Money worries? How to make your Career Change work financially

Vitamin A – Awareness

Are you aware of your financial situation and your relationship with money? 

Money is not an easy topic to discuss, I understand. But it doesn’t really have to be. Being aware of your finances and building a positive relationship with your money can help you develop your financial literacy and grow professionally.

No matter how much money you’re earning if you’re blind to your financial situation, refusing to accept the responsibility for your finances, I am sorry to say – there is little others can do to support you. You are in charge of your finances and financial situation. 

Raising your financial awareness is not going to happen overnight. It’s a process that takes time.

Yet you can start with something very simple today: 

• Check in your account balance regularly without any judgement. Observe how you feel about your money situation?
• Realise that your financial situation right now – it’s a number – status – that you can improve. Your Net Worth is not defining your Self Worth (I’d love to credit the originator of this quote, but I am struggling to find it. So let me know if you know who that person is). 
• Shift your focus from what you CAN’T to what you CAN do about your money and with your money. Start researching the topic of money, financial wealth and abundance. 
• Find role models who demonstrate financial health and wealth matching your expectations and be curious – how are they doing it? What can you learn from them? 

Vitamin B – Beliefs around money

What do you believe about money, earning money and spending? 

What are your beliefs around money? What do you believe about your own abilities to earn/make more money? What beliefs have you inherited from your family and upbringing? 

Whether you realise it or not, every day you make financial decisions. Every day by going to work you say Yes to earning the amount of money you do. Every time you buy something you make a decision – choice. 

Changing your beliefs around money again is not going to happen overnight. Most of the time we are not even aware of our money beliefs. 

The game changer can be to challenge what you believe about your: 

• Abilities to earn higher income and to bring more money in  
• Decision making about your spendings (consumption), savings and investing  
• Possibility to build your wealth

It makes no sense to focus purely on generating more money. Because if you’re not managing your outgoings well, you’ll be left with little or nothing to save or invest into your future. 

Here are a few questions to reflect on: 

• What do you believe about your skills and abilities to earn more? Are you good enough to earn more?
  
• What do you think about the high flyers earning high income in your industry? How does it impact your career ambitions and growth? 
• Are you afraid to negotiate payrise? Why? 

• What do you believe about your expenses and shopping decisions? What can you change or improve? 
• What do you believe about building wealth? What do you believe about wealthy people? 

Vitamin C – Cash Flow (Income and Expenses)  

How skilled are you to manage your cash?  

In other words, how do you work with your Income and with your Expenses? Are you able to generate savings and investments? What types of additional Income could you bring in? How well do you manage your expenses? 

This is an area which helps you create your financial health. It’s not rocket science but some level of discipline and awareness is needed to support your career change.  

If you want improve your cashflow consider: 

• Can you become better at managing your money? How?  
• How can you bring in more money with your existing skillset? 
• Using your current skillset how can you maintain your living standard on a smaller budget? 
• Out of all expenses, which are the ones that are driven by your dissatisfaction or stress from work? 
• Can you review your expenses and manage your impulsive shopping cravings? How? 
• Where do you overspent? Which expenses could you save to invest into your education? 
• Could budgeting this week/this month help you to improve you finances? 

 So let me summarise at the end.

What we discovered today is that to make your career change work financially there are 3 things you can focus on: 

• Your awareness and relationship with money   

• Your mindset and beliefs around money 

• Managing your cash flow (increasing your income and managing your expenses).