Plotting your career requires more than reacting. Here’s how to think strategically.

Often I am helping women get back to work who felt forced to leave their careers when they started a family.  The outrageous cost of childcare is one of the main factor’s women cite for deciding to leave their full-time jobs. Take care, I say. Making what appears to be financially smart short-term moves can prove damaging in the long run. Instead, imagine that your future – both personal and professional – is one very important game of chess… 

1. Think about the end-game

A chess master doesn’t resign from the game simply because she is in a tricky situation.

She thinks strategically, planning 3 or 4 moves ahead. She has an eye on the end game.

Your decision to give up a full-time job might make sense today, but will that decision enable you to play the role you want, living a life you love, in the long term?

Will your new midlife passion sustain you creatively, professionally and financially in the 100-year life?

2. Adapt your tactics as the game progresses

Like chess, your career is a long game. The first phase is busy. Along with your peers, you dig in and work long hours, establish yourself, build your network. As the game progresses, things change.

You may have to take time off to care for a parent. Children may come along who need and deserve attention. You might have your own health issues you need to focus on.

It’s during this middle phase that a grand chess master stands out from the crowd because of her ability to devise cunning strategies; to take risks. 

Be creative about defining your role and contribution, be prepared to be measured on output and not hours worked. Stay in the game. Play to win. 

3. Be prepared to sacrifice some pieces

As the grand master of your own life, it is inevitable that you will need to make sacrifices.

That might mean taking a different role.

Perhaps you might have to start on your new path by working part-time.

Your pivot or new work-life scenario could entail a sacrifice – passing up a promotion maybe or letting go of a dream on where you want to live.

Seek out a mentor or a sponsor who will look out for you in the future. Position yourself to make your next big move a winning one by maintaining and growing your networks. Be prepared to lose some battles if you want to win the war. 

4. For parents: Having young children is a temporary condition

As one working mother put it: “Seeing my daughter start senior school made me really think about what I was going to do with the next 20 years of my working life, something I had given zero thought to when she was 6 and I resigned from a great job.”

Your children will not be young forever. That’s why you need a long-term plan.

However, if you suddenly find yourself as an empty nester or more time as family demands ease, you can still put together an ambitious and exciting plan. You now have a moment to breathe. Think realistically about what your children will need in the coming years (support during university? help with an apprenticeship? a place to stay after they finish education as they start their grown-up life?). Then think about what you want.

Only then can you start to figure out how these two things work together.

5. Remember, the queen is not the only piece on the board

Yes, she’s important. Powerful. A great multi-tasker. But there may be a king as well. Rooks, knights, even pawns. On the same side of the board as you. Wearing the same colours.

There are people out there who can help you. Don’t be afraid to ask and make the most of your network.

6. Be a player

If you cannot work 5 days a week, make up for it with quality and delivery. Have the confidence that comes from knowing your value as a professional and from continuing to develop that value.

Many women see their career as a series of reactive moves, responding to circumstances as best they can. But if you think like a chess master, that begins to change.

Look for opportunities within your organisation. Suggest ways to improve the business. Make your ideas known to your bosses. Walk in and own your role, your responsibilities and your results.

7. Think beyond mere ‘work-life balance‘

It’s the game of creating your life, one move at a time, designed to set up all the people and organisations – your partner, children, clients, employers, and network – to give you the opportunities, support, and guidance that you need to succeed each step of the way. 

It’s not a simple equation, or a seesaw, with more weight on work, then more weight on life. Think of it more as a matrix, with lots of elements that shift over time, according to what is needed.