Discover Your Encore Career

More and more people are pursuing an encore career to combine their passion with their work. As we age, many of us desire to make a difference in the world, but choosing how to go about this can be daunting. “Just because something is a good fit for your skills, values and interests doesn’t necessarily make it a viable encore idea, it must help address an authentic need,” says Barbara Greenspan Shaiman, author of “Live Your Legacy Now: 10 Simple Steps to Find Your Passion and Change the World.” She created a legacy formula to provide clarity to your identification of an encore idea. Her formula: “What you love to do + what angers you = your legacy idea.” Your legacy idea is the spark for your encore career. This simplistic rule provides a way for individuals to combine their passion with issues they care about to help change lives for the better.

Often the path to finding a meaningful encore career proves more challenging than expected. One must think about what you like to do as well as utilizing skills you have that are transferable to what you may want to do. Also take into account skills you have that you do not want to focus on in your encore career. There may be skills you would like to further develop, and you may have a moral bucket list to consider. David Brooks, author of “The Road to Character” believes we have two sets of virtues: resumé virtues and eulogy virtues. Resumé virtues are the skills you bring to the marketplace, and eulogy virtues are the ones that will be highlighted at your funeral; traits such as whether you were kind, courageous, honest or faithful.

To reality-test your hunch as to what you may want to do, create a community walkabout. What needs improvement or what is missing? Go to the source of your passion and talk to a specific group of people you are interested in. Follow stories in the media to learn more about the issues that you are interested in. Hopefully you will find work with purpose and begin your encore career. For more information go to: http://www.nextavenue.org/4-ways-to-get-your-encore-career-off-the-ground/