Finding Your L&D Path with Sarah Cannistra

Luis Malbas  
Here we have our first speaker Sarah Cannistra. Finding your l&d path and you can think of somebody better to open up today. Sarah is the Overnight Trainer. She's got a podcast. She is been in L&D for about a decade now, a 10 year L&D veteran. She's a freelance learning consultants And yeah, everybody enjoy the event. And we'll see you throughout the day. Thanks, Sarah.

Sarah Cannistra  
Yeah, thank you. I'm so excited to be here. And so excited to be kicking off and go ahead and get my screen up for y'all. I see. I see. Some people are in here from Texas, which is where I am right now. I'm in Austin, Texas. So I saw some Texas people have been hastened run. Thank you. Alright, so let's go ahead and get that up for you all. And let me come back and see your amazing faces. All right. Amazing. All right. So welcome, everyone, I'm so excited to really be here and kicking off today's conference with you all. So thank you all so much for joining. And for those watching the recording, you know, thank you for being here and spending a little bit of your time today on you and your own self development and your own lnd path. And I know many of you are here today, really joining to be hopeful, aspiring instructional designers. And well, my goal isn't to persuade you from that. I really hope to be able to open your eyes to all the possibilities out there for current and former educators in the space. So who am I? I know, some of you haven't introduced me before, but my name is Sarah canister. I'm the founder of the overnight trainer and an l&d executive and career and business coach. And so a little over a decade ago, I was a sales manager. And the next day I became a systems trainer. So I expressed interest in my old company, letting them know that I was interested in, you know, being in the training department. They said, Hey, do you know this software? I said yes. And the next day, they made me a trainer. I had no background in l&d whatsoever. And I was tasked with creating and facilitating systems trading for an entire organization. So let's just say there was a lot of trial and error and more on the error side. And so a lot of those a lot of learning that I had came from those errors. And through those learnings, the harnessing of my transferable skills, having amazing coaches and mentors, I really learned what it took to become an effective and modern learning leader. So in the last decade, I've been responsible for the learning function for four different organizations, and have been responsible for 10,000 employees inside those organizations and involved in the hiring and managing of over 100 l&d professionals. So what's led me to be here today is a little over a year ago, I left my full time job as an l&d Director to start the overnight trainer where I take the best of my experience, having transitioned into l&d with no experience whatsoever, combined with my experience as a hiring manager. And I take that into a signature formula that I use to coach people soon to be l&d professionals looking to transition into and grow their career inside of lnd. So my goal is to help you find land and love your l&d career. So I want to kick it off with an informal poll, though nothing really to launch or anything like that. But I want to know from you all, you all are here at a conference for teachers who want to become instructional designers. So I'd love to know why. Why do you want to be an instructional designer? So don't to get too fancy or anything, but I'd love for you to throw into the chat, one of these numbers that resonates with you the most. So why do you? Why have you decided on a career in instructional design? Number one, I don't really know. It sounds like it could be a pretty good fit shrug emoji, right? Maybe you've seen a lot of other people transition into instructional design from teaching, or you research all of your career possibilities outside of the classroom and landed on ID. So I'd love to hear from you all.

Yeah, I'm actually gonna stop sharing for one second just so I can see your faces again, because you did disappear from me. There you all are. Okay, give me one sec to get that back. So throw those in the chat. All right. So I'm seeing threes, twos, threes, ones, twos and threes. Okay. Seeing all those come in for y'all. All right. Okay. Perfect. All right. So Tuesday threes. I see some ones. Okay, cool. So it looks like we have a healthy a healthy mix of all of those as well. I'm gonna go ahead and get this back up for you all. Okay, cool. Second here. Alright, and you guys can see my screen again, I get a thumbs up for yes in the chat. Amazing. Thank you. Alright, so we have, like I said a healthy a healthy mix of these kind of reasons for getting into lnd. And it's really, really important. I'm going to go back to this in a second as to why it's so important to have this and to know, kind of your why around it. So here's the thing. The lnd job market is hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot. I actually have some fire emojis in my notes right here. That's how hot it is. And so I got asked the other day, you know, a coaching client asked me what I thought of the the market, the lnd job market. And, you know, she was concerned with how many people were also trying to break into lnd. Have any of you had that kind of concern? Coming up? So many people feel like there's a lot of competition, I see some yeses in the chat. Okay. All right. So here's the thing. I got an Oh, yes, Caitlin. Okay. All right. So here's the thing. This pandemic has really been a catalyst to what's been happening in the corporate world for years, years, years, years and years. And so with that, what's happening now is that people are no longer staying in their roles at their companies if they're not being developed. And so long gone are the days of, you know, quit traditional corporate America, where you start and retire with a company, right? What's happening is that organizations are realizing that if they want to hire and retain their top talent, they need to invest in people's development, which is incredible news for us for l&d professionals. Right, this is, this is job security for all of us. And so it's great news. It's epic news, right and amazing, an amazing time to be looking for any role in l&d. And as of this morning, just alone, I double checks. I checked yesterday and checked again, there are over 500,000 roles inside of l&d right now available. Right? And so, if you answered right, we're thinking about this, like your your thing about the sheer number of roles that there are now if you answered one or two on that initial poll that I did, right, something to keep in mind is that right now, only 4% of those roles are instructional design related. And so if you're not 100% Sure, if I instructional design is for you, you really are leaving a decent amount on the table. But here's the other thing, if you are sure ideas for you, if you were one of those people that typed in three, there are still 10s of 1000s of ID roles out there. So finding clarity on what you'd like to be doing in your role as an ID is just as important in order to sift through all of those open roles. So here's some numbers.

If you think as an educator, your only option is instructional design. Let me tell you this. So last year, 90% of my clients came to me saying they wanted to be an instructional designer. And when I pressed them for why a lot of times I got those number one in two answers from earlier seems like a good fit. Other people have done it. Right. What actually happened was that only 17% of them actually became one. And that's after getting clarity on what it was they really wanted, not what other people had done before them, not what their friend who was a teacher said they should do, and not what someone on the internet told them was their only option. And even better news, right? 60% of my clients last year had no formal corporate experience in lnd, half of them were educators, teachers, professors, academic advisors, falling into all of these categories. And they did it by getting crystal clear on what it is they actually wanted out of their lnd career. And if any Brene Brown fans out there by throwing a Brene Brown quote quote here because here's the thing about clarity. It is kind, right, and what happens is when we are unclear with ourselves, right? We are being unkind, right? If we're not clear about what it is we actually want to be doing in our next role. We're being unkind to ourselves to our job search to our transition, right? If we're not clear about what it is we actually want. So Okay, Sarah, how do we get clear? Let's go through it. So to get clear, we got to take it back and really explore our past and this is really if you think about it, any of you have done anything research on adult learning theory right adult learning theory 101 is we as adults, I think everyone here is over the age of 18. We have experiences which we draw knowledge and references from. And we take these experiences and learn from them, which is exactly what we need to do in our career transition. So it's really, really important to ask yourself these questions. And as I go through them, feel free to throw any answers that come up in the chat, anything that maybe immediately pops up to you, but also know that these type of questions do take some reflection time. So the first question to ask yourself as you're really exploring the past to get clarity for the future is, what were my past roles. And it's and really thinking about it in terms of what your job description was? Maybe it's pulling your your job descriptions, you know, what the titles of your roles were, I had a client last night in our group coaching call, all a sudden was like, wait, I totally forgot, I held this one role. And I did onboarding in that role. And here's how it connects. Right? So really getting clear on that. What did you do that you loved in your past roles? And I want you to get super, super granular here. I hear all the time. Well, I loved the kids, right? That's what I loved about my teaching job. Well, I want you to think beyond that. What about the kids that you love? Helping them through personal challenges, or teaching a particularly challenging subject to them? Or helping them understand complex topics? Right? Same thing with what you didn't like, right? Maybe you didn't like actual, like the verbal teaching the facilitation? Was it the public speaking aspect, that you're not like teaching a certain subject? Alright, so by really getting clear on what we've done, and what we've liked, it helps us figure out what we're doing for the future. And one of my favorite questions to ask and reflect on is what did i What did I want to do in those roles, but didn't or couldn't? It was I held back by the confines of what my role is, by administration, by the school board, whatever it may be, was there something I really wanted to do and wasn't able to couldn't do or didn't do. And when we look at these, and we get clearer on the past, we can start to pull on these experiences, to start to shape what it is we want next. And this is what makes this journey, a personal process. Right? So I always say you can't We can't Frankenstein our way to success, at least not easily. And what I mean by frankensteining is that we often take bits and pieces of all these other people's journeys, and try to amalgamate put it all together to make this journey for ourselves. And the reality is that someone else's journey is not going to be the same as yours, because no one else has experienced your life. Right. So going back to that adult learning theory, 101, you aren't going to be able to shape your future and what it is you want to do based on your own personal experiences and how they shaped you. So keep that in mind, as we're exploring the past that all of these all of the things that you're writing down that you're reflecting on, these are all just data points for you and learning points for you as well.

So once we explore the past, we can really then take a look at what we're experiencing right now. So what's happening in this moment around me, and again, go to these questions, anything comes up, feel free to pop it in the chat. But really looking at what from the past is still true today. Right? So are there any themes that I've been seeing? Wow, all these things I've been doing in the past are still happening today, whether it's things you liked, things you didn't like, right? What are these constant themes that you've been seeing that are still showing up today? Looking at what do you want to be doing more of or learning more about? And one of the questions I usually ask my coaching clients is to think about what you are learning on your free time that energizes and excites you. And then you might be thinking, Sarah, I don't have any free time right now must be nice. Even if you had five minutes in the day to learn something new, right? Or you can daydream for a minute about what you would be learning if you had free time, really thinking about what you'd want to explore? What do you want to be doing less of? That's a huge important question to ask yourself, right? What can I care less about doing right now a part of my job that I really don't like? And what am I doing right now that gives me energy, and what takes it away? Because here's the thing, work is really all it is, is an energy exchange, right? I show up for work, I give you my energy by working and in return, you give me a paycheck. So rather than it being an energy suck, imagine if you got paid to do something that gave you energy. But again, if you're not clear on what it is that gives you energy and where you're finding that from, it's hard to look for it in a future role. So a lot of this is around getting that clarity and really doing this the self reflection work around that. So once you've done this, right, gone through step two, and step three, or step one and step two, then we can really start to define the future. And here's the thing we already try to jump into this step without any reflection whatsoever. And when we do this, when we jump into step three, before we kicked off on step one, and two, we usually do it because we're running from something ad in this case, it's teaching, rather than getting clear on what it is we should be running towards. Alright, so I always asked my clients, they say, I definitely want to do this. And I always say, are you doing it? Because you want to run from something? Or are you sure you want to be running towards that? So kind of have that clarity. So part of redefining what the future could look like, is also understanding and having a very clear understanding of your strengths. And I know from many of my clients, it might be hard at first to verbalize that, like, what are my strengths, I've been a teacher for so many years, I don't quite understand how to verbalize what my strengths are. And As A Strength Finders coach, I utilize Strength Finders in my coaching to help people live out their strengths, which going back to energy, right, when you live in your strengths, that's what will energize you, and you can actually take a free assessment. So if you Google high five, so h i g h plus the number five, you can get a free strength assessment. And so once you know your strengths, right, you can figure out what it would look like to operate in these strengths. And once you're operating in them or have an idea, that's usually what gives you energy. What's interesting is, for me, kind of give you an example, my top three strengths are strategic positivity, and woo, which means Winning Others Over. And so being able to do things like this and being here with all of you, I'm operating in those strengths. Right here I am giving you strategy from a positive lens hoping to win you over and and have this, you know, this, this positive change here. And so after this, I will have so much energy the rest of the day don't need coffee, you don't need anything, because I'm working in my strengths right now. And so once you figure out what they are, you can really start to think about how would I operate in these? What would this look like? Or what could this look like for me that I want you to think about what are the themes from the past and the present that I want to hold on to? Right for me a theme that's come up my whole adult career from when I was 18, working in a call center at my college was helping people with their careers. And it took a lot of reflection for me to realize that this is my why. And a theme that's important for me to hold on to. But it's also really important for you to look at what themes do you want to leave behind? Right? Really important because for me, I realized that I was having a theme in my life of trying to fix companies and I didn't want to be fixed or whose values opposed mine. And so I learned that was a theme I no longer wanted to carry me. Right. So it's really asking, you know, what in the past has served me? And what what can I go ahead and let go. So once you get through these three steps, and it's not a simple five minute exercise, right, so I know I'm going through it pretty quickly. But the goal is is just to start to get your brains moving in this direction, then what you can do is really figure out well what roles exist where I can live out these strengths. So on my website, if you go to the overnight trainer.com, I have a free guide for you, that actually walks you through over 50 Different lnd roles and the skills needed to land them. And what I encourage you to do is download it, it's completely free for you all is go through and look at all of the skills that are associated with each role, and which ones align with the strengths you have and the themes you want to continue in your career. And then from there, go out and connect with people who have those jobs and have those job titles and find out more about that type of role. Because if you are only connecting and networking with other teachers who are transitioning into IG or have transitioned into IDX, you're keeping yourself in an echo chamber of teacher to ID and you're not exploring the 1000s of possibilities that are out there for you. Because here's the reality. People don't buy what you do they buy why you do it. And it's one of my favorite quotes. And I always encourage my clients to find their why and to really, really spend time on that because even though Simon Sinek talks about this morning, from a sales perspective, the process you're going on to find a new job is actually a sales process. Right? You have to market yourself you have to sell yourself in an interview. So your skills, they will get you in the door, but your Y is what will get you the job. And I know we've kind of talked about it already, but I get asked all the time. How do I stand out in the sea of applicants and the reality is knowing your y finding a role where you can live it out in a company that is aligned with you right is what will help you stand out. Again, your skills are going to get you in the door but your y is going to get you that job and as a as a former hiring manager in some way. Who is around led hiring managers all the time. We hear that's an experience it right? It's a, you'll probably hear about it too, like that gut feeling about a candidate. But it's not really a gut feeling. What we're feeling in that moment is a feeling of alignment, that we share core values and a deeper connection through that why. And so I always like to use an analogy of what I call the momentum train. So those who know me know I use this analogy a lot. But when we decide to make a career change, many hop on the train the proverbial train, and immediately leave the station, right, we don't check to make sure the wheels are on tight, or even if the what direction the train is going in. And it can be a bumpy ride. Or maybe you take off fast in this career journey, and you're, you're, you're learning and you're upskilling you're doing all of these things. But what happens is you keep getting delayed on the journey, repairs, mishaps setbacks. But when you get crystal clear on your why, what direction you want to head in making sure your train is ready to leave the station before it leaves, it makes for a very smooth, easy, and for many of my clients fun and authentic journey. Now after, after my clients go on interviews, I always ask them to tell me what is one word they're feeling right after the interview, and the words I've been getting lately are relaxed, chill, authentic, right? It's, you know, I always say the best way to approach us is to start slow. So you can go fast, and getting that clarity is what will help you do that. So I want to walk you through some additional resources. And I went to that pretty fast, I want to walk you through some additional resources for y'all. The first is that I am the host of the overnight trainer podcast. And if you listen to episode 45, it's a really beautiful companion to that free ebook that I was just talking about before it walks through what lnd is, any adjacent fields to it and what roles you can find in each. I also have a three day mini series on the podcast as well, which goes into Career Clarity. So a lot of what we talked about today go a little bit deeper, obviously, from a time perspective, and you have a lot of a lot of content to go through today. But you want to take some time and go through that it's a three day series on the podcast, it's Episode 4950, and 51, where we go into everything we talked about today. Some additional additional resources, I do have two courses, one of which are free and available to you. The first one is from teaching to corporate lnd. It's a masterclass I did in conjunction with educators and ebb. And it's all around leaving the classroom and the fear of that behind. So we talk about fear of breaking through the fears of transitioning and leaving and all those fears that come up, as well as some strategy around what the next steps are. I also have a course around finding your niche. So your niche is where your transferable skills, your interests, your values intersect, and what will help you really define what the right role the right company looks like. So that exists on there, you can find all of this on my website as well. And if you are interested in coaching, I have a group coaching program. If you go to the overnight Trainer dot Thinkific comm you can find out more about it. But anyone who's here, I will keep this code live forever. But you can use code code T LDC and get $500 off of that. So I went through all that pretty fast. I'm going to open it up to I know some questions came in. So I'm going to go ahead and open that up and see what questions you all want answered.

Oh, awesome for putting those links in there. Thank you. All right. I want to take any questions in the My best piece of resume advice, yes, code CLDC for 500 off. And if you all go if you download that, um, that free resource has all the information on there, too. Okay, so best practice best piece of resume advice. So my best piece of resume advice, and I do a podcast episode on why marketing is not your problem. So I think it'd be helpful to listen to that too. But my best piece of resume advice is get crystal clear on what your niche is, and create a resume around that. I think a lot of times we try to be everything to everyone. And when we do that we're actually not being anything right. We try to be everything we end up being nothing. And so what your resume should really do is rather than being the laundry list of everything you've ever done, it's really getting clear on what it is you want to do and telling that story. So that's my first piece. My second piece of advice is translated into language that a lnd hiring manager is going to understand it is not the responsibility of the l&d hiring manager or recruiter to be able to translate your experience That's a sheet that that's on you to be able to do that. Alright, see what else is coming in here? Luis, do I still have time? Got some good questions. Can you be an lnd? Can you be lnd as a writer, presenter with no text experience? Don, if you can elaborate on that. What do you mean by text experience? Tech or text? The link for the ebook Nancy, it's just go to the overnight trainer.com It's on there. What are some other roles under lnd? Besides ID Stephanie, if you go if you download that guide on my website, I have six actually 60 different roles on there as well. Can I restate the basic types of roles in l&d either, I mean, you can get I would say there's actually not the basic set you probably have. If you want to get basic, basic. There's corporate trainer, instructional designer, a learning experience designer, a program manager, l&d project manager, Instructional Design Manager probably move up the way that way, Director, head of sales are kind of your I would say basic, but there are hundreds of different roles as well. So Maria, hopefully that answers your question. Oh, Cassandra, thank you. I'm glad you loved it kind of going through here. Mentorship live, I love this question. For those of us who thrive on providing one on one mentorship, what led roles could I consider, I would definitely recommend downloading that resource. Because you'll see that mentorship actually exists in a lot of those different roles. Any type of role, I think that includes type of coaching, there are program managers or like you could there are roles where your job is to develop mentorship programs inside of the organization, too. So there's a lot you can do with mentorship. Any good guides for getting the lnd corporate lingo down? Um, I don't know that I necessarily know of it. I will say inside of my group coaching program, I've translated an entire job description, a teaching job description into lnd lingo. So that does exist in there. Um, let's see. I don't have any coding or graph experience on presenter and program designer. Amazing. Yeah, I don't think this is the beautiful thing about lnd. And I'm, you know, people can argue with me on this all they want. But from my experience, what I have seen is there are really there are very few of any unique skills to learning and development. So what this is a beautiful industry full of is transferable skills. And so just because you don't have one thing doesn't mean you can't be in l&d. And so don, would I definitely encourage you to do is thinking about goals, what are the things that you do have the things that you do want to utilize in your next role, and getting really clear on that in order to find out what that looks like, for you. And so again, I'll refer you back to that free resource of all those skills needed inside of these these different types of lnd roles, and start to think, oh, wow, these are all these different things that I could do and start researching those roles. Oh, Lauren, I'm glad you like the podcast. Let's see. Let's see, okay. What software programs, would you recommend somebody making the transition from teacher to IDX? To invest him?

So I'm going to answer this. I think there's other people today here who can answer that question better than I can. What I will say is when you get clear on what your and I would ask like Lou Copson, I would ask Heidi and Laura, pretty much everyone else here except for me, I'm probably would be better to answer that question. But how I will answer that question is really getting clear on the type of role that you want. And you know, when people say instructional designer, but you're probably you probably realizes that at one company, instructional designer could mean one thing and another company, it could mean something totally different. So I want to get clear on what instructional designer means to you. And as you're starting to see different roles that really stand out to you in instructional design, if that's what you've chosen to do, what are the constant kind of common themes that you're seeing as far as software goes? So for example, you might be looking, you know, at certain roles, and what you're seeing as well for all of these roles that are encompassed in my niche and at the types of companies I'd want to work at. Wow, they're really asking for knowledge in Rise whereas there might be another set of companies inside your niche that want more like specific storyline experience. So it's hard to answer that because I'm going to answer it more in the sense of getting clear on your on your niche and then letting your niche dictate what you should learn and by but other people today will be able to answer that much better than me. Um, let's see. I know how much more time I have left. Because if you want to let me know how much time I have, I'll try to get through what software programs Would you recommend making the transition? Oh, we already got that one.

Luis Malbas  
You have time, Sarah,

Sarah Cannistra  
I got time. Okay, cool. They're flying in. So I'm just making sure. Do we need to know about how to work with various learning platforms? And how do we know which one we should have access to learn? So again, I'll answer this twofold, I think it's depending on the exact type of roles that you're end up looking for. And what I actually see is, rather than focusing so much on learning all of these different learning platforms, it's how can I translate my experience on the learning platforms I've already used? So I think that's a big disconnect. A lot of people in the selling themselves part and the marketing of themselves part is they have a hard time translating, Hey, I've used x platform, I've used Canvas, right? Use that over here. Here's what I know about it. Here's how I can translate that into any other type of system that way. So I know it's kind of a Caitlyn a, a twisted way to answer your question, but that's what I found to actually work best. Um, okay. How would someone begin getting short term semi low stakes, freelance work and instructional design to gain some experience? Go on Upwork? I highly recommend going on Upwork. And putting yourself out there. JD seems to call everything Id I know, how do I know they that the job they're hiring for is the role I'm looking for. So I do go through this inside of in both in the niche course, as well as an entire group coaching. But one of the things also just and I'll give this advice to all of you here is, rather than looking for jobs, just based on title, start looking for jobs based on skills. And you'll start to see that different roles are going to be popping up for you. So you can still use instructional design in there. But also, what are some of these other skills strengths that I utilize? And I did actually, I was here, I don't know when I was here last year at some point, and I think it's on the CLDC YouTube, but I did do a a workshop or a little session on finding your niche in a really quick way. So it might be helpful to go back and watch that Joelle that may be helpful to you. Um, the most common ID platforms. Yeah, I mean, articulate, you know, Camtasia again, I think some other people today, Monica, I'll be able to answer that question better better than me. Um, yep. Your role will dictate the minutes. Yeah, they're coming in so fast. You get your old dictate the tools you use, exactly.

Is it possible to make your transition without having to start as an entry level? AKA low salary position, Danielle? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And yes. So I will live and die on that hill. If I had to pick one to die on it is that if you are an educator you have I will, you're about to see me go while but you have so much if transferable experience, you just need to learn how to translate it to people. Yeah, I see all these emojis flying in. I have not. Last year, I coach over 50 people and not one person took an entry level low salary position. I am very hyped on the fact that I know there's people out there saying the only way to get in is to get your foot in the door is to come entry level. You don't need to do that. Now. Are there certain roles that do require experience? Absolutely. But that's the beauty of expanding your search, and that they exist in instructional design, too. But once you expand your search, what you realize is that the qualifications that you have actually led you to so many roles beyond instructional design. And if you go to my LinkedIn, you'll see one of my Featured Posts, I do talk about my clients last year and all of their success. And it It's wild. What happens when we get out of the mindset that we as educators you only get you can only get entry level roles. So not one of my clients has ever taken an entry level role because you have so many skills, qualities strengths, inter whatever word you want to call it here. And so if someone's telling you, you have to take entry level, don't listen to them. Alright. Any lnd roles exploring the metaverse, you know, who's a great person ask that question to you is Dr. Luke Hobson, who will be here later. He will. Absolutely. We actually talked about that. I just had him on my podcast and we talked about the metaverse. So hold no more. Yes, Matt. Right. Oh, hey, Matt. Yeah, too many LMS is you've used one you use them all for sure. Alright, let's see. Can I speak on ageism and l&d? Oh wow, we're getting deep here. Okay. So I mean, if we're gonna talk about ageism in general, like, I mean, bias bias exists right unconscious bias conscious bias that that absolutely exists. What I will say and I talked about this on Actually, last week with my career coaching group is that the right company doesn't, I won't swear on here, but doesn't care what your age is, right? So I've had clients who are 25 years old, I had clients who weren't 65 years old. And everything in between and getting crystal clear on what it is you want to do the value that you add the right role, the right company will see you for the experience that you have no matter what your age is, but it is around getting clear about what it is that you actually do want and ageism exists on both sides, too. Right. So it's really it's keeping that in mind that, you know, there's people who might say, Oh, they're too young to that role, or they're too old to do that role. But I've had clients from every every age, you know, after 24, I think it's the youngest and yet well into the 60s as as the oldest and have all found jobs that are so happy to have them. Um, hopefully that answered your question, whoever asked that. Oh, Giada. Jonah. Right. Okay. Oh, done. Yes. ageism.

All right. And Stacy, I think this is the last one. So does my niche refer to where my skills are now, or where I want to go next to my career? That's a really beautiful question. And it's like the intersection of both. So it's harnessing what you're, you know, taking your transferable skills that you have now, then the interest that you have that either you have now or you want to explore more of, and the values that you have, those are core to you, right, so it's being able to define all of those. And then in the intersection of that lies your niche. So it's really the, what you're bringing to the table, what you want to continue to bring to the table, it might not be something you know, yet but that you're interested in, and that those core values and it's finding what that that, you know, what I always say is this, and I'll leave you I'll leave I'll leave you with this is that the this process, when you first jump in, it feels like an ocean, it feels like you're in an ocean, you don't even know which ocean you're in, you can't see land for miles and miles, that you know, the currents coming over you right, it feels really, really choppy. When you find your niche, the process of finding your niche, what it does is it takes you from the ocean, into a lake and into a swimming pool. And so you're not narrowing it down to one specific role at one specific type of company, you have a swimming pool to kind of Wade around in so your niche usually consists of multiple types of roles and multiple skills that you want to utilize and multiple interests that you have. And it's guided by your core values and the fundamental needs that you have from your career. So I'll kind of leave you with that as well. And Elizabeth Yes, on my web on my website, that that document is on the homepage. So if you go to the homepage and scroll down just a little bit, you will, you'll see it there. And then I also have a Learn tab where you can access additional resources there too. But the the 50 Plus guide is on the homepage. And you all if you need anything covered today, any additional resources, please feel free to reach out to me and DM me on LinkedIn. Don't be a stranger. I'm Sarah can Ostra and the only one only Sara canister there. But I'm here to support support all of you. And I'm so proud of you for taking time today to focus on yourself. It's hard to do that sometimes. So thank you all for for having me. And I look forward to talking to you all soon.

Luis Malbas  
Oh my gosh, thank you so much, Sarah, really appreciate it. The chat was like so busy. Just really into everything that you're saying. And yeah, so next up, who do we have? I think it's Raven Wilson is going to be up next. And she's going to be fantastic. I think that her perspective on her pursuit of instructional design, but deciding to move on to something else is actually really, really important for this particular event. So we'll see you in that one for the next one. And I'm going to go ahead and close this session out. Thanks again. Sarah.

Sarah Cannistra  
Thank you

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