Her Next Chapters

50. Navigating Career and Life Transitions: Reinventing Your Identity with Gabrielle Ferguson Part 1

• Christina Kohl

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Ready to transform your life during key transitions? In our 50th (!!) episode of the Her Next Chapter podcast, we promise to offer you profound insights on navigating identity shifts, especially for moms re-entering the workforce or facing an empty nest. Our wonderful guest, Gabrielle Ferguson, an expert consultant and leadership strategist, joins us to discuss how aligning your identity with your goals can ensure a smoother transition. This conversation is so rich in content that we've split it into two parts, with the first part airing this week.

Through our engaging discussion, Gabrielle and I dissect the process of reinvention and re-evaluation, diving into how past experiences shape current and future selves. We explore the creation of an identity map to recall former roles and accomplishments and decide what aspects to carry forward. Additionally, we shine a light on the often-overlooked value of caregivers, inspired by a Mother's Day Job Interview video and a revealing Salary.com study that estimated the value of a full-time caregiver's duties as $184K.

Join us as we celebrate this milestone episode and delve into how your evolving values and new responsibilities can be harmoniously integrated into your career and personal ambitions.

Ways to connect with Gabrielle:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabiferguson/
www.gabrielleferguson.com

Register for the Free Comeback Resume Masterclass being held on November 21st.
Grab a Free Resume Template for Career Returners
Want to chat about your career goals? Schedule a free call HERE.
Send me an email ---> christina@hernextchapters.com
Connect with me on LinkedIn ---> www.linkedin.com/in/kohlchristina





Christina Kohl:

Hi and welcome to Her Next Chapter's podcast. I'm your host, hristina Cole. I'm a mom of three and soon to be an empty nester. I'm also a certified HR pro who restarted my career after being a stay-at-home mom for over a decade. I created this podcast to connect with moms who have an empty nest on the horizon and are wanting to redefine their identity outside of motherhood, which might include a job search. On this show, we'll have raw conversations about our ever-changing roles as moms. We'll hear from women who restarted their careers and share tips for a job search after a career break. So if that's you, you're in the right place. Friend, let's get started. Hey friends, it's Christina here.

Christina Kohl:

I just wanted to jump in for a moment and celebrate. This is episode 50 of the Her Next Chapter's podcast. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be a producer of 50 podcast episodes. Oh, my goodness, what a ride this has been, and I just want to thank you for being part of this community and thank you for listening. E very now and then, someone like that I know in real life, or they've come to a webinar or something and they make a comment about the podcast. You guys, it just means so very much to me. I can't tell you how much I appreciate getting that feedback and hearing that something that I've said or shared has been impactful for you. That is the whole point. So thank you for being a part of this community and I just want to, like I said, I want us to take a moment and pause and recognize 50 episodes Holy cow. And we have listeners in 16 countries and 162 cities. This is around the world. It's just insane. So thank you so much for being a part of the community. In honor of the 50th episode, if you could do me a favor and rate and review the show and send it on to a friend that you think would find the information valuable and useful, if it's insightful for you, you probably have friends of yours that would also appreciate this content and it would mean so much to me and would help the podcast and the community to continue to grow. So please rate and review and share. That would just be so amazing. And, yes, the Celebrating 50 episodes and our one year anniversary is coming up in November, so stay tuned. Something special is coming. All right with that. On to this week's episode.

Christina Kohl:

Hi, friends, I am so excited to welcome back Gabrielle Ferguson to the Her Next Chapter's podcast. If you've been a longtime listener, you will recognize Gabrielle's name. For those of you who are new to the community, I'd like to just take a brief moment to introduce Gabrielle. She hails from London, the United Kingdom, and she is an experienced and effective coach and consultant. Before consulting and coaching, she spent over a decade working in-house, leading initiatives in the areas of human resources, talent, dei and learning and development. She holds a master's in human resources management and is an accredited coach with a diploma from the International Authority for Professional Coaching and Mentoring in London. She is trained in a range of psychometrics, including DISC, mbti and Hogan, and is also a qualified mental health first aider. She is passionate about using a practical behavior change approach to her work to facilitate moving people from awareness to positive action and take their goals from aspirational to achieved action and take their goals from aspirational to achieved. So that is Gabrielle's bio and I've invited her back to talk specifically around transitions.

Christina Kohl:

So much of Gabrielle's work. The foundation of it is tapping into our identity in order to accomplish those big goals and those big transitions. So to me it seems to make a lot of sense, particularly since I myself am in a season of transition. My youngest child, as you know if you've been listening, my youngest child has left the nest and is a college student. Now he's living in the dorms on campus, away from home, and so that is a big transition. It is also a really big transition for those of you who might be going through a job change, whether that's just a time for a pivot, an up level, something new, or if, like me, you are a long-term stay-at-home mom and you're ready to go back to work, and so those are things that Gabrielle and I are going to go really deep into in this conversation about how that identity shift needs to happen and how that can help us in these transition phases in our lives.

Christina Kohl:

So, anyway, I just wanted to set the stage for who Gabrielle is and what we're going to be talking about in the episode, and Gabrielle and I, we can really talk a lot. So I'm actually going to split this up into two episodes, a two-parter, just to make it a little bit more manageable, so I don't overwhelm you all with too much at once. So we're going to do part one today and I'll stay tuned next week for part two. All right With that, let's get on to the episode. Well, welcome everyone to this week's episode. As I mentioned, gabrielle Ferguson is back. So excited to have you back, gabrielle, as a return guest. It's always so insightful and powerful when we have these conversations, welcome.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

Thank you so much. Third time's the charm. I'm delighted to be back.

Christina Kohl:

And I invited Gabrielle back this time specifically to talk about our identities and Gabrielle and really with her work and goals and as an executive goal strategist I know that identity is like really core to that work. When we have goals and things that we want to achieve, that really the underlying success is the identity shift that needs to happen. So can you kind of just give us a high level around that and then we'll kind of get into more of the details around, like for this stage of our lives? A lot of our listeners are women that are moms and maybe they're in a shift where their kids are getting older, whether that's the high school years or even college, leaving out the home, or maybe their identity shift is connected to return to work. But if you can kind of tell us why this identity piece is so important in transitions and what's next for us, Absolutely so.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

Identity 101. What I have found in my coaching and consulting practice and this is very much inspired by the work of James Clear and his incredible book Atomic Habits, so I can't take credit for all of it is that identity links to systems and links to goals. So let's start with goals. We all know generally what a goal is. We all probably have multiple goals that are on our list and, if you're anything like me and like most other humans, we focus on a goal and we think about how we're going to achieve it, what success looks like, and we set some kind of goal or target. So that can take up quite a bit of energy. And then we think about how we're going to achieve the goal and we start to create a system, what James Clear calls a system which let's take the example of transitioning back to work. It might be job hunting, reaching out to recruiters, sprucing up our CV, looking at our network, looking up different companies, etc. It's all part of that system to achieve that goal.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

Now what happens as humans is that we can slide back and forth between goal and system. We try out a system for a certain period of time. We don't hit the goal that we want. So what do we do? We either change the goal, move the goalpost a little bit. Maybe now is not the right time, maybe next year, maybe when the kids are a little bit older. If this sounds familiar, let us know. In the comments of the podcast I can see Christina nodding at me so we fiddle with the goal or we fiddle with the system. Maybe healthcare is not the right industry, maybe I'll switch and look at jobs within the legal industry. Maybe I don't want to work full time, maybe I'll search for part time roles, etc. To work full-time, maybe I'll search for part-time roles, et cetera.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

And really, what James Clear's work has found is that ultimately, the reason why we don't achieve the goals that we set is because actually there's something underneath that system which is our identity, who we think we are and who we think we're not. Now this is really, really powerful because our brains have a certain condition where we want to live in congruence, so in alignment with our identity. That's just a fundamental part of being human. There are certain things I think about myself and I will act accordingly. I will act in alignment with what I think about myself.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

So if I don't truly see myself as a high powered executive earning $150,000 a year with business cards. I'm not necessarily going to stick to that system of getting that kind of role. I'm going to talk myself out of it. I'm going to adjust my goal, I'm going to lower my standards. So what I do in my world and you know, very similar to Christina, the people that you serve is, before we start to look at goals and systems, let's actually talk about identity first, because that will set us on the right path and that's where we're trying to help you. So that's just a little one-on-one about the link between identity systems and goals.

Christina Kohl:

Thank you. Thank you for that refresh, because I think that's really important for where we take our conversation today, because we're talking about women in transition, particularly moms, and again there's a couple of transitions that happen around this age, this midlife age that I'm in and all my listeners are in to, where the kids are growing up and they don't need us as much whether they're still in the home or not. There's that level of independence which we want. But then it's like, well, wait a minute, who am I if I'm not mom? If mom isn't my primary identity, then who am I? And then there's the other facet of well, maybe I'm going to be an employee again.

Christina Kohl:

If you've been a stay-at-home mom for a long time, it's like, well, what does that look like to connect, to reconnect with that identity of being a professional, getting paid for their efforts and their contributions outside of the home? So there's big identity shifts that need to happen in order for those transitions to go smoothly and not have a lot of angst and to have success in those transitions. So those are kind of going to be the two backdrops of the conversation is and they can intertwine but they can also be separate the return to work and the empty nest, whether it's on the horizon or it's right here and you're living it. Whether it's on the horizon or it's right here and you're living it. Those are very big transitions and I think this identity piece for me is really valuable because I have had to look at my identity. Who am I if I'm not everyday mom, all-consuming mom? What happened to Christina? What are Christina's own interests? And I was so focused on my kids for so long that I kind of lost touch with my own hobbies, interests, friendships. And when I did go back to work, there was a huge identity shift to even connect with that professional side of myself. And I will say it was such a gift when I did get that job that I had something that was only mine, all that my family and kids didn't know. I was doing things that had nothing to do with my family and I felt whole again, if that's the right word, and not to diminish any of my time of that season because I was doing exactly what I wanted to do when I was fully invested in caregiving. And so it's a both and both things are true, and when I started working I just had this boost that came, it was a boost and you know I don't want to lie, it's a big adjustment.

Christina Kohl:

Yes, of all, of our whole family had to adapt, including the dog. The dog used to stay in her mom too. I'm alone during the day, so it's a very rich opportunity for conversation, but that's kind of the backdrop of the things that will be, because we could talk about identity in any all different contexts, but those are kind of the two contexts that I'd like to focus our conversation. Let's do it. So the reinvention, re-evaluation, rebuilding like you know, all that kind of comes during the season of life, and rebuilding, like you know, all that kind of comes during the season of life. What advice or insights do you have to?

Gabrielle Ferguson:

share for people that are facing these types of life transitions. Wow, okay, huge question, right? I could talk about this until the end of time, so please, please, keep me on track. But I think first let's acknowledge how big that question is. Yeah, that question is huge, and if you have had, you know, the pleasure and privilege of raising a family, that is the most important job in the world and you've dedicated a huge amount of yourself to doing that, and so I think that's where I would want to start is just acknowledge that's a huge, huge question.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

We've used a couple of words already reinvention, re-evaluate, rebuild and I think that's very much the theme of this sort of way of thinking that we need to get back into. Number one. I would say you need to give yourself time. This is going to be a conversation with yourself. Whether you have that conversation out loud or not is completely up to you, but it is going to take some time and attention, and I think the answers to the questions we're talking about they need some time to kind of percolate and come to the surface. This isn't the kind of thing that will just maybe pop into your head when you're driving to the shops you might need to sit down with some pen and paper here when I would recommend starting. There's many, many things that you can do, but I would maybe start with looking backwards.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

Who was I before I started creating a family? What did I do? How did I spend my time? When we're thinking about career-wise, you know the job maybe that I was in, what did I enjoy that I remember about that.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

What's really stuck with me, because for some people this might have only been a year ago and for some they might've been quite a bit longer. So what did I enjoy and why, most importantly, and what did I really not enjoy and why? Most importantly, and what did I really not enjoy and why? Because I think, with these kind of questions, what can be overwhelming is almost that blank sheet of paper. So I'm ready to start.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

You know, thinking about considering going back to work. Oh my goodness, where do I start? And that's overwhelming. You don't have to be overwhelmed. Just start with jotting down some ideas and some answers to the questions I've just described, because once you have that, we're starting to create a bit of an identity map. Who was I? How did I spend my time? What did I enjoy doing and why? And what did I really not enjoy about what I used to do and why. That can start to build up a picture and we can use that to point ourselves in the right direction. So I would probably start there and see what you find, see what comes to mind.

Christina Kohl:

I like that idea of an identity map and I teach the same types of things Like let's go back and write down your proudest accomplishments, whether that is in your family, in your personal life or your professional life. And not only that's something you're proud of, but why, what about it makes you feel so proud, and those are really eye-opening exercises for people to go through. We talked earlier about that version of like. You know the things that you like and enjoyed and all of that, but what are you going to leave behind is something that came up. Expand on that a little bit more if you would.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

Sure, this is one of my juiciest questions in my sessions with clients, so I'm really happy to share it on your podcast. So let's say you've done, you know, step one of the map that we've just described. Now, really think back to that version of you, because at any given time there are kind of three versions of ourselves floating around Our past self, our current self. So the version of you that's listening to this episode right this second, and then our future selves, the version of us that's quite aspirational, you know, the version of us that's living in the dream house and driving the dream car, et cetera, et cetera. Those three versions of us are kind of always at play. So if we are thinking about the past version of ourselves, I'll take myself as an example, the past version of Gabrielle in her twenties, climbing the corporate ladder, working within HR and talent development. She was a go-getter, she thrived on ambition and do you know what she was successful in what she set out to do? But when I made my transition to now running my own business, I had to stop and think about that version of me. There are so many things that made that version of me, but I'm not going to take all of those with me into my next thing, my next phase, my transition. Not all of those things actually are what I need now. So I think a really good example of this to maybe bring this to life a little bit more is maybe the past version of you was an over-giver at work, a chronic over-giver, starting early, finishing late, always on, wanted to be seen as maybe trustworthy, reliable, wanted people to notice that you were ambitious. Maybe that worked for you then. But now that you have, maybe, a young family and you're thinking about going back to work young family and you're thinking about going back to work maybe that particular element of past you can't come with you because now I need to be on time for pickup at the nursery or the school gates, or actually the current version of me can't log back on and work for another hour or two at 8pm because that's bath time. So we really have to be careful, you know, pay respect to the past version of ourselves, but I think it's really important to recognise not all of that can come with me.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

Another example would be sometimes our past selves got a lot of our sort of validation from work. Our job title was really important, our grade was really important. Being on certain calls or being in certain rooms, you know, could make or break my day if I was, you know, invited to a certain call and you know part of that discussion. Maybe that's a piece of the job that isn't so important to you now because your values have changed. The reason I'm working now is different, so sometimes a little bit of time to review these elements can be really helpful and form the foundation of a successful job seeking strategy. Now it might be less about what kind of career ladder I want to climb, and it might be. How will this role suit me and my interests but also work for me within my family situation? You know lifestyle that I'd now have. That's different.

Christina Kohl:

Yeah, that's good. Um, I, as you were talking about titles and identity, it just brought back for me when, part of the deciding of for me and my husband of me becoming a stay-at-home mom, my son was sick at daycare again, again, again, again, again, constantly sick. And they call me because I'm the mom. And they call me and I'm like, well, you know, he's got a fever. Whatever it is, he needs to go home, he needs to be picked up. So I call my husband, like, can you go get him? I have a meeting coming up. And my husband's like, well, I'm meeting with the vice president. And I'm like, well, I'm meeting with the vice president. And I'm like, well, I'm meeting with the CFO. Oh, so weird, that's where it was like, this is like much and it just like things are out of balance that we're having that discussion. And I bring it up in this context because my first week at home with my three-month-old baby, because I had gone back to work for maybe a month but I had a short maternity leave and so she was maybe three and a half months old my son was two at the time yeah, and they're crying, they're like not wanting to take their nap, and I'm laying in between them trying to, like you know, reading story and trying to calm them down and I'm thinking to myself. Week ago I was in the CFO's office and now I've got baby spit up on me and two kids that are being squirrely and not doing what they're supposed to do. They don't care what title I had other than mom.

Christina Kohl:

It was a difficult transition for me, walking away from corporate as much as I wanted it. I was the driver behind that transition. There was an identity loss that I felt and it took me a while to get into that groove to where I didn't feel that loss. And then later, you know, fast forward a few years. I mean, I was a stay-at-home mom for over a decade and whether we're at a family event or a, you know, my husband's company would have like a holiday party or something. And oh, what do you do? Oh, I'm just a mom. Oh, yeah, yeah, that word just, or that word that I teach my clients at the beginning no, you are not just a mom. You are so many more things and that role has so much diversity to it that we don't even realize because we just do it. We just do it without even thinking. We're on autopilot, but definitely an identity shift. And then, coming back to the workforce, my confidence was so low because I didn't see all those things in my identity as a fully engaged, 24-7 caregiver, all the things that I did. So anyway, that identity piece just really stands out to me for those reasons.

Christina Kohl:

And yeah, and it just brought back that memory of title, my husband and I were dueling over like who we're meeting with. I mean this title. Okay, I've got a son in college. Well, I've got three kids in college right now. But I remember my years in college, the questions what year are you? What major are you? That's your identity, not who are you? What are you about? What are your interests? What do you like? You know it's what's your major. And the adult, farther into adulthood version is what do you do? Mm-hmm, and that's hard when what you do is unpaid for a decade, oh my goodness. And then it goes unvalued, even though it's. My children valued me, my husband valued me. I didn't always value or feel valued because it wasn't a dollar associated to it. So anyway, I know we're a little bit off topic, but that's just kind of where my brain went.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

No, I don't think we're off topic at all. I think you've summarized some really topical challenges for women really neatly, and titles, grades are wrapped up Ultimately it's status, isn't it? It's status the CFO has got a higher degree of power and influence over VPs. Vps have a higher degree of power and influence over directors. Vps of high degree of power and influence over directors. You know so we are. Our society is based around those kind of chains and and ladders and levels. Um, and interestingly, you say you know the lack of a payment for the work that you were doing, raising a family with three children. If the role of a mother was written into a job description, I think first of all, let's just visualize how long that job description would be. You know key responsibilities, what you know, skills and experience are required. What skills and experience are required? What are the hours for that role? As you say, 24-7. And it doesn't stop when your kids reach 18. You're still a mother who would apply for it.

Christina Kohl:

I don't know if you've seen this. It's about a four or five minute video and it's like a man in a suit. He's the interviewer and people have applied for, like this operations manager job and as he's interviewing them, he's telling them the requirements of the job. Well, your associates, they need it's 24 seven. You know they're like what, who would do that? And then he's telling them all these things about it and I don't remember all the riffs, but, um, you know all the things that are of a full-time mom job. And then he gets to the end and they're like well, and there's no vacation, your associates go with you on vacation and they go with you then hire someone else to manage your associates while you are gone, and so the, the people, they don't know that it's a.

Christina Kohl:

I bet they're confused. They're just like what, like who? Who would apply for this? And then, and and the pay? Um, well, we really don't have a budget for this. You know, they're like talking about, like all the things that you do. We really don't have a budget for it the pay is is zero, like what?

Christina Kohl:

and then the, the candidates. They keep switching to different candidates that are being interviewed and they're like who would apply for this? Like are you crazy? And they're like um, it's your mom, like mom's applied for. Then they're like oh, I gotta call my mom. Yeah, and it was. I'll have to find it and I'll put a link to it in the in the show notes, because it was just so powerful and so well done, um nobody in their right mind would apply for a job if it was written like that in a job like that, yeah, and then there's another one.

Christina Kohl:

I know I've talked about this on in different podcast episodes. So you take all the different jobs that moms do and it started with like coo, cfo, the nurse, the taxi driver, the tutor, all the things and for how many hours they do it in a month. And I added that all up by using real salary data of people who do those jobs. It was $184,000 a year to outsource all the jobs that a full-time caregiver does the jobs that a full-time caregiver does. And that was in 2021, yeah. So when I tell people, don't say just a mom, we mean it right, you're a mom, you're a super woman, um, and, of course, super dads are out there too, and it's just. It puts a whole different lens on what the value is.

Gabrielle Ferguson:

What you have brought to your family is invaluable. You know you cannot put a price on it. It's unaffordable to replace that. So we need to ban that word. Just just a mother. So we need to ban that word. Just just a mother. I think we need to put an embargo on that word because it's at the end of the day, it's doing yourself a disservice. It really is, and it's really important to see your own value. Do we attach so much weight and status to being a grade five or a band J, whatever, and not to being a mother and a family caregiver and raising a family and taking time out of your career, making that sacrifice in order to create and raise a family? It deserves respect. I think that's what Christina and I are saying. What we're united in and the message that we want to spread is that it deserves respect and that has to start with you respecting that time, that sacrifice and the skills you've developed while doing it. You have to start respecting it.

Christina Kohl:

Right, and that's that internal identity shift that needs to happen, because it is so many women that I meet and that have met during my stay-at-home mom phase. There is this sense of just a mom. If we don't value ourselves, it's difficult to ask someone else to see that value in us. All right, friends, I hope you've enjoyed my conversation so far with Gabrielle. Be sure to tune in next week where we pick up where we left off here. Have a wonderful week. See you next time. Thank you so much for listening today. I hope this episode hit home for you and, if you haven't already, be sure to connect with me on LinkedIn and say hello so I can personally thank you for listening. Until next time, remember, your story is uniquely your own and your next chapters are ready to begin.