Hitting The Restart Button On Stalled IT CareersHitting The Restart Button On Stalled IT Careers

IT professionals are often advised to keep up their skills in order to stay marketable. But sometimes digging deep into their pasts can help launch new career opportunities.

John Vidakovich was a 15-year tech veteran earning a six-figure salary when he was laid off in July from his job as director of global consulting at a small Denver-area company.

Vidakovich, 45, says he had never had trouble finding a job before, but by July "the IT world had changed, with globalization and a changed economy." He also realized that single events--such as 9/11--could also greatly affect a career in IT. "I started looking for a job," he says. "I had never been out of work in 15 years in IT."

But Vidakovich knew he had to think carefully to land work, so he started evaluating the future of IT and where businesses would have the biggest needs. After talking to many people in and outside the IT industry, he realized that companies were still trying to figure out Sarbanes-Oxley regulations and how they would impact businesses' processes and IT. So Vidakovich read everything he could about the regulations.

He also tapped into an educational background that he hadn't formally used in 20 years: his accounting degree. Pulling his many years of experience in IT together with his accounting knowledge and newly self-taught education in Sarbanes-Oxley, Vidakovich launched a consulting company that provides Sarbanes-Oxley audits for small- and medium-size companies that can't afford services from high-priced, big-name consulting firms.

Since launching J.R. Consulting Inc. nearly a year ago, Vidakovich has expanded its services into privacy audits, including evaluation of identity-theft risks. He has hired three former IT professionals who also have made midlife career shifts to consulting from recent IT-management jobs at businesses that included startups and a major aerospace company.

Vidakovich advises others who have jobs and are afraid of losing them to "watch the market carefully and diversify your background. Don't rest on your laurels," he says. "You could come in at 8 a.m. one day, and it's over."

For older pros already out of work, there's hope. However, "it might take time and money to retrain yourself," Vidakovich says. Be prepared to spend between $2,000 and $10,000 for certifications that could help land new work, he says.

For Vidakovich, things have worked out well. The career shift has "opened many new doors" for him. Another perk: He's earning more from his consulting business than he made at his last full-time executive-level IT job.

One important key for rebooting a stalled IT career is to effectively market and tap into past experience, says John Challenger, CEO of executive search firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Whether it's attempting to find a new job--or launch a new business--it's key to build on one's prior successes, he says.

For instance, when courting prospective employers, IT pros should point to their accomplishments that were important to their last IT organization, Challenger says. Older IT professionals have a much broader skill set to offer beyond the technology, he says. They have practical business experience, they understand project deadlines, and have experience in decision making. "All that's invaluable," he says.

IT pros should think ahead and keep their skills up to date. "The job search isn't the time to do retraining," Challenger says. Consultants tend to be more proactive in keeping their training fresh "because they're constantly marketing themselves," he adds.

That's true, says Phil Newbold, a former CIO who's now leading a consulting firm specializing in business transitions, such as mergers and acquisitions. While CIO at a large health-care company in the late 1990s, Newbold says the company's librarian--who managed online and book-based training resources--told him that the company's outside consultants used 90% of the training resources and company employees used only 10%. "Unfortunately, employees often think, 'Oh, I can do that anytime,' and end up never taking advantage of training opportunities," he says.

Right now, it's midlevel IT executives who are increasingly under scrutiny, and so they need to be particularly proactive in managing their careers, says Marc Lewis, president of the North American operations of executive search firm Morgan Howard Worldwide.

That's especially so for midlevel IT executives who are more highly paid in industries under pressure, such as health care or manufacturing, Lewis says. For instance, "a midlevel director of IT earning $200,000 needs to watch his back because there are lots of up-and-comers who'd be thrilled to take that job for $150,000," he says.

Beverly Lieberman, president of Halbrecht Lieberman Associates, an executive search firm specializing in IT, advises IT pros of any age wanting to stay competitive in the job market to "never get out of the game. No matter what position you're in, keep taking technology training, keep networking, and stay involved in professional organizations."