Retrain at 48? Learning and development

[Twoshoesnewshoes]

I’m in a bit of a muddle about what to do next career wise.
I’m not feeling ambitious anymore, but definitely want to change direction. I’m a psychotherapist and also work in clinical steering.
I really miss being in a team and having a work place. I also want to move away from working in mental health.

the idea is always seem to come back to us working in learning and development HR type team, maybe at a uni or in the NHS.
anyone in the sort of role? Any advice?

I need to maintain a decent income - at least £40k, though I can afford to drop for a year or two,

im tired and a bit grumpy so retraining will be a challenge, but I really need to make changes.
thanks.

You might find it helpful to browse the Mature Study and Retraining board?

Thank you, I’ll have a look!

I decided to leave accountancy where I had been fairly senior at around that age and I retrained in HR. I added formal qualifications to a lot of management experience from my prior career. Sadly after qualifying with a masters and CIPD L7, I found nobody was interested in a 49 year HR “junior”. On paper I should have been a great fit, they always seem to make out that it is hard to find HR people with strong analytical and numerical skills which I had in boatloads, but my age was more offputting I guess. Sorry I cannot be more positive, hopefully others have had better experiences in transitioning.

@Aprilx that’s so helpful though, thank you. That’s one of my concerns, that’s it’s just much harder due to age.

Also, what do you do now when f it’s ok to ask? Did you go back to finance?

I also re-trained mid 40s, in HR and I even managed a contract role in a international company, recruitment administration, for 18 months. However, I then tried to move into a perm role and was told I was 'too experienced', not 'experienced enough', not the 'specific industry experience' and eventually gave up. So, took a FE teaching qualification, went self-employed, then moved into employment support, where I give and help with a great deal of HR advice and signposting to help with employment issues! So, the qualification was handy, just not in the way I'd hoped!