would change.
People can cope with a lot for financial security, however, if your work situation is affecting your private life by being overly stressful, causing you to lose sleep or affecting your mood outside of work, things need to change.
What now?
Your mental health is so important, and nobody should feel trapped in a job which takes the joy out of other aspects of their life. Recognising the signs you need a change is important as if you’re not careful it can become a dangerous cycle. When you’re at your lowest and most frustrated, mustering the effort required to undertake a career change and redirect your life for the better can seem like a herculean task.
There are resources out there to help. In this series of posts, we’ll explore a wide range of tools you can use to redirect your life away from your current career doldrums and into something inspiring and exciting, including flexible training resources that will allow you to learn new skills or certify the ones you already have.
‘The cure for depression is action.’
(Yvon Chouinard, American rock climber, environmentalist, and outdoor industry billionaire businessman)
If you feel stuck in your career and the prospect of change seems hopeless, the best thing you can do is take small steps forward. Even just small changes can help reframe your position and navigate your way through those common work stress symptoms.
Start thinking of your current situation as something you need to bear temporarily rather than something permanent with no chance of escape.
Stress at work doesn’t need to last forever. You can change things with a new job, new career, you could even move to a new city or country to help you achieve a fulfilling and exciting change.
Hopefully we at Lifesolvers can help you on this journey.