Switching careers late in life may be risky, but some people see it as a viable way of finally taking charge of one?s life.

NOT more than a generation ago, a career meant a lifetime vocation. A passion, preferably, but definitely remunerative work that fully reflected its Latin roots ? carrera, or race, a contest for fame and fortune.

Today, multiple careers are no longer uncommon, with engineers, writers, teachers, accountants, musicians, and other workers taking on jobs other than those they had originally planned for the rest of their lives.

In the Philippines, a teacher or nurse ? educated, licensed and trained for the job ? could just as easily take on a call center assignment or a transcription job and still earn a measure of success, allowing careers to progress both vertically and horizontally.

While career changes are no longer new among young employees, the trend is also rubbing off on not-so-young workers or even retirees. But it?s not the same though, career experts caution. Any career move among senior workers must be deliberate and calculated, and anchored as well on both economic and health realities, these experts add.

Benjie Uichico, 51, president of STI College in Lipa and Tanauan and executive director of the De la Salle Alumni Association, believes it is important to assess the situation before plunging into a new career.

He admits to being less than cautious early in his career, but became more careful and prudent when he decided to venture into education 10 years ago. ?I knew I was not getting any younger,? says Uichico, who was employed in the family agribusiness before deciding to buy a franchise of STI Tanauan in Batangas. ?It was a scary decision because I started the school at the height of the 1997 Asian financial crisis.?

Fortunately for Benjie, brother to professional basketball coach Jong Uichico, his career change was a deliberate choice and not an option forced on him by circumstances. For him and a few others, a late career change does not happen overnight, as they had to go through the process of reflecting between the reality of their lives and the dreams they wanted to pursue.

Angel Lazaro Jr., 91, the patriarch behind Angel Lazaro and Associates, a successful engineering and architecture consulting firm, topped the 1938 licensure exam for civil engineers and was at the crest of his career when he realized that he also wanted to become an architect. After over 20 years as an engineer, he went back to school to study architecture, and similarly topped the licensure board for architects in 1968.

A late career change need not always be driven by a dream. Sometimes, it happens out of sheer need. Lily Quibilan, 65, a former school teacher and organization development practitioner, had just quit her job in a floundering appliance manufacturing company when her youngest son Jose Mari offered to partner with her in the establishment Scents and Blends, a company specializing in personal care products.

In the absence of a steady source of income and in her genuine desire to help her son, the mother of five agreed to support the project by tapping into her savings for the project?s initial capital and lending her expertise and experience in organization development to run the business.

In less than five years, the solid partnership between mother and son has blossomed into 20 outlets in SM stores in Metro Manila and Cebu.

Unfortunately, not all Filipinos have the same mindset as Uichico, Lazaro Jr., and Quibilan, especially if they?re holding down a government job. As one administrative official in a government agency based in Quezon City, explains: ?Most, if not all, employees are conscious of their tenure and are determined to work into retirement in the same jobs.?

The official believes they cannot be faulted. She said a career change was more feasible among people with sufficient financial resources to take up another course in pursuit of a new career path or start a business. ?With ordinary government workers, a late career change is not an easy option because of their meager resources.?

Lourdes Rivera, 71, a former government employee who owns and manages the Ultima Entrepinoy Center and Spices & Foodmix House, does not agree. Anyone can use her expertise and network of connections to start a new career as a consultant and entrepreneur, says this consultant for various food establishments in Metro Manila.

Rivera?s training center, founded soon after she retired from government service as a trainer of 41 years at the Bureau of Animal Industry, is now one of the country?s premier training centers for food entrepreneurs.

With the Philippines? chronic boom and bust economic cycle, a career change forced by retrenchment and economic cutbacks is generally seen as a financial setback or ?a lost race? rather than as a viable opportunity for career change for a lot of Filipinos.

?A late career change is not easy, but certainly doable,? Uichico said. ?It?s all in the mind and if you think you are a lost cause, then you are.?

Successful career changers believe it is not enough that you have the resources and passion for it; you have to pray as well to become successful. You have to take charge as you cannot spend too much of your life waiting for the next stage for things to get better. ?