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Your Specialized Degree Isn't Trapping You: How Transferable Skills Make Career Change Possible · Happen To Your Career - Meaningful Work, Career Change, Career Design, & Job Search

• 0:00
  Jenna Murphy 00:00: There becomes a point in life where you have to decide, "Can I continue on this path? Or do I have to decide that it's time for me to be some and do something different?"
• 0:01
  Scott Anthony Barlow 00:08: This is Happen To Your Career, the podcast that brings you real people, real transformations, and the courage to do work that truly fits. And if you haven't already subscribed, click follow right now so you don't miss any new episodes.
• 0:02
  Scott Anthony Barlow 00:21: "My degree is useless outside my profession." That's the message I received from a chiropractor wanting to make a career change. After years of specialized education and practice, he felt pretty trapped by his specific training, and it's a sentiment I hear all the time from professionals with specialized careers– lawyers, dentists, nurses, accountants.
• 0:03
  Once you've invested years in a specific path, it's easy to feel like you're locked in forever. But what if everything you thought you knew about your career options was wrong? For example, the idea that your specialized degree limits you, not so much. Or the belief that your skills won't transfer, that's not what we find at all. Or the fear that you're going to need to start over. In fact, we see the very opposite.
• 0:04
  So yeah. Or maybe, what about the assumption that you're gonna need to go get another degree? Could be, but usually pretty wrong. The truth is, some studies show that as many as 82% of people are doing work that is partially or significantly different than their degree or education.
• 0:05
  Most mid to large companies care that you have a degree, not necessarily which specific degree you earned. Jenna Murphy was a criminal prosecutor for over a decade, and she started feeling that her career no longer aligned with her priorities as a new mother, and at that point, she found herself at a crossroads that many specialized professionals face.
• 0:06
  With years invested in legal training, courtroom experience, how on earth was she going to pivot to something else? What was going through her head at the time was, how is a company going to value her resume filled with criminal cases and jury trials if she wasn't applying to another litigation role? It's easy to look at somebody else's situation and say, "Oh, yeah, of course, there's transferable skills."
• 0:07
  But the mental trap that catches so many professionals with specialized training is that when all you've known is one path, it's nearly impossible to see the bridge to another. The walls of your current profession just block the view of everything else.
• 0:08
  So I want to take you through how Jenna confronted this seemingly impossible dilemma, and what happened when she challenged the assumption that she was too specialized to change direction. Here's just a little bit about where Jenna's career began.
• 0:09
  Jenna Murphy 02:40: I really don't know what the draw was specifically about the legal field, because if you had asked me in college, I would have told you I wasn't smart enough to be a lawyer. When I was in high school, I had a family member who found himself in some unfortunate, unfortunately, found himself in some trouble.
• 0:10
  And while I guess some part of me could have represented him, I did not think I could do that for other people. I knew that there had to be justice somewhere. But also at that time, I felt like there might have been some injustice that was done by the criminal procedure process.
• 0:11
  And so I began to look and I thought, "Well, if I decide to go and be an assistant district attorney", which is what only thing I knew of at that point in time, "at least I can make sure that the charges that I bring are appropriate, and I can feel like that there's a reason someone is being held accountable for the things they do."
• 0:12
  What I did not want to do is somebody walk in my office and say, "I killed those five people. Can you get me off with it?" And I just couldn't do that. But as a prosecutor, I would have the ability to be sure the charges were appropriate and to make sure justice was seen through.
• 0:13
  Scott Anthony Barlow 03:55: There's often a pattern that happens here. What begins as a great fit gradually shifts as your life circumstances and your priorities change; the career itself doesn't necessarily become bad. Sometimes that happens, but usually it just stops being right for you in your situation. It's also what happened for Jenna.
• 0:14
  Jenna Murphy 04:14: Becoming a mom, getting married, yes, having...
• 0:15
  Scott Anthony Barlow 04:18: How old are your kiddos now?
• 0:16
  Jenna Murphy 04:19: I have a four-year-old. He just turned four in June, and I have a little over two and a half years old. He'll be three in January. And that always, I guess, somewhere new inside of me that would change me. I just didn't realize how much it was going to change me.
• 0:17
  And it was those times that, for instance, that jury trial that just really bothered me that I had spent, you know, granted, I tried to be good to them and put them to bed and do all the things, but then many have not sat on my couch prepping for a trial that my husband sat beside me and didn't get any attention because I was working only to stand in front of a jury and a jury be like, "Yeah, whatever." And that was the part that made it really hard.
• 0:18
  The burnout was extreme. I mean, I think COVID obviously had a lull in it. Our jurisdiction, in particular, was not one that took a whole lot of time off. We got about two weeks down before we went back into actually having a jail matter, where we had to get people out of jail because they, you know, misdemeanors, you just can't keep people in jail forever. And so that was virtual. What we took about 60 days is all we took before we went back to the office full-time.
• 0:19
  Of course, I went back to the office full-time and told them, "Surprised. I'm pregnant again. Here we go." Yeah, so and then coming back, once everything loosened up post-COVID, I'm proud of the sheriff's office that I worked with, but the speed and the intensity of which they are making cases made it really hard to adequately juggle the caseload and the responsibilities I had there and my ability to be a mother.
• 0:20
  Scott Anthony Barlow 05:50: There's something interesting that happens even when we know we need to make a change. Maybe the writing's been on the wall for a while, but the career that once fit us is no longer right. We almost always actually need something further to kind of push us over the edge to make that change. We call this a career change catalyst moment, and here's Jenna sharing her moment that caused her to finally take action.
• 0:21
  Jenna Murphy 06:13: My kids had a Thanksgiving program at school, at daycare. And I can remember being in court, almost running to my car to get back to daycare, to get to daycare, to be there to watch them. My mom and my dad had come from where they live. My husband was there.
• 0:22
  And so, of course, I rushed in, and I watched this program. Thankfully, I didn't miss any of it. But then, I watched the clock the entire time I was there, and then rushed back to go back to court. And I think that was probably the straw that really broke the camel's back, for a lack of better explanation, was that I just knew at that point that I couldn't juggle both things.
• 0:23
  Scott Anthony Barlow 07:07: Okay, so Jenna faces reality; something has to change. But what her legal career felt like a box that she was trapped in, and by the way, this happens all the time for people who are in specialized careers; the real roadblock isn't your actual skills. It's the story you tell yourself about those skills. "I'm just a prosecutor" becomes a self-imposed career prison.
• 0:24
  The minute you believe that your skills won't translate is the exact time that they actually won't, because you won't even try. So the really fun thing for us is when we get to help people work through this, then they can start to expand their belief and look at this through fresh eyes. And that's what happened in Jenna's case.
• 0:25
  Jenna Murphy 07:50: I can remember telling Phillip, "I don't know how I put on here. I put people in jail." Like that's not something that people... They're not going to look at this and be like, you know? And so...
• 0:26
  Scott Anthony Barlow 08:00: It does not feel like a success to other people viewing the resume.
• 0:27
  Jenna Murphy 08:04: Right. It really doesn't. And I mean, I had some really great opportunities at my last job. Probably the most notable, well, no, not probably. The most notable thing that I was able to do at my last job was at 33-34 weeks pregnant with my oldest, I argued in front of the Georgia Supreme Court. That's an opportunity I would probably never get to do again. Maybe if I'd stayed in a prosecution role and doing a lot of appellate work, then I might have.
• 0:28
  But some prosecutors go their entire career and never, probably don't ever get away with not submitting an appeal to the Court of Appeals, but to get to stand in front of the Supreme Court of Georgia or the Supreme Court of their state and argue, present an argument, and for a lack of... To win it, because that's what we did.
• 0:29
  Scott Anthony Barlow 08:57: As Jenna began to clarify what she truly needed in her next role, she discovered that her ideal work environment looked very different from what she had previously accepted as normal.
• 0:30
  Jenna Murphy 09:07: I had to learn to stand up for myself and open my mouth and say things, where things bothered me or where I didn't agree with things, so I wouldn't be taken advantage of. Maybe it was just the fact that I was so burnt out that I knew if I didn't say anything, that if I didn't... I was having to put boundaries. I was starting... That was something, I guess, people kept saying, "Set boundaries. Set boundaries. Set boundaries." And I'm like, "What you don't understand is, I came into this job, my last job, single.
• 0:31
  I had no significant other in any shape, form, or fashion when I moved here. I lived by myself. I ate, slept, lived, and breathed my job. I went home on the weekends, occasionally, to see my family. But beyond that, I had nothing. I could devote 150% of me to my job." Well, when you set that up, setting boundaries, pulling back, and setting those boundaries is almost impossible.
• 0:32
  Scott Anthony Barlow 10:01: Once Jenna got crystal clear on what she actually needed, not just what she thought she should want, doors began opening. And I've seen this happen over and over again.
• 0:33
  Rather than force herself into another litigation role, she started focusing on the work environment and the lifestyle she truly desired, and this led her to consider a position that she maybe hadn't wanted to before. One that was a strategic move forward, and what allowed her to get what mattered most.
• 0:34
  Jenna Murphy 10:32: I just had a really hard time finding companies and organizations to embrace the fact that I had spent my career putting people in jail or prison that I had, you know, sure, I negotiated a lot of things, but most everywhere would have wanted me in a litigation, courtroom style role, and I really wanted somewhere that took a major step back.
• 0:35
  But at the same time, taking a senior like paralegal role also let me learn this industry. It was going to let me have that time and flexibility that I wanted, but also would have made me a big asset to learn a different area of law and expand my horizons, so that if it, you know, if they couldn't offer me a jump or a different place, eventually, that at least I would have those things under my belt, finally, where other places would give me that opportunity.
• 0:36
  Scott Anthony Barlow 11:24: During intentional career change, there's often this moment when you realize that changing how you viewed what you need might actually be your path forward. Specialists get trapped by titles and status, and often it leaves them missing opportunities for what they truly need.
• 0:37
  Jenna faced this whole dilemma when she was considering a paralegal role after years as a prosecutor. Her explanation to the hiring manager reveals a profound shift in how she viewed career success.
• 0:38
  Jenna Murphy 11:53: I think in my last job, because of the nature of where it was, and there's no denying that we needed more staff, we need more attorneys, we need more staff, and we needed more judges. I think anybody in that office to this day will tell you that. The county is just growing at a rate that really needed that, and we just weren't going to have that.
• 0:39
  And so there was not the ability to say, "No". You kind of had to take and embrace whatever was asked, just because it had to be done. I mean, at this point, you're working with people's freedom and their constitutional rights. And so there really wasn't a whole lot of leeway to say no.
• 0:40
  So to have somewhere that I could say, "I'm sorry, my plate is loaded. Is it possible to have somebody else work on that?" It was something that was really important to me.
• 0:41
  Scott Anthony Barlow 12:49: There's this quote by Orson Scott Card. It goes something like, "This is how humans are. We question all our beliefs, except for the ones we really believe in, and those we never think to question. The key here is often narrowing focus on what matters, and expanding your beliefs about how what you want, what you need, might become possible." But here's what Jenna narrowed in on as what was most important to her.
• 0:42
  Jenna Murphy 13:16: Pay, flexibility, career path, and then the belief structure of the organization, and the pay was there when they made the offer. The flexibility was the fact that I was able to work from home. They're good about, you know, I can do daycare pickup, and I can do daycare drop off.
• 0:43
  I mean, the first time I remember, as I wound down at my last job, I had to do daycare drop off one morning, I looked at my husband, I was like, "What? What do I do? Where do I take them?" Because he had done all this for the entire four years of our oldest life. I could count on one hand the amount of time that I dropped him off, or I picked him up, and the little one even less so, because he was younger.
• 0:44
  Career path, I wanted something that I had a really hard time finding places to embrace the fact that I had been a litigator, and they wanted me to litigate. They didn't see the connecting dots of being able to negotiate contracts and things of that nature. So taking... When, actually, when the director of compliance who made my offer called, she said, "Why do you want to be a senior paralegal? Why?"
• 0:45
  And I said, "Honestly, I want to have more flexibility to be with my kids. I want to be able to have more time to..." I said, "I'm not asking not to work, but I said I'm asking not to have to answer to anybody else's schedule other than a PTO schedule, that, okay, there's too many people off. I'm sorry. Or yeah, there is something important that week. We can't go that week, but we can go the next week." I said, "I want that ability." So that's why I want to be a senior paralegal.
• 0:46
  Scott Anthony Barlow 14:53: When you get clear on your priorities and find an environment that aligns with those priorities, your specialized background becomes an unexpected asset, not a liability. In Jenna's case, her skills from handling criminal cases transferred perfectly to this new environment.
• 0:47
  And now, she has a role that supports her priorities. But here's the funny thing that is even better. When you get aligned with the right environment, right situation, right people, that can expand quickly to something you never thought it could.
• 0:48
  She was initially hired on as a senior paralegal, not in the attorney position. Jenna's specialized background quickly proved to be an overall benefit, an overall asset, and even more valuable than either she or the company had initially thought.
• 0:49
  Jenna Murphy 15:40: As of Wednesday last week, I was asked to step in as the third Associate General Counsel for the company where I'm now working. That was, kind of, a shock to me, to walk in and just be content with where I was just there, to onboard and meet everyone and get to know where I was working at, and then to walk into an office and say, "You have a lot of potential. You have a lot to offer. We would really like for you to step into a full attorney role instead of just being a paralegal."
• 0:50
  Scott Anthony Barlow 16:14: Okay, so we've already established that in reality, most of the skills that you've developed are transferable, even if you don't think that they are. You just need to reframe how to think about them. Yes, I know that's hard to do, so here's Jenna's advice for anybody who's in a similar situation.
• 0:51
  Jenna Murphy 16:29: I would give them permission, it's okay. Because I wallowed with that. I felt guilty. For the longest time, there are probably people who still don't know the process that I went through, the links that I went through to make this career change happen. I was scared in that process that it would be detrimental to the job that I really needed, because I have a husband and two children, and really needed to stay in that place.
• 0:52
  You know, I didn't need to be unemployed before I was employed somewhere else. Thankful for the opportunity that I had, but I would give them permission to go after that. But the other thing is, make sure that you define what it is that you want, don't settle. Because there were times where I probably would have. But also, when you select someone to stand behind you, like I did with Phillip, make sure that you'll know.
• 0:53
  When that person comes on, you will absolutely know when they log on, and you talk to them for more than 30 seconds, you will know this is the person who is going to help me the most, and that's what you need in this process. You need someone who will have your back.
• 0:54
  And I probably utilize him more than most people did, but I am so grateful for his guidance, but more so of him just simply reminding me to stay in the place where I was and to stand strong and not relinquish on what I wanted.
• 0:55
  Scott Anthony Barlow 18:00: When I think back to that chiropractor I mentioned at the beginning of this episode, or anybody who has reached out to me over the years, saying that their training, their degree was useless outside their profession, I know it feels that way, but I wish every single one of those people could hear Jenna's story.
• 0:56
  The truth is, no specialized education or experience is ever truly limiting, unless we decide it is. The skills that made Jenna effective as a prosecutor, her ability to negotiate, her attention to detail, her critical thinking, were exactly what made her valuable in an entirely different context.
• 0:57
  And within just a few weeks, her new company recognized this value and promoted her. So a lot of people find this podcast wondering, "Am I too far into this career path to do something different?" And the answer is in unequivocal, no. Your specialized skills are not a prison. They're a foundation that you can build on in countless ways.
• 0:58
  The real question here isn't whether or not you can change the direction; it's what direction would actually fit who you are now, not who you were when you started your career. And by the way, if you're stuck with this whole specialized dilemma, we would love to help. Just drop me an email, Scott@happentoyourcareer.com. Just put 'Conversation' in the subject line. I'll connect you with the right person on my team, and we'll figure out the very best way that we can support you.