Run a 90-Day Career Reset — A Playbook You Can Actually Finish
Burnout isn’t a personality flaw—it’s a design problem. If you’re in midlife and work has started crowding out life, let’s redesign your week and reclaim direction. At WisGrowth, our goal is simple: help you stop guessing and start moving toward a career that serves your life. We’re your clarity companion—practical, honest, and on your side.
What to do next
- Design a sustainable week: non‑negotiables first (sleep, family, health).
- Name the 3 energisers and 3 drainers you felt last week—rebalance around them.
- Run a 30‑day role experiment: one small project in a direction you’re curious about.
- Rewrite your story: ‘What I’m moving toward’ in 3 sentences.
- Take the Career Clarity Quiz to sharpen direction.
💡 Try this next week: Rewrite one resume bullet with an action verb + measurable outcome.
Why we exist: careers shouldn’t be a guessing game. We give you clarity, honest feedback, and a path you can actually follow.
A 13-week program to go from confusion to momentum. Weekly objectives, scripts, and checkpoints you can follow.
What this reset is—and isn’t
If you’re in your thirties, forties, or fifties and feeling stuck, this plan is for you. It’s not a motivational pep-talk or a generic checklist. It’s a compact, 13-week operating system that fits alongside a demanding job and family life. You’ll clarify a direction, upgrade one or two decisive skills, ship visible proof of value, and build a pipeline of opportunities without burning bridges. The goal isn’t to change everything at once—it’s to create measured momentum that compounds week after week.
Use the cadence exactly as written, or adapt it to your pace. The key is small, finished steps, not big, unfinished goals. When in doubt, narrow the scope and ship the smallest useful version.
Weeks 1–3: Clarity
Start by choosing a target direction you can commit to for 90 days. You’re not picking a forever identity—you’re choosing a useful bet to test. Complete a fast personal audit:
- Energizers vs. Drainers: List five tasks that give you energy and five that drain it. Keep what compounds.
- Constraints: Time, money, location, caregiving—write them down so your plan fits real life.
- Target problems: Identify three problems you like solving that employers/clients pay for (e.g., lead quality, onboarding churn, operations chaos).
End this phase with a one-page plan: target role/market, one or two skills to upgrade, two proof-of-work ideas, and a weekly time budget. If you want structured prompts, try our Career Fit Questions—they’re designed to surface strengths you under-value.
Weeks 4–7: Capability
Pick one decisive skill (maximum two). The rule: if you can’t demonstrate it in a short project, it’s too broad. Examples: “SQL for dashboards”, “Landing page CRO”, “Stakeholder mapping”, “Prompt-engineering for research”.
- 45-minute practice blocks, 4× per week: Follow a micro-curriculum you assemble from one course + two real examples.
- Shadow and copy: Rebuild a small, public artifact (dashboard, script, case write-up) before inventing your own.
- Feedback loop: Post a WIP to a relevant community or share with a peer for one thing to improve next time.
By week 7 you should have one tangible artifact you can show—clean, simple, and relevant to your target roles. Not perfect, but publishable.
Weeks 8–10: Proof
Turn capability into evidence. Ship two micro case studies and one public demo. Keep them practical:
- Case Study #1 (Work-adjacent): Improve something in your current job by 10–20% (process, response time, sign-ups). Document baseline → intervention → outcome.
- Case Study #2 (Freelance/volunteer): Offer a tiny, time-boxed improvement to a friend’s business or a community project.
- Public Demo: A short Loom or live page that shows your work in action.
Keep each artifact to a single page or a 3–5 minute video. Add metrics and a “what I’d do next” section. This is what hiring managers and clients actually skim.
Weeks 11–13: Pipeline
Now you turn proof into conversations. Forget mass applications; aim for high-quality, calibrated outreach:
- Shortlist 25 targets: Companies or leaders where your proof is relevant. Note one hypothesis per target.
- Scripts: “Saw you’re shipping X. I built Y for Z and cut time by 18%. If this resonates, happy to share the 3 mistakes we made.”
- Volume: 5–8 genuine messages per week, 2 follow-ups spaced a week apart.
Track results weekly: replies, conversations, small tests, formal interviews. Expect a lag; week 12 is often where momentum shows up.
Your weekly scorecard (keep it simple)
| Metric | Target | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Focused practice blocks | 4 × 45 min | Skill gains compound with short, specific reps. |
| Shipped artifacts | 1 mini-artifact / week | Visible output beats “learning” in private. |
| Meaningful outreach | 5–8 msgs + follow-ups | Quality conversations create options. |
| Reflection | 15 min Sunday | Decide next week’s smallest useful step. |
Common traps—and how to avoid them
- Too many goals: Pick one bet and one skill. Park the rest for 90 days.
- Course collecting: Learn the minimum, then ship something tiny. Feedback is the teacher.
- Silent job boards: Calibrate early—ask about scope, success criteria, and comp in the first conversation to avoid ghosting.
- Identity panic: You’re not “starting over”—you’re translating past wins into a new container. See resume tips for midlife change.
Where WisGrowth fits
Use the ATS-honest resume scanner to translate experience into target-role language, try our Career Fit Questions to sharpen your bet, and explore midlife career coaching if you want accountability. If you’re considering a bigger pivot, these guides help: Career Reset at 40, Switch to Tech in Your 40s, and Job Search Over 40.
Kick off your reset this week
One focused hour a day is enough to change your trajectory this quarter. Keep the scope tiny, ship weekly, and let proof do the talking.
Get Your Career Clarity Audit →