183: Dialing into Your Network to Land Your Next Career with Tanya Malcom Revell

Listen

Whoever said that hard work and perseverance doesn’t pay off sure didn’t meet Tanya.

What Tanya Malcolm Revell did when she was looking to make her big career change was no easy feat.

Besides being an American looking for work that fit her in London, U.K., Tanya is also a Career Change Bootcamp alum and our guest for this installment of our most recent CCB success story.After experiencing the overwhelm of career burnout from her previous positions and frustration with the job search overseas, Tanya found HTYC, enrolled in CCB, put in the hard work, built strategic relationships, and persevered even after hitting a few bumps in the road to land her ideal job. Learn her tips for growing your personal network.

I WILL NEVER GO OUT FOR A JOB JUST BECAUSE IT HAS PRESENTED ITSELF ON SOME RANDOM LINKEDIN JOB BLAST THAT SOUNDS GOOD. I’LL FOCUS ON COMPANIES THAT I KNOW THAT I WILL BE APPRECIATED IN, THAT I KNOW I WILL BE ABLE TO GROW IN, I KNOW THAT I WILL BE ABLE TO WORK IN SOME SORT OF COLLABORATIVE ENVIRONMENT.

TANYA MALCOM REVELL
CURIOUS HOW SHE DID IT?

You’re in luck!

Here’s a case study on how Tanya leveraged her previous work and life experience, overcame her obstacles, and established brand-new relationships with the key players that would lead her to land her new career.

TANYA’S IDEAL CAREER GOALS

Tanya’s top priority was to find a job that aligned with who she was and offered her exactly what she was looking for.

At the top of Tanya’s career needs were sharing a belief system with an organization that valued the things she valued, such as:

  1. A collaborative environment
  2. Growth within the company
  3. Recognition for a job well done

Whether it is lacking the confidence in our own knowledge and skills, or debating which path to take to get where you want to go, we all have our career change roadblocks.

For Tanya, she knew what she was capable of and where she wanted to take her skills and experience.

The things that were slowing her down were:

  •  The fact that she had just moved to a new country
  •  Her hesitation to reach out and establish a connection with people outside of her own network

Like most of our stumbling blocks (outside of getting the correct work visa), it was all in her head, and she knew it.

How did she break free from this mental roadblock?

She changed her perspective.

In her previous work experience, she had to reach out to people to get her job done.

She brought on that new mindset of “this task must be completed in order to get the job done,” to continue her process to reach her dream career.

“OKAY, LOOK. IF YOU WANT SOMETHING THIS DESPERATELY, OR THIS BADLY, THEN WHY WOULDN’T YOU WORK OUTSIDE OF YOUR NORMAL OPERATING LEVELS OR YOUR NORMAL CONVENTIONS? WHAT’S THE WORST THAT THEY CAN SAY?”

– TANYA MALCOM REVELL

With those challenges in mind, Tanya was determined to make this career search a more focused one than what she had done in her previous job searches, so she enlisted the help of HTYC.

Tanya knew that if she was going to make a successful career switch in a new country, she wasn’t going to be able to continue on her own.

She found HTYC and enrolled in our Career Change Bootcamp, which equipped her with the framework and support she needed guide her through the finish line of snagging her new job.

Here are the key elements that Tanya followed in order to land her new position.

1. IDENTIFYING STRENGTHS

Here at HTYC, we’re big believers that people do best when they work in their strengths.

As with any big plan for change, you need to layout a foundation to build on. When it comes to working in your strengths, you need just that — a list of all of your strengths.

In order to identify her strengths, Tanya completed an exercise from the CCB program that consisted of things like:

  •  Looking at her job experiences in the past to identify what she excelled in
  • Looking for patterns, repetition, and connections from her past
  • Asking for input from her close friends and family

You can learn more about the process here.

Once she developed a list of her strengths, she was able to move onto the next step of figuring out what she valued.

2. EVALUATING VALUES

Values like strengths are an integral part to determining where you work next.

Don’t think so?

Think about this:

Would you go for a job that you  knew didn’t value your work ethic? 

Would you work for an organization that wasn’t flexible with your work schedule?

Would you apply somewhere that you knew didn’t promote from within the company?

We all have different wants, needs, and would-like-to-haves, so why not know what those are?

While you’re at it, make a list of what you definitely don’t want in you next job, too!

For Tanya, knowing all the things that she didn’t want in her next career and knowing the things that she had to have in common with the next organization she worked with, helped her narrow her scope of companies that she would be more intentional about focusing her time on. 

Putting in the work and the effort throughout the bootcamp, really paying attention to myself and my thoughts — what worked, what didn’t work throughout my career, what I was looking for, what my wants were, what my motivations were, my minimums, my ideals, etc.

TANYA MALCOM REVELL
3. CREATING AN IDEAL CAREER PROFILE

As we all know, our lives change over time. Depending on conditions, so do our values.

By looking back at you past job experiences, you learn a lot about what you don’t want in your career.

Taking the lists of strengths and values that Tanya defined in the first two steps of the process that HTYC outlined for her, she was able to create her own Ideal Career Profile (ICP).

Creating an ICP is something that Tanya credits for helping put herself into perspective.

With her ICP, Tanya was able to narrow down job positions AND organizations that really aligned with her career and life goals.

Getting all of her ‘asks’ down on paper let her pool her energy to focus on her end goal.

Although she knew that she would never find herself in the perfect role for life, she knew that the ICP that she created would be ideal for what she was looking for now as an American living in London for now.

4. CONNECTING WITH THE RIGHT PEOPLE

As soon as she did the research on her career wants, needs, ideals, and minimums, she knew she wanted to work for Wanderlust, an event production company that produces yoga festivals globally.

The next step of the process required Tanya to take the bull by the horns and reach out to key people within the Wanderlust organization.

She broke this step down by first, reaching out to others in her network to see if she knew anyone that had connections at Wanderlust. With that one action, she made a connection to the Co-founder of Wanderlust (!!).

SO YOU FOUND A CONNECTION?
WHAT NEXT?

The next part of this step is building and fostering your new connection with the understanding that you’re not going to just to flat out ask for a job.

Fostering a new (and important connection) requires you to do a bit of an information exchange. You want to give something to people as well.

How will you help the organization?

What skills do you bring that makes their lives easier? 

Within your communications, you’ll want to make sure to convey interest (and enthusiasm!) in their particular brand/organization.

Just putting this all down on paper, I realized that it’s not rocket science. At the end of the day, this is me. But what it did for me, it helped me put me in perspective. It helped me really think about myself in a different light. See myself through a bigger lens.

TANYA MALCOM REVELL
LUSTING AFTER WANDERLUST NO MORE

Tanya applied all of her learnings from the CCB program (listed above) and landed a position at the organization she targeted from her Ideal Career Profile — Wanderlust.

Tanya is currently spearheading a project to bring the Wanderlust festivals to the UK and Europe.

What does she attribute her successful career transition to?

Her connections.

Tanya is particularly proud about getting over her fear to reach out to her network.

She was able to be more intentional about seeking out specific people and establishing relationships with the key players at Wanderlust.

Without that piece of the career change process, Tanya wouldn’t be in the position that she is in now — working her dream job at the exact company she targeted during the first steps of her career change research.

Things may not happen overnight. But, eventually if you follow your process and are consistently following up with the people you reach out to, a career transition will happen for you.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, even when you don’t see a glimmer.

The career change process is just that, A PROCESS.

With perseverance comes the drive and motivation.

DON’T FORGET WHAT IS DRIVING YOU TO CHANGE CAREERS.

Sometimes, all you need to do is step back, breathe, take it all in, and refocus on your ideal career goals.

It wasn’t somebody coming to me. It wasn’t me trying to throw my resume into a random lotto of 100 million other people for the same job. This was me networking. This was me building relationships. This was me sticking with it, even when I wasn’t getting a response on an email or a phone call. I was just calling back and making sure they knew who I was.

Tanya Malcom Revell
JUST TO RECAP SOME OF THE BIGGEST TAKEAWAYS FROM TANYA’S CAREER SEARCH EXPERIENCE:
  • Know your wants, needs, and values — and don’t just go for any job that pops up, go for a job that aligns with YOU
  • Breaking out of your comfort zone, putting yourself out there, and growing your own personal network is important — what’s the worst they can say? 
  • Push past the negative and continue to focus on yourself in the positive. Your situation isn’t permanent. You will make the change!
  • Hard work, dedication, and perseverance is what will get you through the rough bumps in the road (see bullet point #2)

We know that your decision to change careers isn’t something to be taken lightly. You want your next career to be everything you want and more (we totally get it!). That is why we’ve created the Career Change Bootcamp program to guide you to build a strong foundation that will go even more in depth to help you determine what it is you want out of your next career.

Want tips on growing you personal network? Read more about it here or visit our Career Coaching resource for a more personalized one-on-one career advisor.

DON’T LET THE HARD DAYS, OR THE DAYS THAT YOU THINK YOU’RE NOT MOVING FORWARD OR NOTHING IS HAPPENING, STOP YOU OR SLOW YOU DOWN…IF ANYTHING, YOU SHOULD DOUBLE DOWN IN YOUR EFFORTS.

TANYA MALCOM REVELL

Introduction 00:00
This is the Happen To Your Career podcast, Episode 182.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 00:07
The job searches were pretty much leading me, I was very overwhelmed and very scattered throughout my searches, not really knowing where to focus or how to focus. And then of course, as I'm looking at the calendar, all of a sudden, a week has gone by, two weeks have gone by, and now than a month, and then two months, three months, and I was getting very bummed out, to say the least.

Scott Anthony Barlow 00:37
This is Happen To Your Career, we help you stop doing work that doesn't fit you, figure out what does and then make it happen. Whether you're looking to do your own thing, or find your dream job, you've come to the right place. I'm Scott Barlow.

Mike Bigelow 01:01
I'm an engineer who was living in Portland, Oregon, and was moving up to Seattle, Washington to support my wife's career change.

Scott Anthony Barlow 01:07
This is Michael, he's made career changes before but this one was different.

Mike Bigelow 01:11
A lot of the folks I talk to using a sort of like normal channels, we're often saying, "hey, we'd love to have somebody like you on the team. Unfortunately, we just let three or four people just like you go, because there's not enough work to go around anymore."

Scott Anthony Barlow 01:24
Listen for Michael's story later in the episode to learn how he used coaching to help him figure out what fits him and make the change to work he loves.

Mike Bigelow 01:31
You have somebody in your corner who's looking out for your best interest. They're pushing you to be the best version of yourself and to stretch and grow yourself consistently towards that best self.

Scott Anthony Barlow 01:43
Hey, this is Scott Anthony Barlow and you are listening to Happen To Your Career, the show that helps you figure out what work fits you by exploring other stories. And we get to bring on experts like Jenny Blake, who stopped holding herself back to help people start to make pivots in their own careers or people that have pretty amazing stories like Paul Maskill, who combined his passions to create a business he enjoys running. And these are people that are just like you, they've gone from where they are to what they really want to be doing and there, just like our next guest.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 02:12
My name is Tanya, and I work with Wanderlust and if you're not familiar with them, Wanderlust started as a yoga studio, but now has branched out and produces festivals and events throughout the world. I got myself into a position where I am now a part of the production team involved in bringing Wanderlust into Europe and presently into London into the United Kingdom.

Scott Anthony Barlow 02:38
In her story, this is such a fantastic story. I absolutely love it and had the pleasure of being able to tag along for the ride and give her help the whole entire way. And you're gonna get to learn how and why it's key to create what we call an ideal career profile for yourself before you even begin searching those online job banks, and the most valuable steps in our career change bootcamp process that'll actually help you properly position yourself during your next career transition. And this is a fun what the true benefits, the true benefits of putting yourself out there and networking and what that can even look like, in a way that's useful to you. And how looking at the positive rather than sulking on the negative. Well, it outcomes in instrumental, it's just absolutely instrumental in helping you keep perspective in your career goals. And that might sound obvious, but how do you actually do that too? All that and plenty more. I think you're gonna love this conversation with Tanya.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 03:43
Well, it started in New York City in television production. So I really cut my teeth in the MTV Music Television arena, and was in there, gosh, for about 12, 13 years, on and off doing exploring within television production, and then jumping in and out to different facets of the Music Television arena. So I was, like I said, a TV producer, but I also did experiential marketing around events. And I worked on festivals. And until very recently, I was working as a tour manager for pretty big bands. And like I said, I've done this for years and years and years and the overwhelming process throughout every new job that I would take was, I really don't like this. I really don't like something in my job, because it's not fulfilling. It's not necessarily the work itself, although I'm sure there are bits and pieces that drive me nuts, but it's not that particularly, it's a bigger umbrella, and I can't quite put my finger on what the heck it is. But you know, there's a new job, and it's right in front of me. So I'll go ahead and grab that one anyway. And that been pretty much my story year over a year, you know, the available job and not really diving in deeply into, why am I having these thoughts? You know, why is this job career not really fulfilling? So why is this circle keep happening exactly? So, my journey started, gosh, you heard what I was saying about not being fulfilled about my position, but I’ve been really started to transition really happened when my husband and I decided to move outside of the United States and come over to the United Kingdom. And I was ecstatic for many reasons. But in terms of my career, I thought this would be a great opportunity to just not reinvent myself, but maybe just do that, reinvent myself. Look at what I've been doing and start from scratch, which you know, sounds all well and good and ideally that would have happened and I would have gotten a job the next month or day or whatever.

Scott Anthony Barlow 05:54
24 hours later, at least. “We've arrived!” Okay, Where's it at?

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 05:59
Fortunate, after a little bit of a longer deal getting a work be the spouse work visa, I just got sat down and said, I refuse to fall into my old ways, I really need to think about what I wanna get out of my next position. I'm in a great place to do that right now. There's no overwhelming monetary need for me to jump into something. As I felt that years and years living in New York City, it's just all about the next job and who knows you. So I felt like to slow down and really evaluate where I was at. And I tried to do that on my own and realize very, very quickly that I was going nowhere fast. The job searches were pretty much leading me, I was very overwhelmed and very scattered throughout my searches, not really knowing where to focus or how to focus. So getting more and more frustrated throughout the entire process, and then of course, as I'm looking at the calendar, all of a sudden, a week has gone by, two weeks have gone by, and now than a month, and then two months, three months, and I was getting very bummed out, to say the least. And then I think I went online. And I just said, I need to find a podcast about career transitions and finding a job. And I stumbled across your interview with the on Max list. And I swear, I listened to you and the Happen To Your Career bootcamp, and you were talking about and I said, "Oh my God, that's me." This is what I need. I need some guidance. I need a voice who can help me get to the bottom of what I truly need to get not just for myself, but just that great work life balance for myself, my husband, my career, etc. And I went online and I think we were talking within the next couple of hours. I called or emailed you right away, and voila, I was inundated with the Happen To Your Career process.

Scott Anthony Barlow 07:49
I think I got your email somehow ended up on a Skype call, like I’ll just gonna call her.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 07:53
Yeah, that's exactly how it happened. And I have to say, Scott, you know, it's when I was talking to my husband and I said, "this is the first time where I feel like I have found someone in something that is going to make me focus and give me purpose." But I feel like I, my purpose is about to explode everywhere. And having gone through a couple different conversations with you, I jumped into the bootcamp. And you know, the rest is history, so to speak, in the sense that ultimately, and I'll give you the abbreviated version and then dive in a little bit more deeply, but ultimately putting in the work and the effort throughout the bootcamp really paying attention to myself and my thoughts and kind of my gut as well, what worked, what didn't work throughout my career, what I was looking for, what my wants were, what my motivations were, my minimums, my ideals, etc. And just putting this all down on paper, you know, I realized it's not rocket science, at the end of the day, this is me. But what it did for me is it helped to put me into perspective. You know, it helped me to really think about myself in a different light by evaluating my skills, my beliefs, my needs, and my wants. I mean, it's almost like I was able to see myself through a bigger lens. And then in turn, now, I was able to properly position myself and focus myself like in this career transition. And that's the key that had been missing this entire time. I didn't know how to position myself, I didn't know how to focus and I didn't really know what I wanted at the base. So going through everything, coming out of it at the back end, with this great, like my career profile, and it's there and it's what I want, what I need, and then focusing my search on companies based upon that, that shared my belief system that had the values that I was looking for, I targeted Wanderlust and I think was one of the first companies that came out of my mouth once as soon as I had this great profile, and I was like, "I want to work for Wanderlust."

Scott Anthony Barlow 09:52
Really? That's pretty cool.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 09:54
Absolutely. And then a couple of other places on my list is as you should... That was always key and number one, so yeah. And then I just did everything that you guys basically coached us to do the reach out, the network, you know, massaging your network to see who knows who and reaching out to them and seeing if you get introductions and being very bold and forward, which is part of what I do in my job. But in terms of a job search, I was very hesitant to do.

Scott Anthony Barlow 10:23
It's outside your normal conventional operating area, like...

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 10:26
And that was the other pieces, I was like, “okay, look, you want something this desperately or this badly, then why wouldn't you work outside of your normal operating levels or your normal conventions?” What's the worst that they can say? You know, but that's better than no answer whatsoever that you wouldn't have gotten in the first place. So I did all of that. And I got into one of the co-founders of the festival, I got directly to him. And he, in turn then, you know, obviously responded to my email. And then, because I'm now in the UK, he shot me through to that arm that deals with all of the branding outside of the United States. So then, of course, in bigger conversations started there with that entity. And it was a little bit of a painful process just because they weren't quite ready to have the deeper conversations, although they did recognize that I would be a good fit. It was one of those things. And you've mentioned this and Lisa, during many of our coaching sessions, reiterated this, it's not necessarily what they can do for you right then and there. It's about establishing a relationship and keeping that relationship going so that when there is an opportunity, you're the first person they're going to think of. And Scott, that's exactly what I did.

Scott Anthony Barlow 11:44
Know this is so wonderful, because I'm not surprised by it anymore. I don't think that's the right word. But I'm always amazed at how when you define what it is that you want and when you know what you want and then when you take action or ask for what you want or go after what it is that you want, very often…

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 12:04
It manifests itself. Yeah.

Scott Anthony Barlow 12:06
Yeah, yeah, it is just a really interesting phenomenon that I observe all the time, in my life, I've observed in a lot of the lives of our students, clearly this has happened for you. And just like you said, the other really interesting part of that is 100% of the time, or I should say, nearly 100% of the time, what we want is outside the realm of what we've done before, which means that by definition, it's outside our normal comfort zones or normal operations zones or anything else, which also by definition, makes it uncomfortable. So it’s, kudos to you for moving through that because that's not an easy thing to do at all.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 12:43
It wasn’t. But you know, Scott, at the end of the day, if you want something and you're determined to make a change in your life and in your career, I could not go another day saying, “oh, I'm not happy or I don't like my job or I wish I didn't have to go to work today” I was over that. I spent way too much time thinking of the negatives. So there was only one thing for me to do, and that was focused on me and the positive and the future. I couldn't dwell on the past anymore. And it wasn't beneficial for me, nor was it beneficial for my job hunt. So I still am flabbergasted that the conversations went very, very well, with wanderlust, but I'm still flabbergasted that they said, “Hey, by the way, the London events are starting up and we'd like for you to lead the charge on it. Are you available to start tomorrow?” So yeah, it was exactly like you had kind of presented it in the sense that the hard work, the dedication, having your career profile or dialing that far down into your wants, your needs, your beliefs, etc, like I mentioned, and coming up with that, you can only find something that is going to speak to you and represent who you are. Because that's what you're focusing on. And that's where your career search is going towards. So at the end of the day, whatever presents itself is going to be a positive outcome for you, no matter what. And that has been the biggest revelation for me, I will never go out for a job just because it's presented itself on some random LinkedIn, you know, job blast and it sounds good. Other than me, focusing on companies that I know that I will be appreciated in, I know that I will be able to grow in, I know that I will be able to work in some sort of collaborative environment, a big piece for me to having a flexible work schedule. I really don't like taking the tube during rush hour. I don't know too many people who do. Having a schedule where I could flex my hours and work from home when I wanted to. And also go into an office if I wanted to, and may are 100% on board with that, which I did a couple of fist pumps in the air when I heard that, but more importantly working with people whose values are really aligned with me in mind. So yeah, I've got all that. I've got everything I wanted. That's the craziest part, everything, not one, not two, not two and a half, like everything.

Scott Anthony Barlow 15:14
It feels crazy right now. But I think the cool part is that now that you've done that, you realize that, that is something that you can build for yourself every single time that you want to make a switch or I don't know if something changes in your life in which you need something different and you have to make a change for one reason or another because something no longer aligns. Then you now have the tools and the experience to know that, that's totally possible for yourself, which is super, super cool.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 15:43
Yeah, absolutely. And I have the tools to be able to pivot I mean, it's called a career pivot for a reason, right? And I feel more confident in being able to shift left to right, front or back, whatever, but knowing that I'm going to move forward in a direction that aligns with me. And again, I've never had that before. I've never had that feeling behind me.

Mike Bigelow 16:08
I'm an engineer who was living in Portland, Oregon, and was moving up to Seattle, Washington to support my wife's career change.

Scott Anthony Barlow 16:15
Remember Michael? We already told you that he'd made some career changes before but this one in particular, it was different.

Mike Bigelow 16:22
A lot of the folks I talked to using sort of my normal channels, were often saying, "hey, we'd love to have somebody like you on the team. Unfortunately, we just let three or four people just like you go, because there's not enough work to go around anymore."

Scott Anthony Barlow 16:35
Michael realize that this was not an opportunity for a change in location.

Mike Bigelow 16:39
This could be not just a lateral move from one city to another, but it could have the opportunity, be a promotion, as well, leading projects to potentially leading teams of technical people. And that is sort of been where I wanted to be for a long time.

Scott Anthony Barlow 16:51
As we work with him, he began to explore a much bigger picture.

Mike Bigelow 16:55
It wasn't just about finding a job. It was about finding my place in a community and being able to show folks that I wasn't there just to find something. I was interested in our conversation beyond the Mike needs a place to land in Seattle.

Scott Anthony Barlow 17:11
He put in the work to really connect with people and made it happen.

Mike Bigelow 17:14
As we're speaking now I sitting in my new apartment, having unpacked most of it in a gap week between when I left my old job, when I'm starting my new job.

Scott Anthony Barlow 17:24
Congratulations to Michael on finding work he loves that fits his family's needs. If you also want to figure out what work fits you and find that fulfilling career that lights you up and gives you purpose, find out how coaching can help you step by step, go to happentoyourcareer.com and click on coaching to apply or pause right now and text MY COACH to 44222. Again, you can just pause right now we'll send over the application, text MY COACH to 44222.

Mike Bigelow 17:51
And what was wonderful about working with the Happen To Your Career team was that I was able to learn so much about how to go from good to great in that career transition.

Scott Anthony Barlow 18:05
You're in such an interesting place because you've just moved through it. So I'm always really interested in people's opinions. Like, I'm a research not in this way. But what do you feel like were some of the key either events or things that had to happen in order for you to be ready to make this type of change and look at it in a different way? As you look back, what were some of those for you? I think it's a little bit different for everybody, but I’m curious.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 18:31
Yeah, absolutely. I think 100%, like phase one was figure out what the heck I wanted to get out of my career. What I wanted to get out of this next phase in my life, and I think everybody has to do that before they can be successful in anything period. And you can go through life, you can go through your jobs and be successful. But to truly get every drop out of the experience, and more positive obviously than negative, you got to figure out what makes you tick. And what's gonna keep you going 100%.

Scott Anthony Barlow 19:03
Well, let me ask you even a little bit before that, what caused you to get frustrated enough to the point where you wanting to do it differently than you had done it before? I know that you'd mentioned, hey, there was this move to London, and it seems like the opportunity time, and certainly timing had happened. But I know plenty of people that have made a move abroad or move to a different country. I've interacted with those people over email that aren't to the point and level where they're necessarily going to take action on it, if you will.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 19:33
Got it. Absolutely. Well, as I mentioned, I was working in television production and entertainment. And what I didn't mention is I was living in Los Angeles prior to moving to the UK. So being inundated in the entertainment arena, again was great stepping stone. It's gotten me to where I'm at today. But what it really quickly does is it frustrates you by the amount of ego that needs to be managed in throughout if its artists, producers, etc. The one thing that I through my search my profile, I've really understood that I'm very good at being that person that can morph myself into different situations. So I’m the very good at flexing and being supportive of others. And I was doing that more to it an extent where it was more detrimental to me and my career health.

Scott Anthony Barlow 20:26
That's interesting.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 20:27
Yeah, I was giving out more to others than I was getting back. So and you know, okay great, this me choosing to do this. But the consistency of doing that year over year and feeling like, well yes, I was progressing in my career in terms of title. I wasn't getting anything back in terms of support, or just even if it was just a little kudos, “hey, by the way, great job” nothing, just nothing in that regard. And it didn't make me feel good, at the end of the day while you have the event, the project, the festival, the concert was success, I was still kind of at a, we can say 1 to 10, I was always at a 5, in terms of what I would get out of it. So I was absolutely frustrated with that. And every job even moved through different arenas, from television production to festival thinking, okay, maybe something new and different will happen here. At the base. I really did like a lot of the work that I was doing, it was just this overarching piece that I thought I could change up and unfortunately, it wasn't working, at least in that entertainment festival TV arena. So with the move, I knew I wanted to put a stop to that cycle and that I wanted to get a lot more out of myself and out of what I was doing for others and I wanted to be more empowering to a community but also something that I could feel proud of and say, “hey, Mom, Dad, take a look at what I just produced” you know, instead of some random show on MTV. So that was the impetus behind me really starting the journey. London was the conduit, and Happen To Your Career was the platform. So, yeah.

Scott Anthony Barlow 22:06
I love that, I'm gonna borrow that. Several look, it might change from London, I don’t know.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 22:13
Absolutely, no, but that's exactly, that's my story on the front end into a nutshell. And then other thing, it’s just in terms of what else had to happen to make this happen was very quickly, I've always been into yoga. I've always been into health and wellness, or have it been though ‘whoo’ you know, 24/7 type of person. But it's always been very integral in my life. No matter where I'd been. If I'd been on the road, I would always take out time to go to the gym, maybe take a yoga class, go to the wide, walk around the park or whatever, you know, have a good meal, that's always been a foundation of who I am. So, which was great. But I didn't have the network here in London. So the other part is I really had to establish a network and put my face out there, take those leaps that didn't feel comfortable and maybe present myself at an event where I knew nobody, and with business cards and a handshake, just make people know me like, I'm here yet again. And I did that and did with a couple of key influencers in the health and wellness market. And it just resonated. So I put myself in front of yoga studios and actually said, “hey, by the way, if there's an opportunity, I'd love to volunteer and help out and once a week, or if it's event based, I'm here.” And I actually got signed on with one of the largest yoga studios here in London.

Scott Anthony Barlow 23:35
Really?

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 23:35
And funnily enough, this is a little secret, but funnily enough, we're going to try to see if we can get them on board at Wanderlust because it's such a great studio and I have all the contacts and now.

Scott Anthony Barlow 23:44
Hold on. That's it. This is something that is really interesting that happens with nearly everybody that goes through this process is, and it's so fascinating to me, you go through, and I'm gonna call it just doing the work, you're putting in the reps, for lack of a better phrase. And inevitably, you start to build relationships.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 24:03
Absolutely.

Scott Anthony Barlow 24:04
And then as you build those relationships, you don't know where or when necessarily, but those actually end up becoming useful or mutually beneficial for…

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 24:15
Like one degree separated.

Scott Anthony Barlow 24:16
Yeah, exactly. For a variety of different reasons, not necessarily just, you know, transactional, that's gonna get me to my next job, or whatever it happens to be. But this is super, super, super cool. So now, you not only got to know these people, and it sounds like people that you were really interested in knowing anyway, based on the work that you had done and said, hey, this is kind of where my values and interests and everything else fall. But then now it sounds like you're getting to work with them continuously or possibly, right?

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 24:46
Absolutely. And you're right, the people that I have met just by doing that, the world is large until it's not, you know, and the health and wellness industry in the UK is booming. But it's still I mean, compared to the US, it's still fledgling, so the people who shine and actually take an active part and participate, you will see them over and over again or you know, or maybe you recognize another person at the next event. So having the touch points with the yoga studios, having the touch points with the gyms, having the touch points with the great health platform aggregator that just kind of brings in the health, wellness news and not regurgitates that brings it in a nice condensed package to the consumers and they also have events, I would go to their events where you would meet influencers in the health and wellness arena, whether it's clothing lines or food products, etc. So just a bunch of different POV’s in this arena. Then, you know, afterwards you'd get to meet them, cards or exchange and so forth and so on. And that's just what I was doing. And I kept building and building and building so much so that with Wanderlust, you know, a big part of any event is the ties into the community and obviously for the the consumer draw, but also what can we present to the consumer that they're gonna like and appreciate. So having gone to all of these wellness industry events, where they presented the new and upcoming trendy thing or what's resonating, I already know, all of this stuff, the research is done. Now we just have to go out and engage them. So I could not have made this up, even if I tried. But no, really I couldn't. But just staying on top of it even when I know, here in London, the rain, you know, rainy day didn't really feel like doing anything. I didn't really feel like going up to Soho to go to an event but I just, you know what, Tanya, at the end of the day, what do you have to lose, and just did it and every single time I've walked away saying, “oh my gosh, I got this person's contact. I had a great time. I learned more about X, Y, and Z out of everything, and nothing has been too small or too big.”

Scott Anthony Barlow 26:56
Let me ask you about a couple of different pieces of the process, for lack of a better phrase, like your journey, we'll call it that. You mentioned earlier, you'd sent an email and connected with one of main people for events. Right? So, I'm curious for people, we touched on that earlier, but I'm curious what you actually did in that particular case and why you feel that particular email, contact, etc. actually worked? What about it?

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 27:25
Ah, this is a great question. So it wasn't as simple as I, you know, wasn't as streamlined as that, what happened was, I came out of, I forget what week it was in the bootcamp, and I was like, “Eureka! I know what I want. And I want to work for Wanderlust.” And again, I just started looking at a my network first and foremost to see if I had any ties with the Wanderlust. And on the first level, I didn't think that I did. And I just started mentioning it to everybody again, I'm trying to manifest it. So I'm throwing it out there. And every person that I met, or the person that I had worked with, I said, “hey, by the way, you know, I'm really interested in working with Wanderlust. Do you know anybody? Or have you been to one? Etc.” So I actually landed on a coworker who had, she said, I don't know anybody directly at Wanderlust, but I think I know somebody who's good friends with one of the founders, and I was like, you've got to be kidding me. So based upon my relationship with this woman, which was fantastic, my co workers, she then introduced me to reached out, yes indeed, that this other woman had a relationship with the co founder, and then in turn, based upon their relationship introduced me on the weight, the strength of my work, my ethics and just what I could bring to the party. So then this woman took it upon my friends word that I'm badass and introduce me to the founder. Now that was great. I've now got an email address. I have somebody who's setting this up. That was a big part. But what really sealed the deal, and this is something that Lisa and I had gone through, and you're sending these emails out to people and they're getting a crap ton of them day in day out, you've got to differentiate yourself one, but you also have to say, look, this isn't just about me trying to get something from you. I want to give something back to you as well if possible, and it's an information exchange first and foremost, and I know I'm a little, but you need to know what that means. And I think the person help in this your transition moving overseas. So more succinctly and more deeply than I've just kind of articulated it. I sent a really bad ass, excuse my French, email to Sean outlined all of this. And he said, “Yeah, you do seem like the best person. Let me introduce you over to the EMEA people, people dealing with Europe, Middle East and Asia.

Scott Anthony Barlow 29:50
Very cool.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 29:50
And that's how that transpired. It was really cool. But I don't think he would have given me the time of day if “A”, is the intro, weren't as strong as they were on me, from my friends, but "B" in terms of the written communication from myself. If that had lacked or didn't really show my enthusiasm, then I'm getting one of many, as much as I'd like to think I'm amazing, which I am.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:15
I agree.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 30:15
On paper that can fade and fizzle fast if you're not scintillating, or you don't kind of let them know that you're really willing to be the brand, or you're really into their brand.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:27
Especially recently, a lot of research on how these types of connections are made and why they're so effective at and first of all, it's so interesting that most, not all, but most, might someplace in the range of 70 to 80% of these types of opportunities, these types of it's my dream job type opportunities are found based on interactions through weak ties.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 30:53
Yes.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:54
Yeah. Meaning that it is not necessarily somebody you know, in your immediate network, because if it's somebody you interact with all the time, or somebody who you regularly see or regularly talk to or whatever else, then you're probably already aware of any people or opportunities that they know immediately. However, it's usually in the less strong ties and less strong relationships where you begin to find those type of things that aren't known to you when you're seeking it out. In this case, it was a former co-worker who…

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 31:25
Yeah.

Scott Anthony Barlow 31:26
Yeah, and.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 31:26
Absolutely.

Scott Anthony Barlow 31:28
People underestimate. I have, I did for many years underestimated the weight that is carried behind a strong recommendation and some of the psychological reasons that trust and credibility are already there when you have that initial weight behind it for somebody that you know and like already, and it just, it adds like 150 pound weight to whatever force you're already carrying. So you're really awesome written communication that you had sent off was, I don't know, it's like a parachute or something along those lines or sailboat or something like that. And all of a sudden, you get this huge gust of wind behind it in New Year's cruise and is struggling for an analogy, but we'll work on that.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 32:06
No, 100% agree. And again, it was just articulating, it's like, look, I am looking for a job in this company, or with this type of company or with this particular company in general. Do you know anybody or just keep me in mind? And again, that was my mantra.

Scott Anthony Barlow 32:21
Yeah. This is so amazing for so many different reasons. I'm really curious, because we've got so many people that listen to the show that are in the place that you were not that long ago, where...

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 32:35
I was that person listening to the show.

Scott Anthony Barlow 32:37
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 32:39
In the same position. Absolutely.

Scott Anthony Barlow 32:41
Yeah, you're been in the cycle. You're there and you're frustrated, and you're not entirely sure what to do differently. But what advice would you give that person who's in that place?

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 32:53
Don't let the hard days or the days where you don't think you're moving forward or that nothing's happening, stop you or slow you down. I think that for me was the really, really, really tough part when I didn't see the end of the rainbow. You know, there the end in sight. I couldn't necessarily get that particular connection that I wanted, or I already gotten some sort of negative feedback or no feedback. Don't let that stop you. If anything should double down in your efforts. And I know it's harder to do than say, but you know what? Caffeine and chocolate will get you through it. Just do it. You've got to do it. Because I worked so hard that when this happened, it felt so friggin sweet, that much sweeter and I would have been happy no matter what. But knowing that I made this happen. It wasn't somebody coming to me. It wasn't me trying to throw my resume into a random lotto of 100 million other people for the same job. This was me networking. This was me, keeping my ships. This is me, top of me just kind of sticking with it when even when I wasn't getting a response on an email or a phone call, I was just calling back and making sure that they knew who I was. So stay strong, kick ass. And just remember that you are who you are, and you bring a lot to the table.

Scott Anthony Barlow 34:15
Absolutely love it. You did such a great job. And I so appreciate you taking the time and coming on and being able to share your story so that everybody else can benefit from it too. And firsthand, congratulations. I hadn't even told you that yet. But… over your email. Yeah, very, very cool.

Tanya Malcolm-Revell 34:34
Oh, gosh, I'm staring up at the sky and I'm still kind of flabbergasted. So thank you. Thank you guys. This was an amazing journey. You know, you held my hand along the way, and you've got me to the other side. And for that I will be eternally grateful.

Scott Anthony Barlow 34:50
Well, I appreciate you letting us take along for the ride. Tanya, thank you again.

Scott Anthony Barlow 35:07
If you're ready to get yourself out of your comfort zone and dial in your career to align your wants, your needs, your values and everything else, I'd love for you to check out our career change bootcamp program to help guide you through, not just guide you through, but guide you through the process of manifesting your dream career. And that's exactly what it did for Tanya. That's exactly what it's done. For many others, you've heard a bunch of them on the podcast, but we'd love the opportunity to help you it only opens up a few times a year. And we would love to have you yet. By the way, thank you so much. Thank you so much for those people that have already expressed interest and joined and for the opportunity to be able to help you through and make this career change the way you actually want to be doing. So thank you so much for the people that have already joined. But you can do that just by going over to happentoyourcareer.com click on career change bootcamp, and you'll get all of the info as well as when times are actually open for enrollment during the year. And plenty plenty more. And also, thank you so much for those people that have gone over to iTunes, gone over to Stitcher Radio and left us reviews. I've got another, yet another five star review from Boss12188, "So helpful. Thank you! You've been so helpful because leaving a five star review helps everyone else find the episodes, find the podcast, and then ultimately we get to get more people to work that they love. But also thanks for the rest of it too, because.... thanks so very much, really appreciate that. And we've got more coming for you , coming up next week on Happen To Your Career, take a listen.

36:59
Totally burned out from working a typical nine to five job, just sitting at the desk, drudgery, not only on a mental level, but also like an emotional just wearing me out. And so that's my buddy came along, introduced this book four hour workweek, ended up quitting that job almost immediately because I was just like so pumped up. Concepts, right?

Scott Anthony Barlow 37:18
I'm out of here.

Speaker 3 37:19
Yeah, I'm out of here. Totally blows my mind, right. So I'm like, okay, online marketing business. That's what I've got to do. So for maybe like three years, which is focused on trying to create this online business, kept failing, kept changing approaches, kept pivoting, never truly committing to one thing.

Scott Anthony Barlow 37:38
All right, all that and plenty more. We will see you next week. Same time, same place, same channel, hit subscribe so that you don't have to do anything at all and you just get them in your sleep. Whatever podcast player you have, and whatever podcast player you use, just hit the subscribe button and then you don't have to do anything else. Super cool. Alright, see you then. Until then, I am out. Adios.

Ready for Career Happiness?

What Career Fits You?

Finally figure out what you should be doing for work

Join our 8-day “Mini-Course” to figure it out. It’s free!