Switching Careers with a Little Help from Your Friends with Dr. Dawn Graham
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:40:21] Yeah, and I want to come up with some better terminology than asking for help, because a lot of people do feel like they’re it’s a sign of weakness or vulnerability or something in some way. And I wish that people could turn that around and see it as a source of strength. Hey, I’m confident enough. I know what I want. I know what I’m trying to accomplish. And now I’m leveraging my relationships, my network, whatever assets I have available to me, I’m leveraging those things. Does that mean that when you’re giving to other people, shouldn’t you expect at some point they might be giving back to you? That’s that’s kind of the nature of friendship and relationships in general. And for some reason, a lot of people have that that notion of, oh, I don’t want to reach out for help. You’re not reaching out for help. This is like you said, it’s your turn. You’ve helped other people and and now they’re helping you. And it’s not a quid pro quo. It’s not a transactional thing. It’s just the way that societies work. And and for some reason, people have a hard time with that. I wish people we could figure out how to brand that so that people looked at it as a strength rather than a weakness.
Dr. Dawn Graham [00:41:29] Yeah. And I don’t even I don’t even know what needs to be on that continuum in particular. I just think it needs to be a natural part of of life. If you get a new puppy, you might ask people, you know, for a veterinarian and you wouldn’t think twice about doing that because you’re like, oh, my neighbor has three dogs. I’m going to ask them what vet he takes those dogs to you.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:41:50] And your neighbor is going to be happy that you ask because they’re going to feel like, hey, I’m the expert dog raiser in this person. So my expertise and came to me, I you know, a lot of people don’t like to take advice that everybody likes to give advice. So when you actually go asking for it.
Dr. Dawn Graham [00:42:09] Well, I mean, think about how much time it saves you as a new dog owner, then having them look things up or go through reviews on Yelp and it all. I mean, when you. So that’s where I think networking helps us all become more efficient and more effective. And yes, when it comes to our jobs, we feel like it’s very personal versus asking for a veterinarian. I get that it’s a different thing. But I think that’s my point is I think we all need to get to the to the stage where it’s not it’s not any different than asking for a veterinarian or a mechanic or a great Italian restaurant or anything like that, because the notion of if I was good enough, I wouldn’t need help is so not the case in the world of job search now, because the fact is you don’t even get to the decision makers a lot of times without a referral. So it’s not about you being good enough or not good enough. You don’t even get the chance to have that conversation without a contact.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:43:14] And that’s true in so many areas in life. I mean, go look at anybody who’s super successful and ask them if they had a mentor, ask had a coach. You know, you’ll be hard pressed to find someone that’s super successful that will proudly tell you, yes, this is what I what I sought out, what I found and how that journey worked. So to get someone to help you, like you said, get that referral, get that foot in the door, it’s it’s important. And to leverage your network and to think of it like I like what you said, that is not your turn, so to speak. This is just normal. This is just natural. Just like you to ask about a mechanic or a vet or anything like that. So really cool. So what if we’d like to continue this conversation with you in some way, they’re thinking about switching or anything that we’ve talked about here today. What’s the best way for someone to reach out to you?
Dr. Dawn Graham [00:44:06] Yeah, I would say find me on LinkedIn. I’m very easy to find. And I often post a lot of free advice, free articles there. I mostly done four LinkedIn learning courses. So if you like doing online learning, I’ve done a full course on the book switchers and you one on visibility if you’re looking to get a promotion and getting into the mind of the hiring manager. And so so there’s a number of things that if you like anything you heard today, I want to learn more about it. There’s a lot of things out there where you can find a deeper dove into all of that. And of course, the book goes into that in extreme detail. And it’s interesting because I do think switchers is going to be something that isn’t even a real term anymore in the next decade, because we’re all going to be making so many pivots with the changes in the market economy and technology. And we’re all going to be reskilling and getting new certifications and reeducated and and everything. So I’m excited for that to happen because I do think while a lot of people feel a little bit vulnerable as the traditional career paths start to kind of crumble away, I think for all of us, especially those who who are love learning and love growing and went on to get their Ph.D.. I think part of what is so exciting about these changes is that we can continue to learn and grow and do things. And that’s that’s kind of exciting.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:45:33] Yeah, I agree 100 percent. So we will definitely for those of you who weren’t able to write that down, go to our show notes, go to DissertationDone.com/blog. You can find Dr. Graham’s episode there in our show notes. We’re going to link to the book so that you can get to Amazon easily. The LinkedIn profile, like you siad, you’re on Twitter, is that right?
Dr. Dawn Graham [00:45:54] Yeah. You want to find me on Twitter? You find me at Dr. Dawn Graham.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:45:58] So we’ll put all the good stuff in there and and make sure that you guys can get to it easily. So, Dr. Graham, thank you so much for being with us here today. I really enjoyed this. And I think our audience will really benefit from this conversation about switching careers and networking and all these fun things.
Dr. Dawn Graham [00:46:14] Well, I’m so glad to hear that and thank you for inviting me on. And I really look forward to seeing the episode.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:46:21] Absolutely. You’re welcome. Remind everyone that today’s episode has been brought to you by Dissertation. Done. So, if you would if you might be struggling with your dissertation or, you know, it’s coming and you don’t want to struggle with your dissertation, reach out to us at DissertationDone.com/done. And if you finish with that whole thing and you’re really interested in diving into the expert space, let’s get you to become a published author. We can help you out there at DissertationDone.com/book. Again. Dr. Graham, thank you so much for being here today.
Dr. Dawn Graham [00:46:49] Thank you so much.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:46:51] And for everyone else, have a wonderful day and go out and live your unconventional life.
Outro [00:47:02] This has been An Unconventional Life. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed today’s episode, subscribe now to keep getting inspirational stories of unconventional lives as soon as they’re released. Until then, go out and live your best unconventional life.
