Jumping Ship: Why So Many Mid-lifers Change Careers

This is not the way the American Dream is supposed to work. At least, not the way it was taught to us.

The idea is that you go to college to focus on a major, get a job or start a career based on that major, work for 30–40 years in that career, then retire and take the world cruise. The alternate version is that you learn a trade (either through trade school or some form of apprenticeship), ply that trade in a company or factory for 30 years or so, then retire with a healthy pension.

And yet, the narrative plays out differently for many of us, if not most. Depending on which statistic you listen to, the average American switches jobs and/or careers anywhere between 3 and 7 times. The Bureau of Labor Statistics claims that those of the Boomer generation in particular hold an average of 11.7 jobs during their working years! And remarkably, a huge number of people in their 40s and 50s are changing careers right when they presumably should start thinking about planning that world cruise.

Baby Boomer Restlessness

In an article written for The Atlantic, former NPR journalist Barbara Bradley Hagerty — herself a midlife career switcher — shares a startling statistic from the folks at Gallup: only one-third of American workers in the Baby-Boomer and Generation-X categories says that they are fully engaged in their work. The poll also says 1 in 5 are “actively disengaged” in their jobs. Sometimes this dissatisfaction occurs due to a natural sense of restlessness associated with midlife crisis; at other times, it comes from a sense of disillusionment that their chosen career isn’t bringing them the sense of fulfillment they thought it would. Feeling the clock ticking, many of these people decide the time to try something new is “now or never.”

Forced Changes

While many midlifers make a career change out of dissatisfaction, others do so out of necessity, for financial or other reasons. Sometimes the change happens even later. Terrylynn Smith, founder of Giraffes Consulting and a life coach specializing in change and career reinvention, says she was forced out a 30-year position as an HR executive when her company underwent a merger in her 60s, making her position redundant. While acknowledging there are many possible reasons to explain the midlife career-switch phenomenon, she takes a broader view, citing the statistical inevitability of change.

“The important takeaway is that you’re not abnormal,” writes Terrylynn in a blog post on the topic. “Something isn’t necessarily wrong with you, and the fates aren’t working against you. Change happens to everyone at some time or another; it’s just your time.”

Change for the Better? Many Say Yes

Despite the fact that changing careers later in life may feel like a failure of the American Dream as we know it, Hagerty points that for many midlifers, changing careers may a healthy move, especially if it reestablishes a stronger sense of purpose. She even goes so far as to suggest that a strategic career change could potentially stave off the onset of Alzheimer’s disease. In her article, she cites “a growing body of research indicating that having a sense of purpose is a powerful predictor of mental and physical robustness — by some measures, as powerful as education, wealth, genes, exercise, or social network.”

Smith concurs that change is not always change for the worse, but adds that one’s approach to it can have a significant effect on its outcome. “Depending on how you handle change,” she says, “it can be a nightmare, or it can be one of the best gifts you will ever receive.”

All this speculation boils down to one important common factor, especially among midlifers who make a career change by their own choice: Generally speaking, they are not happy in their current job, and changing careers makes them happier. Having a stronger sense of fulfillment can go a long way toward having a better inward quality of life as we approach our “golden years.”

So maybe — just maybe — this tendency to “jump ship” isn’t a failure of the American Dream. Perhaps it’s another way to fulfill it.