Navigating the future of HR together

Nurturing your second-act seekers

Summer Sanders and Carrie White share lessons for HR leaders from U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes on what it takes to forge new career pathways for employees.

By Summer Sanders and Carrie White | October 10th, 2024

For Team USA, the Paris Games are now a wistful summer memory. As the excitement of medals, world records, and pageantry fades away, what’s left behind is an important part of the outcome of any Olympic and Paralympic Games: What do the thousands of athletes who competed do now?

For some, their focus is on the four-year cycle that leads to the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games. For others, however, an uncertain post-Games life and career looms.

Team USA Olympic and Paralympic athletes often make the difficult choice to delay traditional paths of four-year degrees, internships and full-time jobs so they can train and compete on a world stage. They know full well they will retire someday from the sport they love and pursue new opportunities off the field. And yet, searching for that second act is never an easy feat. The fact that so many Olympians and Paralympians compete well until their 30s these days only exacerbates the challenge, often making them feel more and more out of place in the non-athlete’s professional world when they finally do retire from elite competition.

Though U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes are unique in their contributions to our culture and society, they are among millions of workers in various industries who want to—or need to—transition to a new career. These people might even be working in your organization right now. Much like U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes who have given their lives to their sport, they might feel scared of losing who they are. They might be confused about what to do to get themselves unstuck. They might also be tremendous future assets to your organization.

Companies and organizations stand to benefit enormously if they can learn to nurture second act seeking in their people, whether those people are athletes or employees. Our experiences shed light on the ways in which organizations can cultivate the strengths and capabilities of their people striving boldly for new career paths. These insights can inform how HR leaders can support their workers to reach their full potential and how organizations can drive innovative talent and development programs. If you find yourself needing to facilitate such a change for your people, here are three things you can do.

Encourage a learning mindset

To successfully move from one career (like a world-class competitor) to another, people need internal fortitude, opportunity, and maybe even a bit of luck. Career pivoters, athletes or otherwise, also require contextual intelligence—the ability to understand the context and adapt one’s style and approach. This means an openness to new experiences, a sense of curiosity and inquiry, and a willingness to question one’s assumptions, biases, and perspectives.

Organizations can support the development of these capabilities by fostering a culture of psychological safety and risk taking. They can also afford their second-act seekers the option to contribute to projects and strategic initiatives outside their roles or expertise, and offer them “stretch” opportunities in new product and service areas. Most critical, however, is education and skilling, coupled with coaches to guide their new academic and career pursuits, no matter where that may take them.. Even the most contextually aware and intelligent former athlete needs the resources and tools to take that next step.

Identify transferable skills

Everyone gains skills through experience. Athletes in particular possess some impressive ones. They’re hardwired to go the extra mile in everything they do. They’re preternaturally team-oriented, ready to lift others up. You’d be hard-pressed to find an employee more equipped to handle failure, learn from mistakes, and get better at what they do all the time. They’re a professional population that possesses incredible drive and fortitude. In the main, they have what we would define as “abstract capabilities” that transfer well to in-demand roles in your organizations—but may not yet be translated into clear statements of what someone can bring to a firm.

For HR leaders, an important step in nurturing second-act seekers of kinds is seriously evaluating their skills and helping them articulate them. Many of your employees may be good at describing the specific tasks they do and their experiences with particular processes and skills. That’s why people list their job titles, describe a project they were on, and then list certifications on their resumes. But job descriptions are merely a rough guide to what makes people succeed at work. What are they actually capable of doing? Can they bring people together to work on a project toward common goals? Are they good at taking complex problem statements and turning them into a set of actions that can be carried out? Are they skilled at facilitating tough conversations and resolving conflicts? Some of these skills may not only be transferable but also critical to achieving important business outcomes. It’s up to HR leaders to help people identify them, articulate them in a different way, and transfer them.

Start formal education sooner rather than later

Education and career go hand in hand. Second-act seekers should begin now. Don’t wait to get started. Many U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes who aren’t ready to retire yet start school while still competing in their sport). While no doubt challenging, there’s power in being able to do two things at once: Think about the power of an athlete and a student, a frontline worker and a student, a parent and a working professional. Two or more aspects of one’s identity don’t have to be mutually exclusive. In fact, they can make someone stronger. We need to do a better job of changing the narrative.

Executives equally need to share the responsibility of assisting career pivoters in getting started in pursuing formal educational opportunities that will help them write their second act (which will also allow for greater employee retention in the long-run). Employers need to offer education-benefit programs in such a way and in such volume that employees see those programs as real and accessible to them. Further, people must feel and understand that these benefits offer them a real opportunity for career growth. Lastly, they must be afforded the freedom and flexibility to start a new career through education, hopefully sooner rather than later.

For example, eligible Team USA athletes now have access to tuition-free education and skilling opportunities through the partnership between Guild and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee and LA28, so they can gain new skills, get their degree, and prepare for that second act. Athletes are given access to Guild’s career coaches, so athletes can build toward a new career with a familiar figure—a coach—by their side.

Just start swimming

For U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes, second-act seekers across industry sectors, and their HR leaders alike: When people embark on a new career, it can feel like swimming in a sea of opportunity. They float, then drown, not knowing which direction is land. But the key is to take a deep breath and start paddling.

To ensure success, managers and organizations must provide coaching, developmental support, and educational opportunities, and second-act seekers must swim to them.