After 24 Years Abroad: Preparing to Navigate the What Now?

The untold truths your manager and HR never shared before you took off

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

I left the U.K. in the summer of 2000 on what was supposed to be a two-year secondment.

It’s now well into its third decade.

It was a simple decision at the time and one without regret.

Travel, travel, travel.

Sitting at the pointy end of the plane and 5-star hotels.

Airmiles, oh so many airmiles!

Experience new exciting countries and exotic cultures.

Open the eyes of a young family to endless possibilities away from home.

That simple decision became a career-long adventure spanning counties and continents.

However, a lot can change in a country over 20 years.

The UK, changed Prime Minister 5 times apparently, (yes I had to look that up).

Brexit was endured to the relief of some and the dismay of many others.

And then there was COVID-19, enough said on that one.

Professionally, I’ve been fortunate to have made a career in the medtech and pharma industry.

An industry that has fared far better than many over the years but an industry that has changed significantly nonetheless in the relentless pursuit of profits, even more so post-pandemic.

I’ve also been fortunate to have gained varied experience far exceeding that of many of my peers from those early career days.

There is a cost though associated with that experience that I never considered at the time that I’d like to share.

Time doesn’t stand still and life relentlessly marches onward.

By this I mean, friends, colleagues, peers, customers, and companies all continue on their own journeys.

They all continue to grow and evolve.

The customers that I so carefully developed over the years and a big part of my success up to that point had moved on to other company’s products.

The colleagues that I worked with had been promoted or moved on in their own careers. I, like them to me, was largely a memory of a past life.

The harsh reality is that in business, relationships translate into revenue and revenue determines your net worth to an organization.

Over those years away, I had lost this relationship capital that was of such value.

By chasing an international career, as exciting as it was at the time and has largely been, I was, at the same time, inadvertently slowly closing the door on my return.

In short, those two-plus decades that I had spent as an expat had effectively made me obsolete back home, making a return to gainful employment at a senior level potentially challenging, to say the least, if that was a path that I wanted to choose.

I wasn’t just old news, I was no news.

Still no regrets I hear you ask.

Actually no.

An international assignment, in my opinion, is one of the most rewarding experiences that you can have during a career.

But it should come with a disclaimer, strongly suggesting that you consider your international use-by date and either plan a return on the near to mid-term horizon or plan not to return at all, at least not to the life or career that you left behind.

More on this a bit further down the page.

A few years back when I entered my sixth decade and passed the big 50, I started to question what comes next.

Asia by then, had been my home for nearly half my life, and as much as I love the life it’s given me, it’s not where I want to spend the entirety of the time that I have left.

More recently, over the past few months, I have started to look towards what next and what “next” could look like.

Frankly speaking and as unsettling as it can be at times, I know deep down that there are endless possibilities for reimaging a career after corporate life after 50.

There’s some excellent content out there to reinforce this and that us over 50’s are not over the hill.

Check out, for example, Jerry Keszka’s Plus 50 Forward which is hugely reassuring.

I am not alone.

All I need is a plan.

A plan that starts with a self-assessment of the skills that have become second nature over the years.

• Sales

• Marketing

• Business Development

• Finance

• International Business

• Leadership

• Teambuilding

• Coaching and mentoring

Thankfully, these skills are not career or industry-specific and can be restacked, repurposed and redirected into building something new and personal.

It’s also time to relentlessly network again, and despite how little I enjoy this somewhat painful exercise, it’s highly valuable and can’t be ignored as it is a well-known fact that far more new roles and opportunities come from direct referrals and personal connections than are ever advertised.

Whatever my new “what” looks like, it will be something of my own making and that’s exciting.

If I had my time back, would I still have taken the expat life leap?

Yes definitely, but…

I would have sought out more advice and information.

I would have spoken to those who had trodden the path before me.

I would have developed a return plan early on, just in case.

I would have continued to relentlessly network at home as well as overseas.

I would continue to build skills, learn and invest in education.

I would have had more professional financial planning.

And I would think far earlier on, what reentry would look like.

Right now, I’m starting my next journey to build my “what next.”

What that looks like, I’m not 100% sure yet, but with the help of my friends right here on Substack, its vision is taking shape.

It will involve my lifelong passion for writing, a growing interest in Executive Coaching and reimaging a career after corporate life and after 50.

I can confidently say this though, as these all collide, I’ll be sharing that journey right here.

Stay healthy.

More to follow…