An executive in ortho messaged me on LinkedIn today with a career question that felt simple on the surface yet very familiar underneath.
(at least to me)
He had closed one major professional chapter.
He had stepped into medical sales.
And now he was looking around at the next move with the most honest question a strong person can ask:
What is next?
And, not in a curious, eager-beaver, motivational-poster way. With his background, this guy eats indecision for breakfast, believe me.
As in:
I've done hard things, I've served our country for two decades, I've gone beyond the grind, and I've proven I can adapt.
And I still don't know which direction makes the most sense from here.
If that's where you are, please hear me:
You don't need to know the whole next chapter before you start moving. You need one clear target for the next 30 days.
The trouble is you probably could be great in a variety of industries. You likely would crush it in multiple specialties.
BUT
As my Uncle Chase might say, "You've only got one *ss. So pick one horse and ride it first."
Because when you're unsure, the temptation is to keep every door open.
Every role.
Every industry.
Every company.
Every title.
Every possible version of yourself.
And that sounds flexible, but it usually creates a foggy search.
And you know what happens in fog.
Things. Slow. Down.
Too many directions make you harder to understand
When you're in transition, especially after military service, a layoff, a pivot, a territory change, a leadership shift, or a first move into medical sales, it can feel responsible to say, "I'm open."
Open to sales and leadership, operations and training, device and pharma, and whatever a good company might see in you.
I understand why people do it.
It feels safer.
And honestly, sometimes it feels true.
But here is the problem: if your target is too broad, your resume, LinkedIn profile, networking message, and interview story start sounding broad too.
And broad doesn't always read as versatile.
Sometimes broad reads as unclear.
That doesn't mean you're unclear as a person.
It means the market doesn't yet know how to categorize your value.
Pick the most intriguing target first
Here's what I told that LinkedIn connection, and it's what I tell clients all the time:
You can have a few possible directions at first.
That's normal.
But choose the most intriguing one for the first 30 days.
Not forever, and not as a blood oath.
Just for 30 days.
Pick the role, lane, company type, or industry direction that makes you most curious, and then study it like you're entering a new territory.
For a medical sales professional, that might mean:
- Trauma sales
- Orthopedics
- Surgical device
- Diagnostics
- Laboratory sales
- Specialty pharma
- Healthcare technology
- Training or enablement
- Regional leadership
- Commercial operations
- Distributor or fractional leadership
The point isn't to trap yourself.
The point is to give yourself enough focus to learn something useful.
A 30-day target gives the market something to answer
When you choose one target for 30 days, you create a cleaner test.
You can research that lane more deeply.
You can identify the companies hiring in that space.
You can find people already doing the work.
You can study the language in job descriptions.
You can compare the common problems those companies are trying to solve.
You can ask better networking questions.
And, maybe most importantly, you can see how the market responds.
Do people understand the connection quickly?
Do recruiters know where to place you?
Do your conversations open up?
Do your materials feel easier to tailor?
Do you become more interested the more you learn, or less?
That information is valuable.
It's also very hard to get when you're trying to pursue six directions at once.
Your materials cannot serve every possible future equally
This is where job seekers get themselves into a tangle.
They want the resume to keep every option open.
They want the LinkedIn profile to sound attractive to every kind of recruiter.
They want the summary to cover sales, leadership, operations, training, strategy, execution, relationship-building, market development, clinical support, and whatever else might be helpful.
And pretty soon, the whole thing sounds technically impressive and completely hard to place.
That's not a writing problem.
That's a target problem.
Your resume can only make a strong argument when it knows what it is arguing for.
Your LinkedIn profile can only become findable when it knows the language of the lane.
Your networking message can only sound confident when the person receiving it understands why you're reaching out.
And your interview story can only land cleanly when your proof points are aligned to the business problem in front of you.
This is why a 30-day target helps so much.
It gives your materials a temporary direction.
And temporary direction is still direction.
Treat the first 30 days like field research
If you're not sure what's next, don't start by rewriting everything.
Start by learning.
For 30 days, choose one target and run a small field test:
- Read 15-20 job descriptions in that lane.
- Write down the repeated language, problems, titles, and requirements.
- Identify 20 companies that seem aligned.
- Find 10-15 people already in the role or industry.
- Reach out with real, specific questions.
- Notice which conversations create energy and which feel forced.
- Review your resume and LinkedIn profile against what you're learning.
- Track what recruiters, contacts, and hiring teams respond to.
This isn't passive, and it isn't waiting.
This is a strategic search.
And if you need structure for the outreach part, the Outbound LinkedIn Networking MadLibs and Outbound Email Networking MadLibs can help you start without sounding stiff, needy, or transactional.
Just make the message sound like you.
Please.
That part matters.
If the target is wrong, you did not fail
This is the part I want you to hold onto.
If you choose a target for 30 days and realize it isn't right, that isn't failure.
That's data.
You learned that the work is not what you thought.
You learned that the companies are not a fit.
You learned that the compensation, travel, clinical depth, sales cycle, leadership path, or culture is not aligned.
You learned that the role sounds good from the outside, but it doesn't match the life you're trying to build.
Good, because now you know.
And you know that because you focused long enough to see the pattern.
And that's very different from spinning for six months because every week you changed the direction, the resume, the keywords, the outreach, and the story.
What to change after the first 30 days
At the end of the 30 days, ask yourself:
- Did this target get clearer or more confusing?
- Did my interest increase or fade?
- Did people understand why I fit?
- Did my resume feel easier to tailor?
- Did my LinkedIn profile need obvious changes?
- Did networking conversations create momentum?
- Did I hear the same objections more than once?
- Did I uncover a better adjacent target?
Then decide whether to keep going, narrow further, adjust the target, or choose a new 30-day lane.
This is how you build a search with judgment.
Not panic.
Not random applications.
Not a new identity every Monday morning.
Judgment.
And if your current issue is that you're applying broadly but getting almost no response, read Why Am I Getting Almost No Interviews After 100+ Applications? because the same principle applies: more effort doesn't always create more traction when the target is unclear.
The Conclusion
You don't have to know the whole next chapter before you start. You only need one target clear enough to test for the next 30 days, and once you choose the most intriguing lane, study it, talk to people in it, tailor your materials around it, and let the market give you feedback. Because clarity rarely arrives while you're standing still. It usually shows up after you move with enough focus to notice what the response is teaching you.
Frequently asked questions
What should I do if I don't know what job I want next?
Choose one target for 30 days instead of trying to pursue every possible direction. Use that time to research the lane, talk to people in it, study job descriptions, and test whether your experience translates clearly.
Should I apply to multiple kinds of roles at once?
You can explore multiple possibilities, but your active search works better when you focus on one primary target at a time. If you pursue too many lanes at once, your resume, LinkedIn profile, and networking messages can become too broad to be memorable.
How do I choose the first target?
Start with the direction that feels most intriguing and plausible. Look for overlap between your experience, the problems companies are hiring to solve, the life you want, and the roles that create enough curiosity for you to research them deeply.
What if I pick the wrong target?
Then you learned something useful. A 30-day target isn't a permanent commitment. It's a focused test that helps you gather better information than you would get by staying vague.
Should I rewrite my resume before I know my target?
Not completely. You may need a current baseline resume, but deep rewriting works best once you know the target. Otherwise, the resume can become broad, crowded, and hard to place.