From corporate to non-profit: When considering a radical career pivot, take a cue from your values

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In this series, Sliding Doors, we explore real-life crossroads that shape personal ambition: Take the leap or play it safe? Move forward or pivot? We talk to real people facing real-life decisions and speak to experts about the ambition and intuition behind these kinds of choices.

Lisa Murphy knows a lot about the risks and rewards of making a major career change. As a Toronto-based certified life coach, she’s worked with clients at a crossroads for the past three years having left a 19-year career in media herself.

“I was working really long hours and feeling disengaged from what I was doing, but also I was complaining a lot, and that was a real signal to me,” she says. “Boredom, a growing sense of unease, feeling like you can never catch up, depression, disconnection – these feelings are signs that you need to make a change.”

For some, that change is fuelled by a desire to serve their community and make a meaningful impact. “If you’re not clear about what you want to do next, it can be helpful to do exercises that help you define your values and write lists of things that you really enjoy doing, both personally and professionally,” says Ms. Murphy.

The following three women all left successful, high-powered roles to change their lives and support their communities. Read their inspiring stories, plus tips from Ms. Murphy on how to pivot to a more fulfilling career.

Rosel Kim, senior staff lawyer, Women’s Legal Education & Action Fund (LEAF)

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As a first-generation Korean immigrant, Rosel Kim wanted to do something meaningful for her community. “I had aspirations about giving back and working in the justice system,” she says.

After law school, however, Ms. Kim was lured into the prestigious, high-pressure world of corporate law on Toronto’s Bay Street. While she enjoyed the work and had good support, she was stressed by the long hours. “Your life really is dictated by the schedule of the business deals, so you don’t have a lot of control over your time.”

The toll was too much. Ms. Kim left corporate law to take a nine-to-five as a lawyer for a financial tech company. “I wanted to have the time and space to volunteer more and explore what I really wanted to do.”

She joined the Asian Canadian Women’s Alliance, which brings Asian Canadian women together who are interested in making social change. Those connections led her to the Women’s Legal Education & Action Fund (LEAF), where she’s been a senior staff lawyer since 2019.

“LEAF’s mission is to advance substantive gender equality through law, and we do that through litigation at the courts and law reform before the parliament,” she says.

Fighting uphill battles can challenging, says Ms. Kim, citing a recent case around the decriminalization of sex work that didn’t go their way. She also took a pay cut, acknowledging that not everyone has that privilege. It’s worth it though, she says.

“I feel good about the work we do.”

Krystyna Lloyd, CEO, Safe Haven

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At 16, Krystyna Lloyd left an unstable home and entered the world of adulthood with little resources or support. Two years later, she was a young mother determined to break the cycle by attending university on a bursary that would leave her debt-free.

“I wanted to provide for my family in a way that we could all be proud of and would earn them respect,” Ms. Lloyd says. “So, after graduation, I entered the work force with this level of intensity and drive and ambition.”

That drive eventually led her to the role of vice-president of engagement at Castlemain Class Action and Community Delivery, a consulting agency working on behalf of Indigenous communities. It was compelling work, but she says the 70-hour work weeks and expectations of perfection were a struggle.

“I entered life and adulthood with this feeling that I was not deserving of respect, that I needed to earn it,” she says. “This consulting industry, that is so built on meeting targets and being validated for over delivering, met that need in a very unhealthy way.”

Ms. Lloyd discovered Safe Haven, a “small, but mighty” Calgary-based non-profit supporting girls and women ages 14-24 who have left unhoused circumstances or unstable living situations. “Safe Haven provides not just a house, but a home, and provides wraparound supports that are centred around youth empowerment.”

She applied for the CEO position with a personal letter outlining her own experiences as a teenage girl who left a dangerous home. Now, she says, giving girls and women the mental health support she didn’t have as a young woman is full circle fulfilment.

“Their focus can, and should be, on healing.”

Jessica van Rooyen, executive director, Baby Love Beginnings

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After 15 years in corporate marketing, Jessica van Rooyen was killing it in the startup world, relishing the frenetic atmosphere, high stakes and emotional highs and lows.

“That’s kind of in my personality,” she says. “If I’m going to do something I like, I take it really seriously. I was proud of what we were building.”

She took a six-month maternity leave with her first baby and dove back into work. Just over a year later, while three months pregnant with her second child, the startup was sold. “I realized then that I didn’t want to repeat the same cycle. Motherhood profoundly shifted my perspective on how I wanted to spend my time and the kind of impact I wanted to have,” she says.

While on her second maternity leave, Ms. van Rooyen networked and met people in early childhood philanthropy including Julia Miller Black, who co-founded Toronto-based non-profit Baby Love Beginnings. The organization’s mission is to address diaper needs and early childhood inequities by providing free diapers to 13 charitable partners across the GTA.

In September, 2024, Ms. van Rooyen joined the organization as executive director.

“I just feel so passionate about what we’re doing,” she says. “I’m so excited to support growing Baby Love Beginnings using all of my startup mentality.”

Tips on how to pivot to a career in the non-profit world from life coach Lisa Murphy:

• If you aren’t certain what type of work you’re interested in, try volunteering at a few different organizations to see what resonates with your values.
• Talk with your partner or household members about the financial impact of changing careers and making less money.
• Save the equivalent of at least a few months’ salary before leaving a full-time job because it can take time to find a new role.
• Network. Use LinkedIn and personal connections to discover who works in your area of interest. Ask for a discovery meeting to learn about what they do and how your skills could be beneficial in that space.
• Apply for jobs at every level that align with your experience – communications, operations, law, hands-on labour, fundraising. There are many entry points into non-profit work.