EP50: You Don’t Need a New Job! How to Choose Purposeful Career Change Instead
Most people think the answer to corporate stress or burnout is to get a new job. But here’s the truth: without rethinking your relationship to work itself, you’ll end up in the same cycle of dissatisfaction, stress, and burnout — just in a slightly shinier package.
In this episode of From Corporate to Calling, I share why career change means so much more than job-hopping. I’ll walk you through three powerful ways my clients have approached purposeful career change — balancing meaningful work with family life; immersing in a passion field like regenerative agriculture; and building a bold entrepreneurial vision from the ground up.
What you’ll hear in this episode:
Why jumping to a “better” job often leaves you with the same problems
The difference between incremental change and true career change with purpose
Real client stories of leaving corporate systems to find meaningful work and build regenerative careers
Three pathways to find your purpose and create life-giving work outside of burnout culture
If your current role looks great on paper but feels wrong in your bones, this episode will help you see why the answer isn’t just a new job — it’s a purposeful career change.
Remember: it takes courage to quit. Hold onto that courage, and use it to step into a path that brings you back to life.
Listen here
Full Transcript
Alisa:
So, I’m on one of my trips to London where I’ve been going now and then to step into the corporate world. I’m in this big-brand co-working space on the 10th floor. Surrounded by glass and steel, there are banks and banks of desks. I’d chosen a corner, and diagonally opposite me was a very nice, very stressed guy who was on back-to-back video calls the whole time. He’d finish a call, run into a meeting room, run back out. It was non-stop.
There was a lot of dehumanised language in the way that he spoke. At one point, I heard him drop the phrase “mass termination capabilities,” which seemed like normal parlance in his world. He was working on some kind of AI-powered HR software.
Now, I’m sure when he talked about “mass termination capabilities” they meant something technical — like batch removing access or benefits. But still, it didn’t feel good. It didn’t feel human.
There was something about this guy I couldn’t take my eyes away from. We had a little chat when he borrowed my phone charger — he seemed like a really nice person. But he was clearly caught up in this extremely fast-paced, stressful, and dehumanised mode of working.
Then something ironic happened. Later in the day, he took a personal call with the HR department of his old organisation about some kind of dispute — over shares or a bonus payout. It struck me as painfully ironic that he’d left an organisation in conflict with HR, only to move into a new role where he was now building software that treated people as numbers.
This is the thing. If you find yourself in that position — stressed, burnt out, dehumanised by your work, disconnected from the purpose of what you’re creating — the answer is not to polish up your CV and jump into a new job. Because it’s never enough.
If you don’t take the time to redesign your relationship with work, to divest from the extractive systems behind it, you’ll just carry the same dysfunction into your new role.
Now, if you’re listening to this and you are at the point where you are ready to quit, I want you to pause. That might sound contradictory because my whole thing is helping people quit corporate, right? And yes, that is what I want for you. But there are two parts to my work:
Quit corporate.
Create a life-giving career or business.
So yes, I want you to quit. But I want you to do it with purpose. And that is what I’m going to explore in today’s episode.
Here’s what usually happens. You reach breaking point: I can’t do this anymore. I can’t survive another bonus cycle. I’m waiting on a promotion I don’t even want. Something has to change.
So you head to the job boards. You finally pick up the phone to that search firm that’s been pestering you. You start asking around. You look for a job that feels better than the one you’ve got right now.
But here’s the problem: that approach is incremental at best, risky at worst. Most of the time, you’re solving for one thing. Maybe that’s flexibility for family commitments. Maybe a culture that feels more human. Maybe a mission you can get behind.
Those are all good things. They matter. But nine times out of ten, they keep you locked in the same corporate system.
You take the gamble, you put in the work, you find the courage to quit… and you end up with a slightly better version of the same stress and dissatisfaction. That’s why people wonder: Why do I keep burning out, again and again? Because you’re stuck in the same system.
So let’s talk about career change with purpose. I want you to bottle that courage you’ve found to quit, and hold onto it. Because we’re going to put it to better use.
This is what I mean by career change with purpose.
Career change that takes you out of extractive corporate systems altogether. Career change that opens up a whole new kind of work — connected, communal, human. Career change that lets you experience purpose every day, where you can see and feel the tangible contribution you’re making.
Isn’t that what you really want? Not just another rung on the ladder to nowhere.
That kind of career change is possible. It takes courage, and it takes a different starting point.
So let’s talk about three pathways into purposeful career change. Instead of starting with salary, title, or what looks good on your CV, here are three places you can start.
Number one: start with how you want work to feel.
Really imagine it, and let that feeling guide your choices. It might lead you into a role that delivers that feeling — or it might tell you that you need to create your own work.
That was how my client Clare approached things. She’d come out of the big London agency world, working on corporate sustainability for global brands. Her whole experience of work was extreme hours, wraparound childcare, deadlines on Christmas Eve.
When she was ready to return to work after having children, she knew it had to be different. We built an approach around putting her family first, finding balanced work that brought her satisfaction, using her skills for genuine purpose — and leaving space for the things she wanted most, like picking her kids up from school, making costumes, packing lunches. These things mattered as much as her work.
Number two: start with a passion issue.
Choose something you care deeply about and go all in. Learn everything you can, meet people in that field, immerse yourself. Opportunities will emerge. Often that’s through freelance work or by building an ecosystem career — balancing higher-paid work with volunteer or lower-paid roles — that allows you to fully commit to what matters.
My client Aline did exactly this when she left her role in big tech in the U.S. She’d wanted to move into regenerative agriculture for a long time but had no hands-on experience. That had been holding her back.
So she began volunteering, building her network, immersing herself in the local regenerative agriculture scene until the opportunities started coming to her. Today she offers fractional chief of staff services to grassroots organisations, who benefit enormously from her big-tech experience.
Number three: start with a vision.
Decide what kind of world you want to help build, and bring it to life. This is the entrepreneurial path. It’s bold, but it’s also the way to create work that means something to you — and, eventually, to create meaningful opportunities for others too.
I’ve just started working with a client, Anna, who is taking this route. She’s long dreamed of creating a regenerative hub in Catalonia that combines food, family, and ecological learning. She’s finally set aside the pressure to build on her already successful career, ignored tempting job offers, and is bringing her vision to life.
So here’s the takeaway.
If you’ve got a job that looks great on paper but feels wrong in your bones — yes, it’s time to quit. But don’t just quit and leap into a slightly shinier version of the same thing. Even if it looks like a much better job, pause. Pay attention.
Ask yourself:
What system is that role operating in?
What is the real purpose of the organisation?
What vision would you be supporting?
How would that work feel in your body every day?
If those things don’t align, you’re being called to quit with purpose. Because when you do, you’ll never find yourself back in this position again.
If a purpose-led, life-giving career change is what you need, you’re in the right place. This podcast is your weekly lifeline into meaningful work. Make sure you’re following so you don’t miss an episode.
If you want to go deeper, subscribe to my emails — I share things there I don’t share anywhere else. And if you’re ready to take your first step into purposeful career change right now, take a look at Courage to Quit. It’s my 90-minute session that takes you from trapped and anxious to clear, grounded, and free, with a personalised exit plan you can act on with confidence.
