169: You’re Not Just a Teacher: Lisa Harding’s Blueprint for Career Reinvention

Holly Owens (00:00.648)
Hello everyone and welcome to another amazing episode of Ed Up Learning and Development. My name is Holly Owens and I'm your host and I have a very good friend and guest and colleague, all the things, LinkedIn connection here with me today. I have Lisa Harding, so Lisa, welcome to the show.

Lisa Harding (00:21.145)
am so excited to be here.

Holly Owens (00:23.29)
I am so excited for you to tell us all about your journey, what you're currently doing with your teacher. Make sure I say it right, because I get the words mixed up sometimes. I don't want to mess it up. So I'll let you talk about it. So let's start at the beginning. Tell us about your journey into learning development. I stalked your LinkedIn profile. You were doing something a little bit different before you jumped into this Academy space and helping transitioning teachers. So tell us about your journey. Where did you start and where you are now?

Lisa Harding (00:53.103)
Sure, well thanks Holly. Just a shout out to the power of networking because Holly and I met on LinkedIn and we've done various projects together over the course without ever meeting in real life and I think that's just a great testament to the power of networking. yeah, yeah, it's great.

Holly Owens (01:00.372)
Yeah

Holly Owens (01:05.235)
And we're friends! We're friends! That's... for sure.

Lisa Harding (01:11.873)
My journey where I am now is a proud and excited co-founder of the Teacher Career Transition Academy, which is an online coaching program that helps teachers find new roles outside the classroom. But that venture is about three years old for me. So let's rewind. And how did I get where I am? I like to go all the way back and just say my parents were both school teachers.

They met teaching and public education, all my aunts and cousins were school teachers, and it kind of runs in the family, right? So there was this thought that like, I would just be a teacher, because everyone else was but I took a little bit of a different path after college.

I went directly to work for an Ed Tech company. Specifically, it was a company in the teacher professional development space, online learning and CEUs. If you're a teacher and you've done online CEUs, you may have worked with me or my company in the past. I worked there for 15 years. I had various roles at the company, but I'd say probably what I most honored to say that I did there was the last

five years that I was at the company, served as their CEO. I loved every single day working with teachers and

Lisa Harding (02:30.821)
Holly, did I lose the audio? I cannot hear you now. wait, I can hear you now. Yes.

Holly Owens (02:35.96)
no. Okay, can you hear me now? I was just gonna say, I learned something new about you through stalking your LinkedIn profile and that was it, that you were a CEO.

Lisa Harding (02:47.821)
Okay, can we edit this out? Okay, okay. So I had the honor and privilege to serve as the company's CEO and during my time there, I joked that I probably sat through more teacher PD than the average teacher, but I think another important aspect of it is that all the various jobs that I had there from marketing, from content, from community management, customer success, sales,

Holly Owens (02:50.836)
Yes, of course we can. Just keep going with your story.

Lisa Harding (03:16.085)
I interviewed, recruited, hired, and worked with career transitioning teachers. And at the time, I just thought that was part of my job. And I just had that experience. Well, fast forward, I wanted to focus on my family and myself. So I stepped down from my role as CEO and I thought that was it. I was gonna be a stay at home mom, love on my babies, grow my family.

And I realized that I really missed working with teachers and I guess teachers missed working with me. Folks started reaching out to me on LinkedIn asking about how to get jobs in the ed tech space. And I think that's kind of how it all organically started for me. And I started just chatting to folks about tips and tricks that

From my perspective, on the other side of the hiring table that I saw with transitioning teachers, and one thing led to another, I ended up getting my career coaching certification, and here we are three years later with the Teacher Career Transition Academy.

Holly Owens (04:21.742)
And it's grown so much since you started it. I really want to commend you on that. And I love the fact that you have all the experience of the CEO, the marketing. You truly have what it takes to what you're doing and building this. So it's really cool that you got that experience. like you just started another path. You just started another career. And it's so neat to kind of see that come to fruition for you.

Lisa Harding (04:48.165)
Thank you, yeah. Never in a million years would I have thought that I would be doing this, but here we are and now I truly just can't imagine doing anything else. I feel like everything before this was leading me to this path and that just feels really good.

Holly Owens (05:00.456)
Yes, yes, 100%. I love it that you said that because I feel like every career or job you have is just a stepping stone to something greater. Like I had no idea in 2011 when I left teaching that and getting into e-learning development that that was gonna help me land a role at like Amazon or any of these things that have happened. It's crazy, isn't it? People are like, it's, know, everything happened.

happens for a reason. really do feel like careers do that jobs and roles and such.

Lisa Harding (05:32.289)
Yeah, and when it aligns so naturally, I think the other thing is just the passion. And if the passion is there, and I've always been someone to follow the passion, I feel like that makes a big difference too.

Holly Owens (05:46.398)
Yeah, so as you know, many of the listeners here, have the bulk of them are transitioning teachers or they're looking to navigate career shifts into this learning and development state, this place where there's just a vast amount of different roles. Like I did a LinkedIn recently live where I talked about all the different roles in L and D.

So what's like one pivotal decision or a turning point that really just kind of changed everything for you? And can you put that into a perspective where you're telling the listeners and giving them kind of advice on like how to do this because you're successful at it that's what people want. They wanna be successful at it.

Lisa Harding (06:25.465)
at creating like your own.

Holly Owens (06:26.74)
Yeah, creating your own little journey, even to your, you know, the L and D space just from being in this career academy, because a lot of your teachers come into this and they want to be instructional designers. So like, what can people do? Like talk about a point where it's like, this is what changed for me. And then talk about a point where like, maybe this is something that they could do to make it change for them.

That's a hard question. I'm putting you on the spot.

Lisa Harding (06:53.771)
Yes, I'm trying to see like which angle to take here, but I think clarity before action is really important. So whether you want to get into a career in learning and development, or you want to start your own business where you're putting your learning and development skills into practice, I think either of those avenues or maybe it's you don't know what career you want yet.

Holly Owens (07:02.726)
I love that.

Lisa Harding (07:21.381)
and maybe it's not in learning development, but whatever the next step is, think clarity before action is so important because you need to know where you want to go before you get there. And I think, I mean, in the world of development and even software development, there's a saying, it's like, for every hour spent pre-planning is like 10 hours you're going to save in development. And I think the same is true with your career.

So the more you can spend really niching down to figure out what's gonna make you happy, where are your true strengths, where's that intersection of passion and skill, and then lots of research and exploring. If you can do all of that before you start taking any action, you'll save yourself a lot of time, I think.

Holly Owens (08:10.684)
Yeah, I say the same things to some of the people that I talk to, know, having those 15 minute coffee chats with is like, they'll come in and they'll say like, I want to be in learning and development. And I'm like, well, what part of learning and development do you want to be in? I think it's difficult. Like, you're not just going into like, say, a software engineer role where that's like a, you have a strict set of structure there. You know, what kind of credentials do you need?

learning and development is seen different everywhere. So you really have to figure out, I going on the corporate track? Am I going to stay a little bit in the education realm? Am I doing freelance? Am I doing government? So I think that's really...

Lisa Harding (08:56.802)
boy.

Holly Owens (08:57.143)
My computer's been acting up all day. So for those of you listening or watching, my computer has had a mind of its own. My video's gone still, all different kinds of stuff. So the Clarity Procore Action is really, really, really great advice. So before you were going into starting up your academy, what did you learn from just listening to the transitioning teachers group?

What are some of the things that people are coming into academy and saying, like, what do they really need? I'm thinking in particular, like, the experience of talking to teachers that come from a lot of trauma in the classroom and before they can really have that clarity before action, they have to kind of deal with that. So what are some of the commonalities and similarities that people are coming in with and, asking you consistently about?

Lisa Harding (09:47.685)
Yeah, and that's definitely at the forefront of every single conversation. mean, because teachers can go in so many different career paths. But at the very beginning of it, it seems like everyone has the same struggles. And we kind of break it down into a four step process at the Academy. And step one is mindset. And it's mindset for a reason. A lot of people want to skip it, Holly. And I'm like, please don't skip this. And a lot of times

Holly Owens (10:12.167)
I know. I know.

Lisa Harding (10:15.429)
lot of times the suggestion is for some folks, you may want to actually get professional help and you may need it even after you transition because just depending on your environment, there can be real trauma that has happened. There can be real physical burnout that you might need a doctor for. kind of the common things there is the guilt of leaving.

Holly Owens (10:42.443)
Yes.

Lisa Harding (10:43.013)
Everyone kind of suffers from that and I did not leave a classroom setting, but I left a company that I worked at for 15 years and they felt like family too. And I even know the emotional side of making a career transition with guilt and emotion. So I can't even imagine what that would be like with a teacher with little like with children because the bond there is even more emotional than I think maybe like working with adults. So

there's that guilt and like navigating through that. There is also realizing your self worth so many times we hear the phrase like just a teacher or people say I'm just a teacher.

Holly Owens (11:22.817)
Those who can't teach. Yeah, right.

Lisa Harding (11:25.187)
Those that can't do teach, why do we say that? Teachers are phenomenal and they don't even realize it sometimes. So it's believing in yourself, imposter syndrome, thinking that you can't be anything else. There's just really a big emotional and mental side of any life change and especially a career change for a teacher.

Holly Owens (11:52.151)
for sure. And I just remember coming out and like you said, you pointed to the guilt, the guilt of like, you you feel this ultimate responsibility towards your students and like making their lives better. And you develop these connections with them. And now you don't know, like I worked in a very tough district. So I was like helping them. I like, they didn't have lunch money. They didn't eat breakfast. They, know, stuff like that. And it's like,

they relied on you and now you're stepping away from that and you're taking care of yourself. That is such a difficult transition. It's a lot to deal with. I also coach field hockey, so I had to leave the field hockey crew and I really wanted to just have a different career path. So I'm so glad that's one of the first things you talked about is that mindset shift because you have to deal with that first before you can focus.

on where you're going in the L &D space and having this career transition be something that's successful for you and something that you want to do. Speaking of that, all too many times, I don't know if you've experienced this with working with transitioning teachers, but people take the first job right out of the gate sometimes, and that's not necessarily something that I think you should do, and they take a pay cut. So how do you feel about

How do you navigate that when people ask you like, okay, should I just, I took this job, it's a lower salary, but it's getting my foot in the door. So how can we kind of mitigate doing that and then having to jump again into a different role?

Lisa Harding (13:26.553)
Yeah, and I think that's a really tough question. And I think the reason it's so tough is because every individual is in a very different place. We're all the same or they're all the same because they want to, they're transitioning teachers that want to change, but everyone's personal situation, financial situation is all very different. And those are the practical aspects of a career change that we have to consider. So I like to talk a lot about bridge jobs.

And to me, a bridge job is something that, like you said, is that stepping stone. but to me, bridge jobs are ones that are like easier to walk away from. And so you're not necessarily like, job hopping, but it's there as a bridge and no one really expected more from you than it being a bridge. So that could be like,

a great example, like working at Costco or nannying for a family for a year. And you can be upfront with them, like I'm gonna nanny for a year because I need to get out of the classroom, but I don't know what my next career is yet. So I look at those as bridge jobs and you go into them knowing they're not the end all be all. you're talking about career jobs though, that's a harder.

Holly Owens (14:35.946)
Yeah.

Lisa Harding (14:42.125)
That's a harder conversation because sometimes you might want to take that lower level job to get your foot in the door and then jump from here to there. But if you have, again, clarity before action, if you follow that, I would say the clarity will push you to only apply for the jobs that really maybe you should be going for, if that makes sense.

Holly Owens (15:06.455)
That makes sense and a lot of people do. I love it. You have names for all the things that I talk about. So now I'm going to be stealing your terms to talk about things that I normally talk about. So I'm like, it's the first job out since the first thing that you do, but the bridge job makes sense. And one of the things I kind of want to hone in for the listeners is that your first job out of it, it's not your last stop. I feel like people put so many of their eggs in one basket sometimes. like, I just...

Lisa Harding (15:13.253)
you

Holly Owens (15:35.479)
Because teaching was supposed to be a lifetime thing, right? I put all my, I just want this to be the final step for me, but it's not because you're going to learn so much throughout your career. So take as much of that in as you can in my role. Do the PD, learn the tools, and then, you know, set yourself up for success for that next position or that career position that you're talking about.

Lisa Harding (15:56.677)
Yeah, and that's a big conversation we have a lot too. Because like, as you pointed out in education, if you want to know what you're going to be making in 10 years, all you have to do is go to the Department of Education website, if you're a public school teacher, and you know what your job and what you're going to be making is in 10 years. It's not like that in the corporate world. And obviously, I'm not a fan. Like, I'm not going to say, Oh, yeah, you should be job jumping all the time. But I mean, just look at my career. I was at the same company for 15 years.

Holly Owens (16:08.651)
Yep.

Holly Owens (16:12.744)
Exactly.

Lisa Harding (16:25.445)
Holly, I literally had to beg, beg to get my first job there. Like they did not want to hire me. And I was like, because I was going for a role above what they wanted to hire me for. And they had a lower role open. And I was like, I can't survive on that one. Like, please give me a chance. And then I was running the company. That's crazy. Like, like, I mean, how did that even happen? But it's because in corporate America, you get your foot in the door and

Holly Owens (16:31.863)
Yeah.

Holly Owens (16:44.523)
Yeah.

Lisa Harding (16:51.813)
all of these opportunities open like your mind going from teaching into corporate America is going to be like, it's going to explode because you're like, I didn't know that that was a department like, what is that department to like, what's your job? Like you're just introduced to so many new aspects. And companies are growing and changing all the time and they love to promote from within. So your first job is literally just like getting your foot in the door and really the sky's the limit.

Holly Owens (17:20.255)
Yeah, I think that speaks to another thing too that we really need to tell the listeners in the community of transitioning teachers is that you're worth it. And the fact that don't take like a lower pay to where you can't live, you know, really advocate for yourself in those higher roles. Like you said, you became CEO, so it's possible to do that. Give yourself a seat at the table. Give yourself the opportunity to really

take your teaching experience and put that to use in those transferable skills. I think one of the things that is so challenging is that teacher transitioning teachers get complacent in the fact that they're like, or imposter center, like, I just can't do this. So I'm not gonna apply for it. So how do you feel or how do you help people when they're looking at roles and they're like, I don't know if I'm exactly qualified this, but they probably are. How do you encourage them or motivate them to kind of see that they should be taking these chances?

Lisa Harding (18:17.209)
Yeah, it goes back to like working on, you know, your view of yourself and what your skills are. I love doing just an inventory. Like I think a great exercise is when you start doing this, write down everything that you rock at, like everything that you're good at. And then maybe ask peers, a friend, a family member, like write down everything awesome about you. And I think when you see it on paper, you start to realize like, wow, I really do have a lot of amazing skills.

And then what you can do is look at the job description. And as you hone your transferable skills and you start making connections between the skills you have in a classroom and you start to see how they relate in corporate America, just go line by line in a job description and say like, do I do that? Yes, but how is it different? Okay, well, how can I rephrase that? And I think you just start to build your confidence that you can do it too.

I think another thing to help build confidence is surround yourself by other people that have done it or positive people that have gone through it. you know, following you Holly on on LinkedIn and yeah, and but but really again clarity first is following the people that have taken that exact path that you have. So if we have a member that's into learning and development, like you got to follow Holly like that, you know,

Holly Owens (19:23.575)
Following you Lisa too.

Lisa Harding (19:39.107)
surround yourself with people that have done it and talk to people that have done it too. but also, you know, there will be jobs that come along and you'll read the description and you won't be qualified for them. And that's fine. I mean, there's jobs that I'm not qualified like, and that's fine. It's not a match. but just because it says like X years of experience, think of the term like experience more broadly. It doesn't have to be exactly experience in that niche, but you have.

have that experience in your classroom. And a lot of it is the same when you look at transferable skills, especially in the world of learning and development. Like that's one where it's to me a no brainer, like you for sure have that experience. I have teachers that get into like brand new career fields and they may not, so they have to go and upscale and do different things. But if you wanna get into learning and development, trading, corporate America, I mean, that is all like you have that.

Holly Owens (20:11.051)
Right.

Lisa Harding (20:37.933)
skill set already a thousand percent.

Holly Owens (20:41.079)
Yes. And I think that kind of translates into the next question or a good transition. The next question I want to ask is like, everybody realized like there's a piece of your academy that talks about like resume cover letter, LinkedIn profile. But one of the things I see people focus on far too heavily is probably the resume aspect. And I always tell them it's not just one thing you can do. And it's not like the olden days back in the day where the resume was like the mecca of like what everybody knew about your experience.

It's so different nowadays. So how do you help people in the academy kind of get out of the mindset as like, they are just focusing on perfecting that resume or putting in specific tailored resumes to different roles. And then what comes along with all of that, the cover letters, the LinkedIn profile, the portfolio, all those different things. Can you speak to that a little bit?

Lisa Harding (21:32.835)
Yeah, people love a resume holly. So I'm doing a keynote in the teacher career transition summit. And part of the keynote is the areas that teachers tend to get stuck when making a career transition. And one of them is just wanting to do the resume first. People think, I need a new job. The first thing I have to do is update my resume.

Holly Owens (21:36.151)
I know!

Holly Owens (21:52.865)
Definitely a blocker. Yeah.

Holly Owens (22:01.727)
Yes.

Lisa Harding (22:02.101)
everyone. No, that's not the first step actually. But you know, work on your mindset is step one, step two is career clarity. And then step three is your marketing materials. And I think you kind of hit the nail on the head there where, for me, the resume is essential because you need one, but it is literally just a piece of an entire puzzle. And in today's job market, what I like to tell people is you need a good enough resume. And yes, I do it does need to match

the career that you're going for, it does need to match a job description. So that it's like, this is an L &D role, I'm going for that role. And you wouldn't use an L &D focused resume to apply for a sales job, like that would need to be different. But when it comes down to like obsessing over every little detail and changing it for every little bullet point, I say take all of that time that you would do on that.

Holly Owens (22:47.575)
True.

Lisa Harding (23:00.419)
and put it into networking and you're gonna get a much higher return on your time investment because in today's job market, it is a tough job market and there's market experts much smarter than me that all they do is study the job market and so this is coming from them. It's a tough job market. And submitting your resume alone is not enough right now. So take that extra time.

Holly Owens (23:23.797)
Yep.

Lisa Harding (23:26.805)
and put it into setting up informational interviews, joining LinkedIn groups, talking to people. You're gonna move the needle much faster.

Holly Owens (23:35.893)
Yeah, I love that because I, you know, it's literally not just one thing. You can't just focus on that or even obsess over the portfolio that because that's changing too. The resume, I tell people, is such a static document. It doesn't show your personality. It just is like what you put in there, what you've experienced at your career, maybe some skill sets, some soft, some hard skills or things you have, but it doesn't show.

you know who you are, it's a way to kind of get in and just get that initial interview, but it's not the whole package I see, it's a piece of the puzzle. So this is going by really fast, this episode, but I want to see what you would say as an expert, seeing you as an expert in this transition and doing all the things you're doing with Teacher Career Transition Academy. What are like, you've said a couple throughout, but what are like the three pieces of advice if there's a listener right now?

They're sitting and teaching, they're not happy, they're looking to transition out. Besides joining Teacher Career Transitioning Academy, which we have everything in the show notes about how to do that, and all of Lisa's great events, what would you tell them to do? Like if you were sitting down with them, what are the top three things?

Lisa Harding (24:47.845)
Sure. I think number one is believe in yourself because there's a lot of us out there that believe in you and know what amazing employees teachers make. And I can say some of my all time best employees were former teachers. So believe in yourself. And two is the importance of process. And I think that's kind of at the heart or that is the heart and soul of the Teacher Career Transition Academy.

and what we do with teachers. And I think a lot of the roadblocks are just kind of getting off track, doing things in the wrong order, but there's a process to making a career transition. And you don't need a coach, you don't need the academy, like I'd to work with you and help you through it, but start at the top and work your way through. So to simplify it, it's work on your mindset, believe in yourself. Step two is finding career clarity.

Step three is putting your marketing materials together. And step four is learning how to interview and negotiate. And we talk a lot about the process and whether you just have those four steps or you dive in and write down a checklist. Teachers do so well with checklists and working things through. Just having that there as a guide so that when you get off track, you can come back and pick up. Because momentum is also important. It's like,

If you want to diet or get healthier, it's so easy to fall off the wagon and it's 10 times harder to get back on and keep going. Exactly, so career change is the same. So think of it as a process and even if you can do 15 minutes a week working towards your goal just to keep that momentum. And then my last big piece of advice is networking. Networking is so important.

Holly Owens (26:16.427)
Yeah, every Monday, every Monday we're jumping on that wagon, right? We're jumping on that wagon.

Lisa Harding (26:38.437)
from the first second that you think maybe I want a new job, all the way through to actually getting the offer, networking needs to be something that you're regularly and consistently.

Holly Owens (26:52.535)
Yeah, love those. So believe in yourself first, deal with all the trauma coming out of teaching and knowing your worth, dealing with the imposter syndrome. Implementation process is important, taking the steps. We all know this from being in the career space. then, you said checklists are important as well. then, what was the, I wrote it down, networking. Yeah, the networking piece and being out in LinkedIn world, can't stress that enough. Now people are like, ah, LinkedIn, not nowadays.

Lisa Harding (27:12.942)
Networking.

Holly Owens (27:21.737)
Job applications, mostly ask for your LinkedIn profile. Like I haven't seen, I've seen more ask it than not at this point in looking and doing some of the research. So Lisa, thank you so much for coming on the show. I want you to be able to tell people about some of your events through Teacher Career Transition Academy. So where can they find you? Where can they learn more about your events? Where should they go? And of course, you're gonna include this all in the show notes. And of course, it's gonna be attached to your bio, but where can we find you?

What are you up to?

Lisa Harding (27:51.045)
Sure, sure. Thanks Holly. Well, our website, which you can drop a link, just teachercareertransitionacademy.com. From there, you can learn about our formal coaching program, but there is a place for an events calendar. And if you go over to the event calendar, we're always offering free coaching calls. So you can jump on any free coaching call that you want.

Lots of different topics from LinkedIn, resumes, career clarity. We cover all of it. And then we also have a podcast as well, which Holly, I got to get you on an episode over there. And just would love to connect with anyone and feel free to follow me on LinkedIn and reach out if you have any questions.

Holly Owens (28:24.224)
Yeah.

Holly Owens (28:34.881)
Yeah, thank you so much. I love the free events you do. I love participating in those and meeting your community and some people who are new to the community. So it's really fantastic and I'm honored to join those because you do such a great job of hosting those. So thank you so much again for coming on the show and everybody check out the show notes of where you can find Lisa and the Teacher Career Transition Academy and we will talk soon.