My favourite career podcasts for women
My current top recommendations for helping you stay motivated and feel supported no matter where you are on your career journey.
Back in May I shared with you some of my favourite wellbeing podcasts which turned out to be one of the most popular posts I’d ever written (you can read it here).
So I thought it was high time to follow up with my top picks for careers podcasts too, particularly ones which address the issues that women currently face in the workplace.
When you’re experiencing a career struggle or are starting a career change journey, it can be a lonely experience if you don’t know anyone else going through it. And that’s where these career podcasts can come into their own, not only offering excellent tips and advice, but also connecting you with others who have been through something similar. I really hope they help you. Let me know what you think in the comments and if you have any recommendations of your own…
This podcast is hugely popular (over 3 million listeners) and with good reason. Hosted by Sarah Ellis and Helen Tupper who run their own careers consultancy called Amazing If, there’s not much these two don’t know about the world of work. Each episode is highly practical and covers all sorts of topics to help your career development from staying confident, to portfolio careers, to how to improve your work relationships. I’ve recommended it to countless clients and friends, and they often come back telling they’ve been binge listening all the past episodes!
This show is all about championing gender equality and discussing what that really looks like in the modern workplace. Host Joy Burnford is a strong believer in not fixing women but fixing the system which allows for gender imbalance to creep in. Her guests are inspiring and relatable real women who share how they’ve achieved success at work whilst balancing ambition and motherhood. The recent episodes on job sharing and wellbeing at work were really eye opening for me, as well as the episodes covering the impact of women’s life stages on their careers, from managing periods, to fertility (and infertility), pregnancy (and pregnancy loss), maternity leave to menopause and everything else in between.
The DIFTK podcast is for self-employed parents who are trying to juggle freelance work around their kids. The two hosts Frankie and Steve are hilarious and relatable, discussing all sorts of topics that are universal to self-employed parents such as what to do when you need to take a client call with your kids around, to planning maternity leave as a freelancer or how to juggle your workload during the summer holidays. There’s a great online community you can join too and even real world meet ups where you can get off Zoom and meet other freelance parents face to face.
If you have a dream of writing a book one day, this one is for you. Earlier this year I decided to stop putting off a long held ambition of mine and start working on a proposal for a careers book idea. It’s been an exciting and scary process and I still have no idea if it will ever see the light of day, but I knew at the start that I needed some advice and to hear the experiences of other writers to help me along the journey. The host of this podcast Penny Wincer is a published author, book coach and busy working mum, and she interviews other writers about the challenges of writing, publishing and creativity whilst juggling the demands of motherhood, caring and other paid work.
Careering Into Motherhood was set up by Jane Johnson to empower women and help them negotiate with employers to offer flexible working so they can stay in their careers. Jane negotiated her own senior role as a job-share, and in 2019 she set up the Careering Into Motherhood Facebook Group to promote discussion around flexible working. The free group now has more than 10,000 members and a successful women’s mentoring programme. I’ve also hosted an episode on why summer is a great time for a career change, and been interviewed in this episode about how to set achievable goals.
Got any recommendations of your own? Please share them in the comments.
Are you feeling the mid-career itch?
According to research, 31 is the average age that workers look to change careers.
A survey of over 5000 workers found that employees around this age are much more likely to consider a change of role or even industry. This is because they've been in work for over a decade by this point.
The top reasons cited were better earnings (33%), wanting a role they're more passionate about (31%) and better work/life balance (19%).
In my coaching practice, I speak to clients all the time who are feeling motivated to change careers because of a landmark birthday or significant life event. Their 30th, 40th or 50th birthday may be approaching or has passed, or they are thinking of starting a family, or they are on maternity leave and planning a return to work.
Some have taken a much longer break out of their careers to care for their kids or older parents, and now want to finally reclaim their professional selves. But so much time has passed since they were last in work that they need some help figuring out who they are now, what they want from their careers and how to re-enter the workforce.
Going forward, I want to really focus on the thrills and challenges of making a midlife career change. After all, I went through one myself and have never looked back, but I do remember how scary it was when I first starting thinking about it.
I'm going to be sharing lots more written posts on this topic via my newsletter, as well useful links, book and podcast recommendations, and Q&A's with clients who have made a midlife career change themselves, to give you inspiration and encouragement that you can do it to!
Am really looking forward to getting stuck into, sharing lots more conversation with you and helping you navigate this tricky but exciting change.
If you haven't already, just sign up to my newsletter here.
What's it like to have online coaching with me?
Sometimes I get asked why I don't do in-person coaching, so I thought I would run through some of the benefits of online coaching compared to face to face.
I work 100% online with clients and always have done since I started coaching 7 years ago. In fact, my clients are based all over the UK, and they LOVE the fact that we can connect no matter where they live and from the comfort of their own homes or offices. I do get asked from time to time if I offer in-person coaching as well, but online has always worked brilliantly for my clients and here’s a few reasons why I’m deciding to stick with it:
1. Convenience
You don’t have to spend time travelling to a hired room somewhere miles from your home or office.
You can dial in for a session from wherever you are, whether that’s from your bedroom or kitchen, a meeting room in your office at lunchtime, or even when you’re travelling abroad.
2. Flexibility
By working with a coach online, you have much greater choice over who is the best fit for you and who you click with. You’re not limited by the availability of local coaches in your immediate area.
I know you are a busy woman juggling lots of different things in your life. I like to make arranging a video call as flexible and convenient as possible, so I use a simple online booking calendar which allows you to see my availability, choose a day/time which suits you, sends you an appointment reminder with the video call link and also allows you to easily re-arrange if necessary (with 24hrs notice).
3. Familiarity
Many of us are used to talking to friends, family or colleagues online, and so working with a coach online isn’t any different in terms of the technology. Currently I use Google Meet for my coaching sessions.
As your Coach, I have extensive training in how to use active listening skills to deeply and empathetically understand the issues you’re dealing with, even when we’re on a video call. In fact many clients tell me that they find it easier to open up when we work online, because they are in their own environment with maximum comfort and privacy.
4. Cost
I don’t have to pass on expensive room hire fees or my travel costs to the cost of my coaching sessions, which saves you money!
Sound interesting?
Just click here to learn more about my coaching programme or book a free 15min career breakthrough call.
You can also watch a little video here that I did on Insta of me chatting on a coaching call and also read some feedback from happy clients 😊
