Career changes are some of the biggest moves we will ever make, but they don’t have to be daunting.

Using mental models can help you clarify the direction you want to go and plan for how to get there. They are tools that will give you more control over your career and more...

Do you know where you want to go? Are you moving with direction or just moving? As a mental model, velocity reminds us there is a difference between speed and direction.

It’s easy to move fast without getting anywhere. We can stay busy all day without ...

Once you know where you want to end up, it’s often useful to work backward to where you are now. This is known as inversion. Start at the end and carefully consider the events that get you there in reverse order.

For example, it could be something as simple as waking up...

Take stock of the skills you already have. Why do you need to do this? So you know what you can repurpose. Here, you’re using the concept of exaptation, which is part of the broader adaptation model in biology.

Exaptation refers to traits that evolved for one purpose and t...

It’s hard to know how great (or terrible) a job is until you actually do it. We often have two types of maps for the careers we wish we had: maps of the highlights, success stories, and opinions of people who love the work and maps based on how much we love the field or discipline ourselves.

• One of the things global and local maxima teaches us is that sometimes you have to go down a hill in order to climb up a new one. If you look at your career change through the lens of global and local maxima, you will see that steps down can also be steps forward.

In this particular situation (of a career change), it can be helpful to use a Bayesian casino.

A Bayesian casino is a thought experiment where you imagine walking up to a casino game, like roulette, and quantifying how much you would bet on any particular outcome.

Probabilis...