Did you know that one in five people changed careers during the COVID-19 pandemic?* I am one of them. I have a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with an emphasis in Supply Chain Management. I spent the past 10 years of my career working for BP, analyzing supply markets and material costs, negotiating contracts, managing supplier performance, and strategic planning. My job was to make the budget stretch further in order to help the business achieve goals by spending more efficiently.
So how did I go from contract negotiator to personal financial advisor? It may seem like less of a shock knowing that when I was growing up, phrases like ‘opportunity cost’ and ‘living below your means’ were commonplace in my family. Fast forward, and my Facebook is mostly sponsored articles like, “How much you should have saved for retirement by age 30.” My last year with BP I worked on a project for global finance on the value proposition of the energy transition. As a result, when BP announced the sale of its Alaska assets and I began assessing my next step, I kept circling back to the idea of transitioning to finance.
I met with Laura Bruce from AWMI in 2019, and just like that (two years, a new baby, and a pandemic later), I realized that I wanted to develop similar strategic plans as my former work but now for individuals planning for their future – plans with the same long-term outlook, flexibility for changing objectives, and durability under different conditions for a new purpose. I am excited to swap my performance metrics from contracts to clients, to individuals who are confident in retirement, who have financial freedom, or who can help their kids through college. Helping Alaskans achieve their financial goals by planning and investing more efficiently is my new metric for success.
My husband and I both grew up in Alaska. We have a three-year-old son, a one-year-old daughter, and a four-year-old Bernese Mountain Dog. I also recently joined the board of the YWCA Alaska. We are a hockey family in the winter, so we are counting the days to the season opener for the Anchorage Wolverine junior team. And, with the Seattle Kraken sponsorship of our University of Alaska Anchorage Seawolves hockey program, our family will soon abandon our San Jose Sharks gear or at least put it towards the back of the closet. In the summers we are camping, fishing, playing at the lake, working in the yard, or teaching our three-year-old the next sport.
While I re-skill for a new career, my evenings and weekends will include another activity: studying. With my husband on kid duty, and an amazing team to learn from at AWMI, I have the best support for a smooth transition. Having them in my corner is the chief reason why “starting over” feels less like a leap of faith and more like a carefully considered strategic plan with a long-term outlook, flexible and durable in order to help me achieve my goals.
Every day I get to research something new, optimize social security strategies, and assess at what age clients can retire without ‘breaking the plan’. When I was little, my sister and I would complain about my dad listening to Money Talk in the car. Now, I listen to financial podcasts each morning, but I try to keep it for after daycare drop-off because not everyone needs market news with their morning coffee. That’s where AWMI comes in. We watch the markets so that you can pursue your own passion.
*Prudential: Pulse of the American Worker Survey – March 2021
Kelsey Rising
Associate Financial Advisor
