Five big mistakes to avoid when changing careers - Management Excellence by Art Petty

Most career transitions fail not from lack of skill but from predictable traps. The biggest one isn't what you'd expect: it's doing everything you've always wanted to do without building a sustainable business model. That's what caught the author after a company sale - writing a book, consulting, teaching MBA classes, blogging, keynoting. Great activities, zero income model. When it came time to make money, there was no there there.

The passion trap is subtler but just as deadly. Passion and purpose are not the same thing. You might be passionate about backyard grilling, but that doesn't mean opening a BBQ joint fits your purpose at this career stage. Purpose is about what you're here to accomplish - helping motivated professionals achieve things they never thought possible, for instance. Passion is just what you enjoy doing on weekends. The article advocates for the Chicago hot dog stand test: take vacation time and actually work at one 40 miles from home before you invest. Reality converges with fantasy fast.

The other killer is trying to solve for forever. That pressure paralyzes action. You don't need your next career move to be your last one. Think in terms of next steps, not final destinations. Most people hop, skip, and jump their way to their ideal situation. Very few nail it in one move. The goal is clarity and minimized risk, not perfect certainty about the next 20 years.

What makes this practical is the focus on what actually goes wrong with career transitions among experienced professionals - people with accumulated wisdom who want out of corporate life for good reasons (stress, bad bosses, income caps, lack of freedom). These aren't job changes, they're career remixes. The distinction matters because the failure modes are different.