Are you feeling stuck in your career? Are you yearning for a change but don't know how to make it happen? 

Join us as we discuss the outdated concept of career ladders and explore the exciting world of zig-zagging your way to success. Our guest, Garvey Seaton, is a career architect with a wealth of experience helping people pivot to fulfilling careers. He'll share his insights on how you ca build a career that aligns with your passions and values, even if it doesn't follow a linear trajectory.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why the traditional career ladder model is becoming increasingly outdated.
• Strategies for building a career that aligns with your values and goals
• Practical tips for landing a job in the booming privacy industry

Whether you're just starting out or looking to make a change, this episode will empower you to break free from traditional career norms and chart your own unique success story.

Garvey Seaton is a Career Architect & Corporate Trainer. 

He helps professionals build the career they want and employers retain the talent they want. Through his free weekly newsletter “The Lonely Pivot”, Garvey gives career builders actionable ideas to help them build fulfilling careers.

If you're ready to transform your career and become the go-to GDPR expert, get your copy of 'The Easy Peasy Guide to GDPR' here: https://www.bestgdprbook.com/

Follow Jamal on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kmjahmed/

Follow Garvey on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garvey-seaton/

Ready to become a World Class Privacy Expert? Book your call to join the World's Leading Privacy Program

Subscribe to the Privacy Pros Academy YouTube Channel

► https://www.youtube.com/c/PrivacyPros

Join the Privacy Pros Academy Private Facebook Group for:

• Free LIVE Training
• Free Easy Peasy Data Privacy Guides
• Data Protection Updates and so much more

Apply to join here whilst it's still free: https://www.facebook.com/groups/privacypro

The career ladder is a really old school idea and it's very much focused on a linear path. your path to success isn't just a straight line. So it's not really a ladder that you're looking to climb. It should be looking to make zigs and zags to build a career that really makes sense to you

Are you ready to know what you don't know about Privacy Pros? Then you're in the right place. Welcome to the Privacy Pros Academy podcast by Kazient Privacy Experts. The podcast to launch, progress and excel your career as a Privacy Pro. Hear about the latest news and developments. Discover fascinating insights from leading global privacy professionals.

And hear real stories and top tips from the people who've been where you want to get to. We've trained people in over 137 countries and counting. So whether you're thinking about starting a career in data privacy. Or you're an experienced professional. This is the podcast for you.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Privacy Pros podcast. I'm your host Jamal Ahmed, founder and lead mentor of the Privacy Pros and the number one international bestselling author of the easy peasy guide to the GDPR. I get loads of questions on LinkedIn almost every single day from lawyers, from people in technology, people in cyber security, people in project management who are thinking about pivoting their career towards privacy, but they're a bit hesitant. They don't want to start again. They're not really sure if they can make it, but they're attracted by the challenge. They're attracted by doing a fulfilled role. They're attracted by all of the benefits and the respect and status and the salary and the reward that comes with privacy But they're just that little bit hesitant. So I thought I want to create a podcast that's going to actually help you if you're in that position to decide How to pivot whether you should even pivot and if you do pivot how to make sure that you go on to be a thriving success . My guest today to help you navigate your pivoting journey is none other than Garvey Seaton. He is a career architect and a corporate trainer, and he helps professionals build a career that they want. Through his free weekly newsletter, The Lonely Pivot, Garvey gives career builders actionable ideas to help them build fulfilling careers. Garvey, welcome to the show.

Appreciate you having me Jamal.

Garvey, you have a fascinating post on your free newsletter, The Lonely Pivot. And the one I particularly enjoyed was why climbing the career ladder is outdated.

Can you tell me more about that?

Yeah, I guess the notion is the career ladder is a really old school idea and it's very much focused on a linear path. When you join an organization, you stay in that organization indefinitely until you die or until you retire. And that's your path. But in this day and age, in 2023, moving into 2024, that's not the case anymore.

We live in a really interconnected world. There are so many opportunities. There are jobs that are being created pretty much every single day. And so the idea that you need to stay in an organization and have a linear path is really archaic. A lot of people are sticking by a decision they made when they were 21. If you decided to join a bank or a law firm or wherever it may be at 21, that may no longer serve you. And I think it's just getting out of the mindset that what you did then and the decision you made then is what you need to continue doing now. It's about being brave in your decisions as well. So again, understanding that you can have success in your career not just in one straight line, but by taking a left and taking a right and going up diagonally, your path to success isn't just a straight line. So it's not really a ladder that you're looking to climb. It should be looking to make zigs and zags to build a career that really makes sense to you as opposed to just that straight line.

So that's the overall arching idea of why it's quite outdated. The other thing I would say as well is, if you think back to the Industrial Revolution, most of us go through school, and we're taught to understand certain subjects, we're good at a certain thing, and then present yourself to the world of, I can do A, B, C. I referenced the industrial revolution, because that was a time where certainly in the UK and in the West, you're taught to be like a component in a machine. So these are the skills that I built up in school or in uni or whatever it may be. And now I want to be a component in this big machine.

In this day and age, people that are successful, don't think in that kind of way, they understand I've got a skillset and they also thinking, okay, how can I add to this? Or I touched on strengths earlier. That's really important to understand. Okay. I was really good at this thing when I was 15. Maybe there's something in that.

And can I now build and develop a new skill set in a new area to help with this new career that I want to attempt to get into? So again, it's more like getting out of the mindset of there's one path for you. It's more so understanding, okay, who am I? What do I want in this new phase of life? And then how can I acquire those skills and develop the strengths I need to get that career. So it's just changing your mindset around it.

Awesome. And one of the things I want to say is obviously you work with a lot of people and you've helped them. And before people come to you, maybe they've tried some things for themselves and it hasn't worked out. In your experience, what are some of the most common mistakes people are making when they're trying to pivot their career?

One of the questions I always ask them is what have you tried so far? So like I say, make that transition over two, three years. And changing your career shouldn't take that long. And I reference that because there's no plan behind it. It's more, I'm going to move. And this is maybe talking on personal experience.

You watch videos online, on YouTube. You might watch YouTube videos like this. So two people talking about how you can make a move. But you don't actually have any skin in the game. You don't actually take action. I think that's probably one of the biggest things. When you pay attention and this is a line that's always stayed with me and it goes to the people paying for programs or paying for help or paying for a coach when you pay money, you pay attention.

And I think a lot of people feel that they can make these big transitions in life by having no skin in the game. And often they don't because they don't value it. So that's probably been one of the biggest shifts I've seen for people that actually take action and actually have the success they want is they have skin in the game and it means something to them usually because they paid or they're dedicating their time to it and that for me is by far the one of the biggest things.

100 percent because when people pay to come to the program and we set up a framework of 12 to 16 weeks is what it should take to successfully pivot. When people pay, they actually pay attention. And there'll be people on LinkedIn who I've been talking to for years and they're always coming and catching up. And we're talking about the same thing. They're in the same place. They're doing the same things. One of the biggest challenges I see with people who are looking to pivot is they think that they can figure everything out by themselves. They think they can self study. They can just go and read a book and learn how to pass an exam.

And someone's going to come and knock on the door and offer them a job. And it doesn't happen. The challenge with that is your best level of thinking has got you to where you are. And if you're looking to move to a different industry. How do you expect to be able to swim in the swimming pool and win the race? If all you've done is read a manual, you have to actually get into the pool. You've got to try it out and you've got to have an instructor, an expert to actually help you to say, Hey, this is what you need to do. This is where you're going wrong. Do this. Don't do that. Otherwise you're going to end up drowning.

It's a little bit like saying you're going to go and enter a karate competition and you've read all of the manuals by yourself and you've watched all the YouTube videos, unless you're going to actually do the training, it's never going to happen, is it? You're going to get knocked out.

The learning curve is significantly different when you actually get real world feedback, you actually try something. Like you said, people reading and consuming is very different to them saying I've learned this. Now how can I execute? I think that mindset shift is really important. Execution is where you actually make progress. Not just the learning side of things, too much theory but not enough action I’d say.

100% and so Garvey I want to run the five pillars of our Accelerator program which is designed for people who are looking to either enhance the career and get to the next stage Or actually make that pivot from the legal background or other background and I think we covered a lot of things you said, but if there's anything missing I'd love your feedback on that and if you think it's great then also tell us why. So we have five pillars on the Privacy Pros accelerator program. I always say the first pillar is all about mindset. Like we have to start with the foundations. We need to Have a growth mindset. We need to have an abundance mindset and we need to foster the habits of excellence. So I always say we have to start off with the right mindset Once we've got the right mindset, we know anything's possible. We know we can acquire the skills We know there's only feedback, no failure.

Then I say the next pillar is subject matter expertise. This is understanding the law, the nuances, the different recommendations, the guidelines, bringing all of that in. So you become a true subject matter expert. So now you have the right mindset. We've built the foundation, the subject matter stuff, but the next step is you can't just talk the talk.

You need to walk the walk. So this is where the practical side of it comes in. And this is where we focus on actually taking that theory and applying it in things like data protection, impact assessments, privacy notices, responding to subject requests, data mapping, records of processing activities, all of the fun stuff.

So now they can actually say they're competent in doing what they're doing. And not only are they competent, they can actually do it at a world class standard. The next thing we need to couple onto that is the personal branding. So we've got three steps. We've got the mindset, we've got the subject matter expertise.

We've got the practical know how and now we say, okay, you have to get visible. You have to give employees and recruiting managers and headhunters a reason why you stand out over the competition, even though some of that competition might have more experience than you, you need to show why you're so valuable and why you are their best option and why they can't afford not to have you.

So we focus on the personal branding and oftentimes what we'll do is help them to get visible on LinkedIn. We'll optimize their LinkedIn profile. We'll help them with their resume as well to make sure that it's got all of the keywords. They highlight their strengths and they highlight the skills that are transferable that they're bringing into this role.

So none of that goes away. And finally, we embed them in a powerful community. And when you mentioned peers and sponsors, we have all of those people who plays multiple roles in that community of people who are actually at the top of the game, other people who have been on this podcast, we have a community of those people and a community of their peers as well.

What do you think of that five pillar framework? It's been working great, but are there any gaps or if there is something that you particularly liked about that, tell us more about that. So we can do more of it.

I don't see any gaps really. I think you've plugged it all. Like you said, you start with the main thing, which is your mind. We've covered that quite a few times. You've built up the information, the theory that you need, then you're like, Hey, how can I execute on theory? Personal brand is something that I think is really important. Again, for my journey, my big thing, obviously, that I help people is how can you change industry?

And then obviously the last part around community. I think that's tied to the first one of mindset. People feel lonely when you're going through a transition. My newsletter, The Lonely Pivot, obviously you've referenced that at the start. It's called The Lonely Pivot because it is a lonely process when you're trying to change career and your spouse doesn't really understand that and some of your friends don't understand that. And so I think the community piece is really important. If you've got a thriving community of people that have gone through what you're going through. Invaluable. And it also allows you to then communicate how you're feeling, how you're thinking and ideas that are coming up.

I think those things are really foundational. So I don't see any gaps in it, but I think the biggest parts of what you mentioned are the last two community piece and the personal branding. Just for making sure it's topical today, that those things I think are really important.

Cool.

So Garvey, earlier you mentioned you do career coaching for people who are looking to pivot. Tell us more about your coaching, who it's for and how people can get to know more about that.

Yeah. So I do two things. The first one is one on one coaching, but slightly less of that nowadays but that's really for anyone where they want to change industry, I'd say.

So they're in an industry where they've become slightly disillusioned by it. They've outgrown it potentially. And I think similar to me, they feel like they've got a lot more to offer and in other areas, they want to exercise that. So my coaching helps them go through the phases you need to one, understand who you are, a lot of introspection. Secondly, The strengths, the skills that you have, how can that then be applied to a new industry? How do you build authority in that industry? And then obviously, how do you then execute in terms of more so starting a business? So I'm actually starting a program in January. So I've got a waiting list at the moment.

I think you can put in the show notes the link it's called launch 30. And the idea behind it would be for anyone who's in an industry where, they feel slightly disillusioned, but they want to start their own business, which is a big challenge for a lot of people working in corporates, we'll run you through a framework, a four week period, so it's very quickly 30 days from idea to validating the idea and then executing on launching the business.

So a lot of programs tend to be quite long. This is 30 days because it can be done in that time. So again, the steps would be, you've got an idea. Is it fit for purpose? Who's your client avatar? Who's the ideal customer? Who's the mark? What's the market you're going after? We build an MVP for you. So that's your minimal viable products where you can get real world feedback and create a content machine, a content engine for you, leveraging AI and automation.

if any of your guests know much about that, and then the last thing is we actually create and launch the business for you. So I think one of the biggest hurdles for people when they want to start a business is that they're time poor and there's just a lot of theory being thrown at them. So this is slightly different.

We've got quite a few people on the waiting list, which is really good. Up until then i'm going to be running webinars which we delve into some of the steps that you need So for some of those that they're capable of doing this by themselves join one of the free webinars.

I post about on LinkedIn all the time Garvey Seaton. Yeah, that's what we're doing in the new year.

Wow, that sounds awesome. And there'll be some people who are listening to this podcast who not looking to pivot from a different industry But they're actually looking to pivot from becoming an employee and selling time for money to actually being a consultant Having some of that freedom, being able to work from anywhere.

And so if you're someone who's thinking about becoming consultant, setting up your own thing and doing your own thing, I know many of you message me on LinkedIn about every single day, I would recommend that you go and look at Garvey's waiting list, have a look at the information, go and watch some of his webinars, and if any of that resonates with you, just drop him a message on LinkedIn, have a conversation.

And see if he can help you to really make those next steps, make them bold and make them great. So fear of failure, isn't something that you think about instead all you're thinking about is how do I execute this awesome plan that's been validated with all of the content and all of the efficiencies that's already been done by someone that's already been there, done it for himself and done it for others now, he's got a coaching program to help more people do it. So we'll link all of those into the links Make sure you click on those links below and make sure you follow Garvey on LinkedIn.

Garvey it's been an absolutely amazing podcast. We covered so much value in the time that we've spent together we learned all about some of the challenges of why actually People actually want to pivot.

Thank you so much for coming to the Privacy Pros.

Appreciate it Jamal, thank you for having me.

And to you listening, if any of this resonated with you, or if there's another topic that you want to hear more about, then get in touch, let me know, reach out on our emails, reach out on LinkedIn, find a way of getting through to me and let me know what.

What more we can do to help you to really make that successful pivot to privacy. And if you're already in privacy, but you're stuck in a role, you're stuck in a meaningless role, you've been offered promotions, you're not getting those things. Get in touch with me and we will see what we can do to help you too.

And Garvey is also here to help you with the coaching. And from everything I've known and everything we've heard about him, we definitely know he can help you too.

Until next time, peace be with you.

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, like and share so you're notified when a new episode is released. Remember to join the Privacy Pros Academy Facebook group where we answer your questions. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you're leaving with some great things that will add value on your journey as a world class Privacy Pro.

Please leave us a comment a four- or five-star review. And if you'd like to appear on a future episode of our podcast, or have a suggestion for a topic you'd like to hear more about, please send an email to team@kazient.co.uk. Until next time, peace be with you.