When Jacinta Ahern stepped away from her role as Prime Minister of New Zealand just over a year ago citing burnout, she arguably became the highest profile member of ‘The Great Resignation’.
This movement, which began during the COVID-19 pandemic, saw millions of people around the world quit their jobs, even C-Suite Professionals.
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Many of the departing workforce were CEOs or C-Suite Professionals, upper management position holders who were suffering from fatigue, wanted to take a step back from the daily pressures of the role or just fancied a new challenge.
While the pandemic is now a thing of the past, a recent survey by Deloitte illustrates that the issue is very much a pressing one. Notably, they found that almost 70% of executives or C-Suite Professionals are thinking about leaving their present role for another workplace with a better culture of employee care.
If you find yourself in this boat, you will no doubt be at a crossroads in your life. So, in this article, we aim to give you food for thought by outlining nine career paths you can undertake.
Enjoy a break
When was the last time you had an extended break? Well, if you haven’t had one for a while, you should grant yourself permission to enjoy one after leaving your current role.
Whether you make the most of your time away from the workplace by sipping pina coladas on a tropical island, playing endless rounds of golf or simply watching Netflix all day, you need to take the time to process the reasons why you left your previous employment.
Doing this is important because it will allow you time to invest in self-care and undertake some soul-searching to have a deep think about how you want the rest of your working life to play out.
Essentially, the purpose of this break is to gain perspective and clarity. Once you have this, you will be better able to work out your next move.
Career Moves for C-Suite Professionals
During your well-deserved rest, you should have plenty of time to think about what type of role you want to do when you are ready to return to the workforce. However, if you are struggling to come up with anything meaningful, here are nine professional career options you might want to consider.
1. Set up your own business
Should you still have the burning hunger to work at the highest level, but on your own terms, a terrific solution is to set up your own business. Doing this can provide you with a new and exciting challenge – after all what could be better than building something from the ground up?
Depending on what your business is, it can also help to make a real difference to the lives of many customers or solve an issue people have been taking for granted. Moreover, if your business is in a field or area which you love or are passionate about, then it really won’t feel like work either.
2. C-Suite Professionals and Coaching
As someone with a C-suite background you will no doubt have a wealth of knowledge, experience and expertise that people will want to tap into. For this reason, you might want to consider business or executive coaching.
In the business world, few feelings can match the sense of satisfaction you get from watching someone grow as a professional or entrepreneur thanks to your guidance.
In addition, the great thing about this career move is that you could end up being hired by people from different industries, ages and backgrounds, which will provide you with differing challenges to tackle and a more varied working week.
To find clients, partnering with a business coaching franchise like Brainaict is a great way to kickstart a career move like this.
3. Become a board member
Another way to share your knowledge and utilise your expertise to good effect is to serve on boards.
Regardless of whether you sit on them for private, public or non-profit businesses you should work out what boards you would like to sit on, what you could bring to them and, most importantly, why you would want to do it.
Once you have worked out these details you should use your connections to sound out opportunities in industries and businesses you are interested in.
Generally speaking, a board seat at non-profit organisations might be easier to secure. Although often they don’t offer remuneration. By contrast public and private companies do pay a salary, however, for this reason, they usually are more difficult to secure.
4. Become a brand ambassador
If you want to stay within your current organisation or you have an affiliation with another that you want to tap into, becoming a brand ambassador for them is a terrific option.
As a brand ambassador you can help with recruiting and networking on the company’s behalf. You can also become the face of business in marketing and social media campaigns and speak at various events on their behalf.
Thanks to TikTok and Instagram, the importance of brand ambassadors has elevated. We are not suggesting you start doing funny skits or choreographed dances, but there are several other ways companies can creatively employ your services as an influencer to good effect.
5. Charity
Many C-Suite Professionals, particularly those who have recently retired from the corporate world, choose to take up roles in charitable organisations. Often this is based around emotive reasons, for instance, due to personal experiences, although sometimes, it is just because they want to help a particular cause.
The good thing about working for a charity is that you can help to improve the lives and personal circumstances of significant numbers of people, both in Australia and around the world, through the work you do for them.
6. Write and podcast
For those who want to step away completely from the board room, an excellent career option might be to turn yourself into a writer and podcaster.
With your experience you will no doubt have a wealth of business knowledge which people will want to tap into. So, why not turn it into a series of books and a monetised blog that can showcase your insights and mastery of specific business-related topics?
You can choose to self-publish your work on Amazon or approach a publisher to do so on your own behalf. At the same time, launching a series of Podcasts that can be accessed on Spotify or your blog, as well as embracing the power of social media, can bring further exposure to it.
If you do become a writer, you won’t have to work 60-hour weeks and you will undoubtedly be doing something that brings you joy, and ultimately, a tremendous sense of achievement.
7. Teaching
Most universities run business and management courses that would welcome lectures given from someone of your corporate experience and standing. So, teaching is a brilliant way to get paid to convey your knowledge to budding executives and entrepreneurs.
Teaching is an excellent way to give back. It draws upon similar traits to that of a CEO as you have to learn to think through your thoughts in a more effective way, when passing on the knowledge to others.
As a teacher, you also should retain the thought that you might potentially be imparting the benefits of your wisdom to the next Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk. If you empower people with knowledge, you never know where it could take you.
8. Volunteering
If you have made enough money to live comfortably for a while, you should consider volunteering. Whether that will involve building water pipelines for remote villages in Africa, cleaning up the beaches and parks in your state or working in an animal shelter, will depend on your passion.
However, volunteering your services to organisations that require help to do this should give you a sense of purpose, achievement and pride in making a difference to the lives of those less fortunate than you.
9. Follow your passion
Lastly, but not least, you should not be afraid to follow your passion. Just because you have worked in a corporate role for decades does not mean you have to stick to it. Instead, if it is financially viable for you and your dependents, your next career move should be to something that will bring you lots of joy and job satisfaction.
Irrespective of whether that is driving a train, learning to be a barista or becoming a nail technician, if that is what you really want to do you should do it. Life is too short to spend time weighing up in your mind whether to quit a role you are no longer enjoying.
Final Thoughts About C-Suite Professionals
Quitting your job due to burn out is something an increasing number of C-suite professionals are contemplating. While it can be a scary proposition in terms of how it might affect your career, if you are wanting to achieve a better work/life balance it is a necessary step to take.
But resigning from your job is only the first step and unless you are retiring completely from working, you will need to find a new way to earn a crust at some point down the line.
We hope this guide has provided you with insight into some of the roles you can undertake if you do leave your present role. When deciding what to do next, it is important to take some time out to recharge your batteries and remember why you left your job in the first place.
By the same token , when you are ready, you should also take these steps to nurse yourself back to work too. If you do this, you should quickly find yourself a lot more fulfilled in your next role.
