Ask-A-Career-Coach: How Do You Position Yourself for Two Different Careers?

Contributed by Caroline Ceniza-Levine of SixFigureStart™

I had a client who had started a business that needed a cash infusion. At the same time, recognizing that cash flow was an issue, he started to explore going back in-house (he had been a successful banker before starting his own shop). He needed to position himself as both an entrepreneur and an employee without diluting either focus or confusing his market. How do you position yourself for two different careers?

I see this conundrum more and more. On the entrepreneur/ employee front, more people are starting side businesses or picking up consulting projects. But even when one is committed to traditional employment, jobs are wider in scope and you may find yourself with a role that is a compilation of several different functions. I reconnected with an old hire of mine from my media days, and she was straddling PR and marketing in the same firm. Consequently, she was unsure how to talk about both without diminishing her experience in either.

Positioning is framed by two things: who you are; and what you are targeting. So the above conundrum seems to revolve around the first half – confusion on how to express who you are. But it really is more about the second – describing who you are in the context of your target. If you are sure about your target, you can easily find a way to talk about your two (or more) sides in a way that adds value to your target and therefore makes you the logical choice, not the outlier.

When you have multiple targets (as in my banker client who was targeting investors and prospective employers) this is trickier, but still not impossible. We worked on a story where entrepreneurship was a logical extension of his career but not the only one. He created a message that focused on the current growth stage of his business and how the fork in the road involved either investment or employment and that he embraced both possibilities. Most importantly, everything was framed in a positive and empowered way so that his targets, whether investors or employers, could see that he was proactive about his choices.

An upbeat attitude about the choices you have made in your career and life are a critical component of positioning. Notice when you talk about your history, whether you tell the story as if it happened to you or as if you selected what came. Try framing your story around proactive choices, even when they were opportunistic (you still walked through those open doors!). You will find that your positioning is much stronger, and whether you have twists and turns in your career or two (or more) career paths, you still come across as focused, empowered, and therefore desirable.

Caroline Ceniza-Levine is co-founder of SixFigureStart (www.sixfigurestart.com), a career coaching firm comprised exclusively of former Fortune 500 recruiters. Prior to launching SixFigureStart, Caroline recruited for Accenture, Booz Allen, Citigroup, Disney ABC, Oliver Wyman, Time Inc, TV Guide and others. Caroline offers a half-hour Complimentary Coaching Consultation to individuals who are interested in experiencing coaching and finding out more about how it can help them reach their career goals. To schedule a consultation, contact her at caroline@sixfigurestart.com.