In this conversation with Julianne Miles, co-founder of Career Returners, chartered psychologist, and author of Return Journey: How to Get Back to Work and Thrive After a Career Break, we explored what it really looks like to navigate the “return journey” after time away from paid work.
We also examined why career breaks are still stigmatized despite longer working lives, and how returners can reframe their stories as strengths rather than liabilities. Miles shared her three-part roadmap for returning to work—starting out, finding what works, and thriving back at work—and offered evidence-based strategies for rebuilding confidence, overcoming recruitment bias, and helping both individuals and employers see career breaks as a powerful, natural chapter in a modern professional life.
Lecturer bio:
Julianne Miles is a renowned return-to-work expert, Chartered Psychologist and author of Return Journey: How to get back to work and thrive after a career break. She is a passionate advocate for making career breaks a valued part of a lifelong career.
After a decade in international strategy and marketing roles, Julianne took a four-year career break to care for her young children. Inspired by her own experience, she retrained in psychology and went on to co-found Career Returners in 2014. The social impact organisation has since become a leading voice in returner inclusion and support, partnering with over 200 employers and supporting thousands of professionals to return to fulfilling work after extended breaks.
Julianne has an INSEAD MBA and an MSc in Occupational and Organisational Psychology. In 2019, she was awarded an MBE for Services to Business and Equality, recognising her pioneering work in changing the landscape for UK returners. Now Executive Chair of Career Returners, Julianne lives in London and has two adult children.
Transcript:
Seth Green: Welcome to all who have already joined us for our conversation on the return journey, thriving after a career break. We are really excited for this conversation with Julianne Miles.
On a morning like this one, I’m especially grateful to say that I’m Seth Green, I’m the dean here at the Graham School at the University of Chicago, and welcome to our gorgeous campus, although we need to add in a winter photo, because it is all white on this day, because we’ve had a couple of snowstorms here in Chicago, and so it is even more picturesque and beautiful than this picture fully shows.
For those of you who don’t know us, we are the School of Lifelong Learning at the University of Chicago, and we are 134 years young, and we are a place where people come for timeless ideas, and for discernment of what might be their next chapter of impact.
We have a number of events coming up in the week ahead. We have, at the end of this week, our first Friday lecture that is titled The City of Ladies. And next week, we will have a conversation previewing our class on the humanistic basics of productive disagreement, where if you want to learn how Intigone can help you to disagree better, you can come and join us. And then early in the new year.
We’ll have a conversation that is very complimentary to this one on re-educated, someone who went back in midlife for education and went from being a columnist to a teacher, and she’ll tell her story. She didn’t entirely give up writing, because she then wrote a book about her experience called Re-Educated that became a significant book and award winner.
We also have our holiday party coming up, so we hope you’ll join us. Next week, on Thursday, we’ll have our holiday party at the Gleacher Center downtown. We have over 500 RSVPs, so this is your chance to see all of your friends in our lifelong learning community, and to make some new ones.
And just prior to the holiday party, we will be having a conversation with Chris Jones. He’s just gotten back from taking a group of Graham School lifelong learners to Broadway, where they saw four shows and talked to a lot of directors about the business of Broadway, and he will be sharing fresh perspectives on that topic, both based on his own role as a theater critic and on that trip.
And we will also be celebrating, most importantly, our incredible instructors. We have our 2025 Excellence in Teaching Awards, and four outstanding people that we will be fedding. But the reason that you are here today is to be in conversation with Julianne Viles, so I will add a spotlight there. Hello, Julianne, we are thrilled to have you here. By way of background, Julianne Miles is a renowned return-to-work expert, a chartered psychologist, and author of Return Journey, How to Get Back to Work and Thrive After a career bake.
She is a passionate advocate for making career breaks a valued part of a lifelong career. After a decade in international strategy and marketing roles, she took a four-year career break herself to care for her young children. Inspired by her own experience, she retrained in psychology and went on to co-found Career Returners, which you can see in her background.
And it is a social impact organization that has been a leading voice in returner inclusion and support, partnering with over 200 employers and supporting thousands of professionals to return to fulfilling work after extended breaks. And we’re very interested in this because since we started the Leadership in Society Initiative about two and a half years ago, which is for accomplished professionals typically coming to the end of a long-standing career arc, but wanting to have another chapter of purpose and impact, we’ve also received a lot of inquiries from people in the middle of midlife, let’s say, you know, early to mid-40s, and they’ve said, I’m thinking about coming back, I took this break, how do I do it? And we’ve said, we’re not sure, and we’re going to go out and find some of the best people to begin answering those questions and bringing that expertise into our universe, and so we’re thrilled that Julianne has joined us, and we’ll be sharing some of her wisdom today. And so, Julianne, to get started in our conversation, we are, as you know well, in an era of longer lives and extended careers.
Yet career breaks are often still viewed as liabilities rather than natural chapters in a professional life. Can you talk a little bit about why you think there is the stigma of career breaks, and then we’re going to talk over the course of the conversation about how to hopefully overcome it?
Julianne Miles: Yeah, yeah, and it clearly makes no sense. It makes absolutely no sense, now we’re working for 40, 50 years or more, that there is still this perception that careers should go in straight lines without breaks. And… you know, if we look towards the future of work, I think we’re all going to want or need to take career breaks at some point. It could be to look after our children, it could be to look after elderly parents, it could be for our own physical or mental health, or just for a bit of a break and to do something different, but…
The problem we’ve got is that most organizations, most employers, actually society as a whole, is still holding onto this traditional view that the best career path is a linear one.
And there’s something when you have a gap which is problematic. And actually, that’s baked into recruitment processes, because we find there’s a lot of evidence that recruiters and hiring managers make assumptions that experienced candidates who’ve taken a career break somehow lose their skills, they take too long to catch up, they can’t hit the ground running. And we actually… we had a study recently, I’m based in the UK, there was a study here that highlighted this.
And they found that experience within the last 12 months is one of the top two screening factors for a job application.
So, and this negative view feeds through if you’re a returner, because you’re thinking, I’ve now got to hide my break or defend it, so this is what I’m working really hard to change.
Seth Green: Well, so let’s begin with your story, because you, as I mentioned, took a 4-year break.
And then you, at this pivotal moment, really changed your perspective to seeing this as a potential strength. You used it as a pivot. Can you talk about your story individually, and then we’ll kind of come up to the bigger picture of the trend lines as a whole?
Julianne Miles: Yeah, and I think, you know, the real genesis of my book, well, of Career Return as an organization and our return journey, was my own experience, and I really remember sitting there, I was… I’d had a four-year break, as you mentioned, after a first career in corporate strategy and marketing. I had decided pretty quickly that I wanted to go back to work in some shape or form, but not… I wanted to do something a bit more rewarding, with a bit more autonomy and flexibility. But I got really struck… stuck as to what that might be.
And I remember casting around at the time for, sort of, sources of support, and thinking, there’s nothing really here, and I felt quite isolated.
And I flip-flopped. I had so many different ideas, but got absolutely nowhere. About 14 months, I remember I, you know, I had this list of about 20 ideas, but got really stuck. And I think what got me out of it in the end was I took an evening class, and again, talking of lifelong learning, you know, took an evening class on, introduction to psychology, and I was like, I love this. This might be my thing. And I started then, I started to learn more, I took some classes, I ended up taking a conversion course and getting the confidence to retrain into psychology, which led to then me setting up my own career psychology practice, which then led, as these things do in this winding path to me deciding that there was a bigger societal problem here in terms of people like me who were getting stuck, and most… well, too many, who weren’t finding their way back into fulfilling work, like I’d somehow managed to do myself.
Seth Green: So, let’s now kind of come out of your experience and into some of the expertise that you’ve developed over the last decade plus, and that you write about in your book, Return to Work. And in that book, you lay out a three-part map of how people can navigate this return to work. And you have the starting out phase, the finding what works phase, and then the thriving back at work. And so, maybe you could give us a high-level picture of that three-part route, and then we can dive into each of those a little deeper.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, yeah. And I think it is really important to have a roadmap, because I think it is hard, and it’s daunting, and there are challenges at each stage. And I started out with this preparation stage, which is really about looking inwards.
And that’s to help you to get the confidence, to get the clarity, to be able to move forward. And… really recognizing some of the psychological challenges, because what I found from my experience of supporting thousands of returners over the last… well, more than the last decade, is that it’s often those mental barriers that stop us even moving forward. So, the first stage is helping people to look inwards, to get clear on their motivations.
To tackle some of these mental barriers.
And then to develop more focus in the direction they want to take. So that’s the looking inwards. The second stage is a lot more practical.
And it’s easy here, there is a bit of a pitfall of not moving into the second stage, which is you spend too long on the introspection, you make your life a bit of a research project, and you never actually do anything. So the second stage is about starting to look outwards, starting to really engage in active exploration, and taking those actions that will get you back into fulfilling work.
And then the third stage, sometimes we can forget about, because we’re like, okay, well, now I’m back at work, I’ve succeeded. But actually, the return to work journey doesn’t stop there, because people can actually drop out quite quickly if they’re not sufficiently prepared for what can be a real emotional rollercoaster in those first 6 to 12 months back at work. So that’s what the third stage is about, helping people to prepare practically and psychologically, and then ride… ride the emotions so they get through to the other side.
Seth Green: Well, so let’s go through it a little more in depth. Let’s start with your starting out phase, and you mentioned there’s a lot about looking inward.
Julianne Miles: Yeah.
Seth Green: And so, can you talk a bit about some of the common psychological barriers you’ve seen at this stage, where people are their own biggest critic, or, you know, they’re in their own heads, and… talk a little bit about what you’ve seen from an evidence-based strategy perspective, especially with your psychology background, and how people break through some of those hidden challenges within their own mind in this kind of first phase of return to work.
Julianne Miles: Yeah. So, so the big three, I’d say, are loss of confidence, guilt, and perfectionism. And… the one that needs tackling, really, up front, because I think it’s the biggest by far, we found from… we do an annual research study of returners, and we found that around about 90% of people consistently say that they’ve lost confidence during their career break. And… they often don’t voice it as I’ve lost confidence, though they’re like, they just say, have I been out too long? Am I too old? Is it too late? I’m a different person now who’d want to hire me. And underneath all that is this loss of confidence. And you mentioned this bit about negativity bias, and, you know, the fact that we tend to focus, and we tend to believe… what these negative thoughts are, and we over-focus on those. So that’s a trap in itself. It sort of re-compounds those feelings. And… what I talk about in the book is unpicking this a bit, and realizing that you haven’t lost overall confidence on career break. You just lose a lot of what I call your professional identity. So it’s this belief in yourself as a competent professional, it’s this sense of… I can do… I am the same person. I’ve evolved, I’ve changed, and actually I’ve strengthened during this period.
And I have a huge amount to offer an employer. So, but easier said than done, you can’t talk yourself into confidence. So this is where the psychology comes in.
And it’s important to focus on your strengths. And really, it’s easy to think about… your weaknesses, what you can’t do at this stage, but it’s switching your mindset to think, what are my strengths? What are my strengths that I developed come to me naturally? What are the strengths that I’ve developed during my career break? And that’s where the field of positive psychology has shown us so much evidence that if we identify, if we leverage our strength, it builds our self-esteem, it makes us more engaged.
And it makes us more likely to succeed when we’re back at work. But again, it’s tricky. So, a real tip here is don’t just sit there and go, what are my strengths? What you need to do, get feedback from other people.
And actually go back and think about year… you know, chunk your life up and think, what are your achievements?
Through your life.
And the joy about being in mid-age is that you’ve got so many achievements, you’ve got so much that you can draw on, and that’s your evidence.
Evidence of what you do well, what you’re energized by, and you build on that.
And I think that helps to build your inner confidence, because you feel that you’re getting that credibility, and you’re starting to recognise what you can take forward and what you can bring to an employer.
Seth Green: And Julian, as you think about starting out, I’m curious, as you think about the strengths you may develop over your career break.
Julianne Miles: Yeah.
Seth Green: Are there recommendations that you have for people during their career break… that can help them to be more ready and confident when they want to return. I realize that some people may find you at the point at which…
Julianne Miles: Yeah.
Seth Green: One return, in which case…
Julianne Miles: Yeah.
Seth Green: it’s not an actionable idea, but for someone who is about to begin their career break, or is in the middle of it and thinking about, I know this time is going to come, I know these challenges, maybe are there things that people can be doing? Obviously, they can’t be doing too much, because then they may not be getting the break that was the intent. But I’m curious if there are any high-level tips there that you’ve seen over time that people can be engaging in to set up for that as well.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, and I think one of the most important things is don’t completely relinquish your professional identity, yeah? So keep a toe in. And that doesn’t have to mean actually doing work, but it’s like… reading your professional journals, having conversa… keep in touch with your old colleagues.
Seth Green: Yeah.
Julianne Miles: Just keep a little bit of interest in knowledge in that, and it may be, again, depending on your circumstances for your career break, it may be that you can do some skilled volunteering during your break.
Seth Green: Yeah.
Julianne Miles: But it’s… keeping that identity going, because I think that’s… that’s one of the biggest challenges coming back, if you’ve completely left it. And we can see this quite often, a classic example of somebody who takes a career break to look after their children. And you start at the beginning of your break, you’re like, oh yeah, I’m a lawyer.
And then, you know, maybe a year in, you’re going, oh yeah, well, I used to be a lawyer, and then, you know, a few years in, you’re going, oh yeah, well, I’m, you know, and often it’s, you know, just a mom, or just a mother, you know, and then you’re… along that way, you’ve given it up.
And then you’re like, that feels so long ago, that professional self, it’s not even part of who I am anymore. But if you keep in touch with it, if you keep in touch with colleagues.
Again, super important for networking when you do want to come back and get a job, but it also keeps that sense of self. Yeah.
Seth Green: You know, it’s so interesting, Jillian. We had a conversation with Allison Gilbert, who looks at the science of relationships, and one of the things she recommended is, you know, for those people that you get to know in college or grad school, and then you become a parent, and you have no time, and you literally just, you know, can’t make the calendar work. Once a year. Once every other year.
Just… a call.
And, you know, you may not have the closest relationship over those next 10 or 15 years while you’re parenting, but it will be one that you come back to, and if you have no call for 15 years, right, you lose that sense of identity of that relationship. And so, anyway, it’s just interesting, because it parallels from a very different context, and it’s not that you need to be at the same level of friendship that you may be earlier in life and later in life when you’re in the midst of parenting and have no time left, but that you don’t want to entirely lose sight of these, because there’s an emotional and identity component that you then lose, potentially, in this resource that could be really meaningful to you, that you’ve invested in, that you want to come back to later.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, and I think that’s such good advice, and I also think it’s never too late. And I think there is… there’s a lot of fear of getting back in touch with people that you haven’t spoken to for a long period of time. But I think it’s people that you have… you got on really well with, you have positive memories of.
typically, they’ll be happy to hear from you. And this is where, you know, LinkedIn is such a boom, because we can get back in touch with people.
And just reach out. And I think it’s scary to do, and there’s a lot about regaining your confidence, which is about courage.
And it’s just getting out there, doing the things that, you know, that feel a bit hard, but get, you know, don’t feel that you’ve lost your network, because your network’s still there.
If you really take those actions to reinvigorate it.
Seth Green: Well, so, part of what you need to do when starting out is you need to figure out how to overcome some of these really natural challenges. Another part I know, and you’re a great example, because you went back and trained in psychology and moved in this new direction.
is to figure out, okay, who am I today, 4, 5, 6, 10 years later, and what actually energizes me, and where do I want to head? And so, can we talk a little bit about discernment from the perspective of where you may want to go, which, after all these life experiences, may be with some level of new direction. How do you help people to think about where they head next as they begin this journey into returning?
Julianne Miles: And I think it is… a career break is a fantastic opportunity, and I think it is one of those few times in your life where you can take a step back and think.
who do I want to be for the rest of my life? You know, and I think that’s such a plus, but it’s also hard. And I think we find some people who are, like.
I’ve no idea what I want to do now.
And then you get the people like me who feel so many options that you get stuck in what psychology we call the paradox of choice, which is, I could do anything, so you end up doing nothing. So, what I advise people to do is to start with, at this stage of looking inwards.
what’s going to make work fulfilling for you? And I think the key components here are what kind of work is going to be using my strengths? What am I interested in, and what energizes me? And that’s both in terms of what I enjoy doing, and this may have changed as well during your career break.
You know, and I think that’s what’s important. But, you know, really think about how your career break, how your life has changed, maybe what you enjoyed when you were much younger and you made those initial career decisions.
But also, what’s… what’s important to you now?
What are your values? Do you want more purpose? What is it you want? What are your motivations? And I think when you’ve been completely out of work, what are you missing about work?
And clearly, the financial importance is often a key component, but it’s what else? You know, what else are you missing from work? And make sure you’re going to get that. So I think that’s the start point, is what’s going to make work fulfilling for you.
Think about it like a jigsaw puzzle, that you put together the components, you’re putting together a bit of a decision matrix, so you can evaluate some of the options that you’re considering.
But also, don’t underestimate what feels right.
And I think we can do this, and I think particularly if you’re somebody who is very analytical, if you sort of really trust that… the, you know, the very, sort of, logical pros and cons of options. Do also trust your instincts, because, again.
By midlife, you’ve got an idea about what works for you and what feels right, so trust that as well when you’re thinking about options. And aim to narrow down to a manageable number of options, not the one choice. And again, this is where let go of the perfectionism, which is, I have to find the perfect path, which is yet another pitfall when you’re coming back. If you… you can get very stuck trying to find the absolute perfect path after a career break.
Find a couple of options which interest you, which energize you, and start to actively explore those, and that’s what gets you along the right track.
Seth Green: Alright, well, so that is starting out, and then you need to actually, for most people, find work that works.
So, in your book, you look at how to tackle recruitment bias against returners, which you named as a major factor, and you’ve now worked with over 200 employers, and so, can you talk a little bit about what’s been the most effective way to help returners. And then maybe talk about your advice for organizations in how they can see returners not as a risk, but as a strategic opportunity. So let’s start on the individual side. What can I do if I’m returning? And then I’m curious your tips for employers and how they can see with new lenses the possibilities that returners provide.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, yeah. And I think as a returner, something that’s helpful to know is, is about the psychology of luck. And I think psychologists who have researched luck have found that if you are open-minded, if you’re creative.
if you take actions to develop your networks and get out there talking to people, you create those lucky breaks. And I think often it is… it is a lucky break that you need when you’re going to be going back, particularly after a long career break. I think you do need to be creative. Don’t just sit there and, you know, fire off scattergun job applications, because that is very unlikely to succeed. You need to be targeted enough but also, thinking a little bit differently. And we find that often, returners take a stepping stone role. It might be you get in, you do some project work, you do temporary work, you do some freelance work. You’re doing something where it’s a less competitive marketplace in terms of getting in there, like, for a permanent job, but it gets you a foothold back in an organization. There are increasing numbers of programs, returnships, other forms of… return and retraining programs, so do have a lookout for those. Look at organisations who are more open to different types, so to being more inclusive, to maybe different types of candidates, so… and then use your networks, and I think that is, you know, it’s so important. Just get out there and talk to people.
Tell them what you want, you know, tell them about yourself.
And often we can feel really uncomfortable about this, but it’s just… people need to know about you, they need to know what you’re looking for to be able to help you.
Seth Green: And how do you suggest talking about the career break? I mean, I think there’s a art, probably, to this, where you’re not apologizing for it, but there’s an acknowledgement. Are you aiming to tell a story of, you know, natural occurrence. Oh, a person fell ill, and so I took off to be with them for a period of time, and coming back. You know, at what level do you explain that? I mean, maybe in full transparency here, I was a trailing spouse, and so I made a couple of moves, in order for my wife, she was on a postdoc and then got her professorship, and so, you know, I footnoted, you know, with a little asterisk on my resume, like, you know, time frame, was dependent on being a trailing spouse.
you know, she’s now a professor at Northwestern, in her case, just so that it would kind of explain this, and it would reduce curiosity of, like, why was this person here? Well, if a postdoc is two years, and he’s trailing… so, you know, so I don’t know if that’s something that is appropriate, but I just share that as an N of one, that my aim was to kind of… explain. Reduce, you know, the questions that people might have about that moment of transition. Is that something that you recommend in terms of trying to provide… absolutely.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Zeth. I think you need to own your career break. Don’t try and hide it. Don’t try and… you know, apologize for it, or defend it, or somehow feel there’s anything bad about it, whatever the reason. You know, and it’s really up to you how much you want to talk about the reason. Clearly, in your case, it was easily to explain. You know, if you might have a painful reason for your career break you don’t want to talk so much about, that’s absolutely fine. But what I will share here is my, my concept of the career break sandwich, because I think this is really helpful for people when they’re telling their story after a career break. I think it’s important to reintegrate your professional self before. Yeah? Put your career break in the middle. And then talk about what you want to do now.
And the reason that that’s important is that you don’t want, in terms of when you’re looking for another job, you don’t want people to over-focus on your career break.
Seth Green: And I can find that… that…
Julianne Miles: Sometimes it’s hard when you’re going back, because you talk too much about… you can get quite defensive about your career break, and actually. it’s, you know, the important thing when you’re talking about career break is to explain the reason, as you say, so it’s not this sort of mystery gap on your resume. But it’s also to talk about what your career break has given you, the skills you’ve developed. you know, what you’ve learned. It might be adaptability, flexibility, it might be, you might have done sort of specific learning during that period.
All sorts of skills, resilience, a fresh perspective, you know, the energy it’s brought you, and then move on to what you want to do now.
So I think that… that career break sandwich works really well, and I think you need to practice it, and you need to refine it, and tell it to somebody else, and think. is, you know, am I getting the response that I want from somebody when I give them that story? Get feedback on it from your friends, your family, until it feels comfortable, it feels you’re putting yourself across in the best possible way. So I think that’s the story. The other thing I’ve recognized here, Zeth, is I didn’t answer your question about employers.
Seth Green: employer.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, so let’s talk about…
Seth Green: What do you recommend to the company, exactly?
Julianne Miles: Yeah, and I think, you know. The proof for employers is often when they bring returners in, because as soon as they start to bring in returners, they realize that they are bringing in some people who are… you know, they bring something different and special because of their career break, and I think their employers talk to us so often about the motivation, the energy, the fresh perspective that returners bring in. So, you know, one employer said, you know, the career break is like the secret sauce. I was going to… I was prepared to ignore it, and then having had a return on my team, I’ve realized that, no, I actually value it. So, and that was joy, joy to my ears. But to get returners… to get employers to that stage.
Really, first step is really highlighting what a fantastic talent pool this is. I mean, within our network, you know, the majority of people have 10 plus years of work experience, they have professional postgraduate qualifications, they have this incredible range of skills.
And, you know, they are a relatively untapped talent pool. So what organization would not want to access a fantastic talent pool?
And then, you know, to actually highlight to them all these great employers, probably in their sector, who are bringing returners and have benefited from it. So I think, you know, we walk employers along the journey, and then we get them to try it out, and then things tend to work from there.
Seth Green: Well, so, you mentioned, Julianne, you can get the career. And then there are challenges sometimes in thriving back at work. And so, can you describe the first 6 months back at work? You know, you’ve talked about it earlier as an emotional rollercoaster. What does thriving during this period look like, in your view? And how do you know when someone has kind of gotten beyond that transition and moved from returner to return, so to speak. And then I’m going to come to the many questions that are populating the chat. So this will be my last one, and for those who have put in questions, please know we’re coming to them next.
Julianne Miles: Look forward to the questions. Yeah, it’s, you know, it can be a really tough period, and I think it can be unexpected for people as well, because they think, yeah, I’m sorted now, I’m back at work. And then, imposter syndrome hits, often really magnified. And so often we find with returners, after about, like, you know, 4 to 8 weeks, this feeling of. I can’t do it, I’m not good enough, the perfectionism hits. I should be more back up to speed, I’m failing at work. It might be also I’m failing at home, I can’t do it. And that’s a real risk point, and we can find that if people don’t get support, and we always recommend to employers that they do. Provide structured support for people who’ve had a long career break when they come back in, because this is where it’s tough.
You know, and you need to… part of it is, if you’re ready for this when you’re coming back in. you’re less worried. You’re like, okay, this is normal, I’m having these self-doubts, I need to ride it out. You need to get support, and I think you need the people at home, at work, who are going to give you support through that transition. It might be just finding a buddy in your team, finding people, you know, making sure that you might need to coach your manager to… give you that feedback on your strengths, your weaknesses, to, you know, to help you to develop, but also to recognize what you’re doing well when you’re back at work.
And so I think… and try and get the peer support, and I think don’t try and do it alone. So I think that, if you take those steps, then there is a moment, often, and I think this hits people, it’s like… I’m not doubting myself anymore. I’m actually feeling I am back, I am stronger, I’m starting to… not be concerned that I can’t do what I did before. I can realize that not only can I do what I did before, but I’m better because of all these skills, these strengths, this perspective I’ve built during my career break. And that’s the moment where it’s like, yeah, I’m getting there.
And I don’t know if anybody, you know, you’re never completely there, are you? You know, we always… we have these… we have great days at work, we have days when we doubt ourselves, that’s… that’s… that’s reality. But you have a point where you own that identity again.
And I think that’s the point you can feel, yeah, I am, I’m truly returned.
Seth Green: Alright, well, I want to come now to the many questions populating our chat, and the first one is a really interesting and powerful one. Regarding keeping a toe in the field to maintain that professional identity, what about the case where the professional field that one was once in has disappeared? For example, international development with the closure of USAID, and many people who have lost their federal-funded careers here in the U.S. But more broadly, where, you know, there are significant changes in your profession. I mean, I even think of AI and how that’s upending many fields, and so you may be coming back to a very different field than the one that you left. How do you think about maintaining your professional identity in a context of what might be abrupt and meaningful changes or disruptions?
Julianne Miles: Yeah, and I think this is the reality of working lives nowadays, isn’t it? I think the first point is realizing things are changing so fast in most areas of work. that people are experiencing these feelings, whether they are in a job or not, that the world of work is changing very fast, and that maybe their particular role in it might be threatened. So, I think it is important to not be too rigid about your professional identity, and that’s where some of the exercises that I talked about when you’re thinking about what you want to do next, in terms of thinking about
Rather than yourself as a job title, thinking about your… your strengths, your skills, your experience, and how that can be packaged up in different ways.
And I think that, in terms of a career change, which you might well need to do, is never going to be starting from scratch again.
And I think, you know, it’s… if you think about all the experience you’ve had in your life to date.
And… consider how you might reform them in different ways.
And start… this is where the act of exploration thing can help you.
Because, think, how could I use it in a slightly different area? And it might be a pivot in terms of… I’m using the type of skills that I have, but in a different sector, or dependent on, or it might be I’m staying in the same sector, but going into a slightly different role. Or it might be like me, that you are doing a more major change of both, sort of, sector and role, but you are still bringing a huge amount from your previous experience.
So, I think that’s just, just… play around with it a bit. You know, it’s just don’t think that it’s got to be all or nothing. And I think that’s what we so often do, we’re like. I can’t do what I did before, so I need to start all over again. And I think change that mindset. Think, how can I take what I did before and reshape it into an area where there are opportunities? Because we’re… we live in the real world here. You know, we’ve got to look where there are opportunities, where there are growth areas.
And put ourselves, you know, you can use your career break as a way to reorientate yourself into an area where there are more growth opportunities.
Seth Green: We’ve got a couple questions here about how to overcome what might be that interviewer bias set against returners. And so, let’s start with one from Henu. How do you answer what if a similar situation comes back in your life? So you say, okay, I took off because I have a child who went through something, I took off because I have a parent who went through something. And let’s assume that this person is still there in your life, and it’s possible to support them, and that interviewer is saying, you know, I understand this, but we want to hire someone from the long term, and we want to know that, you know, you’re going to be here for years. You know, what if a similar situation comes? How do you answer that question and that doubt, and how do you even think about, even if they’re not asking that question, how you might approach that, because it may be in the back of their minds, which could be more dangerous than if they’re actually asking you directly.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, yeah, and I think you do need to know that a lot… often these stereotypes are there, and these concerns, even if they’re not being voiced. And I think it’s important not to feed into them. And I think emphasize here your commitment, your readiness. but also the support that you have in place. You know, so address any of those doubts. clearly up front, you know, but… but not in a… not in a defensive way, yeah? Just in a… you know, this is… this is sorted now, yeah? These are the, you know, these are the… elements that I’ve put in place in my life to… and I’m really excited, and I’m committed to getting back to work. Now, it is important, and again, this is the real world, if you do need a particular degree of flexibility, or if you need to have a working model to make life work for you. then don’t ignore that, and make sure you are finding a role where that is going to be possible, because if not, that’s not going to be a great situation for yourself or for the employer. So I think that’s… there is, also a point where, if you’re getting lots of questions, and you’re thinking. It might make me question whether this is the right employer for you.
Seth Green: So, we have a series of questions here that relate to what is a career break versus, for example, if you are involved in a reduction in force, or some kind of cutbacks, and you may be out of work for 6 months, a year. Kind of, how do you think about what constitutes a career break, and how do you come up against those issues of a negative mark on you for having some kind of break that might be assumed, even, to be related to performance.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, and I think a career break could be for whatever reason. It could be for redundancy, and then, you know, things happen in your life. You know, the important thing is to get your story clear, and don’t… recognize that you are in charge of your own narrative, and I think you need to feel comfortable with the story that you are telling. It needs to be, you know, it needs to be based on reality, but you don’t need to tell absolutely everything about your story. And I think you need to work to create a narrative that you feel comfortable with. And we are in a world where there are so many redundancies. You know, this is not… this is not a black mark on you. You know, if your career break started because of redundancy, talk about talk about that, and then talk about what you’ve done during a career break. And again, it’s back to this bit about… thinking about what you can put forward about your career break, whatever the reason, which has grown you as a person. In terms of all those skills that employers need nowadays, we just talked about the world of work changing so fast. Adaptability, identity shift, you know, being able to cope with changes is a huge plus for an employer. And, you know, your resilience, the ability to embrace a new identity. is a really important skill. So I think, think about how how to talk about that. But also, you know, do do some practical skill building. And I think, you know, if you are… if you’ve had a career break because of redundancy, if you do have the time to be able to do it, you know, do some skill-based volunteering. You know, take some courses so you’ve got things to talk about as well, in terms of practical skills building during the break.
Seth Green: And there’s a question here, so I’ll ask it now, it’s a little lower down, about volunteering and how to present that, because someone was mentioning they did volunteer leadership, but that there was a great deal of skepticism or bias against that as an explanation of what was taking place over those years while they were on a break. Can you just talk about how you suggest presenting that? Is it almost on a different section of the resume, so it’s kind of direct about, here’s my paid work experience, here’s volunteer, and they can put that together. And then also how they are on the resume you might frame what you’re doing during your career break. If you’re COO of your household and raising your kids, or things like that, is that, you know, something that you put proactively, even in a work context where they may not recognize the many skills you’re developing, because there is real skill development? If you could just talk about how to think about all of those volunteer skills you’re developing, and then how to present them in this context.
Julianne Miles: Yeah, I would not say to put them in a separate section down the bottom, because they’re likely to get missed. So, what we recommend at Career Returnist is to have a career break section, and then put a few bullet points in that career break section, just as you would if it was a job. And if you’ve done… skill volunteering work during that period, then put that in there and talk about what you’ve actually… tangible achievements in your volunteer role. But also, say if you’ve relocated, if you’ve learnt new languages, if you’ve, advocated for your child with special needs, you know, whatever it is. That has, if you set up a small business from home whilst, you know, whilst being on your career break, don’t underestimate any of those skills and how you’ve developed them, but just put them simply and clearly on your resume, and then move on to your experience from before. Because again, you need to, you need the employers, when they’re looking at your resume. to not see a whole page about what’s happened in your career break, and actually not see what happened before that. And there’s another tip in there, because sometimes people do small-scale work. And they put a lot of, like, junior jobs and on their resume, and that is the focus of the recruiter, rather than seeing what they did before. So that undersells you, yeah? So I think you need to… you need to sort of put that in there, but treat it… it’s fantastic, and again, value your leadership work. And I know one employer said to me, should I… I’ve… I’ve had… volunteer leadership roles. And nothing is harder as a leader than actually motivating a team of people who aren’t being paid to do these tasks that I’m asking them to do. So yeah, you need to… if you frame it that way, then often you see the light bulb moment in the person you’re talking to. Because I think they’re like, oh yeah, that is hard. Yeah? So you need to be… you need to value it yourself, and then be able to put it forward in those interview conversations.
Seth Green: You mentioned earlier returnships as a model. Do you have examples, and how would you pitch or secure this type of opportunity?
Julianne Miles: Yeah. So, a returnship is a… it’s like a high-level paid professional internship that’s been developed specifically for people who’ve taken a long career break. And a number of big employers, a lot in financial services, people like Goldman’s, people like JP Morgan, some of the big tech companies. But also, some organizations in, public sector across the board run these programs now. So, you know, a simple online search for returnship should draw up a number of these programs.
What you’re doing in that stage… what’s fantastic about this opportunity is the career break is a requirement for the program. So you are competing against other people who have also had career breaks, rather than people in the open market, which is fantastic. And ideally, you know, in most cases, you will get some form of support through the transition, and a high likelihood of a permanent role at the end of it. It’s not guaranteed with a returnship. They tend to be somewhere between, like, three to nine months. And with well-structured ones, there is a high likelihood of, you know, we get really high conversion rates. But in terms of. how could you pitch that yourself? I think the concept of it is… what employers like about a returnship? And it’s back to this, you know, this concern that they have about you. You’re a bit of a risky candidate. They think you’re great, your CV’s wonderful, but they’re not… they’re like, okay, you’ve been out of work for a long period of time, where are you going to fit? Is it… how’s it going to work?
So they get… it’s… it’s a try before you buy, yeah?
Seth Green: Right, yeah.
Julianne Miles: If you look for opportunities out there in the marketplace which give you that… give you that similar opportunity, if you’re looking for, maternity covers, if you’re looking for, fixed-term contracts. Then, from an employer’s perspective, they get that similar sort of testing opportunity, and it gets you a toe back in the water. So I think that’s a better way to do it, rather than try and pitch the concept of a returnship. Look for the returnships that are out there. But also, then, if it’s with an employer, and again, you know, fantastic way to do this is go back to your, you know, your old employers, your contacts, see if they’ve got any project work. Just sort of put yourself out… put yourself out there as, I’m really interested, I want to get back into this. If you’ve got any projects I can work on, I’d be really interested to do that. And sometimes even the concept of work experience, as long as it’s not for too long, it’s just to get your toe back in the door.
Seth Green: Well, Jillian, this has been a phenomenal conversation. We are so grateful for your joining us virtually, and we really admire the work that you’ve been doing to build this really important way back into work. It’s something that helps our labor market, ultimately, activate all of the talent in our economy, and on an individual level, it’s obviously transformative for people to be able to regain their professional identities and purpose, and to be able to put into action all the things that they want to do with their immense talents. So, as a school devoted to lifelong learning, we could not be more grateful for the chance to speak with you, and as you saw in the chat, there is immense gratitude from the people in this conversation, and many of them actually figuring out, trying to order your book from abroad, because it would be so valuable. Thank you again for your time, and we look forward to continuing the conversation, and thank you all for joining us, and for the really thoughtful questions that you raised for Julianne throughout this conversation. Hope everyone has a great rest of your day, and in your case, Julianne, I hope you have a great night in London.
Julianne Miles: Thank you so much, sir.
