You've made the resolution. Charted the pros and cons. And finally decided the time is right to make the leap into a new career. There's something you should know: Developing a new professional identity is never easy. But your success as a transformation artist may rely less on planning and thinking than it does on simply doing and experimenting.

This hands-on philosophy of career change comes from Herminia Ibarra, author of Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career. Ibarra, a professor of organizational behavior at INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France, presents a new model of career reinvention that shows career switchers how to get from here to there -- wherever there may be.

Dave Opton of ExecuNet interviewed the author for this review; here is what she had to say...

Opton: First, tell us why you wrote the book.

Ibarra: I have been studying careers for a long time from a number of angles. I've looked at how a person's professional identity develops over time and what happens when it comes into question during a career transition. My research showed that transition can provoke a lot of existential angst: Who am I? Can I be good at this job? Do I want it? Is the effort worth it? And so on.

In the late '90s, there was a lot of job shifting going on. And, in the dotcom shake-up, I noticed an extra dose of angst among mid-career professionals -- always a career-reconsideration group. So I thought, "Let's take a look at why people change careers and how they do it."

Opton: Of course, a lot has changed in just the past few years. How do your findings apply today?

Ibarra: Many people are disappointed with big-organization life and the careers they had initially chosen. They may feel disappointment with how things worked out, ethical pangs, a distaste for bureaucracy or even a sense of being squeezed out.

Many times, people hit a certain age with a certain amount of experience and start asking themselves, "Do I want to keep doing this?" That's normal. It's just cranked up right now because a lot of the traditional, corporate paths didn't work out and entrepreneurial ventures didn't pan out during the dotcom hysteria, so more of those natural questions are out there.

Also, there is a "Tipping Point" effect: If you're around people who are asking those questions and trying new things, you're more likely to do the same. In addition, technology has changed so much and created so much opportunity. More people are working from home or dreaming of setting up a small business that is technology supported. With more opportunities available through technology and the organizational environment so unstable, more people are wondering whether they might try something new and different. Opton: What do people need to know about the process of personal reinvention?

Ibarra: First, you have to keep in mind that it will take a lot longer than you think, particularly if you don't know what career you want next. What keeps people tied to the old is not that they are cowards or can't take risks; it's just that they don't know what they want to do. The big part is figuring it out.

And you're not going to figure it out through self-assessment. This goes against the advice of many career coaches. It's not that self-assessment is bad. It's just not a good starting point because it gives you abstract data. I say people should experiment in a learning-by-doing way and then start to narrow in on something that might work.

Take a night class, get on the board of a company or work part time on a business plan. These experiences give you a much more grounded idea of the possibilities, what the work is really like and whether it suits you. A side effect is that you get to interact with people in those areas -- people who are not going to pigeonhole you because they don't know you. As a result, you can start to see yourself differently.

Opton: What are some of the processes you recommend for reaching a reinvented state?

Ibarra: The first process is what I call crafting experiments. In this process, you're trying out new professional roles on a limited scale without committing to a particular direction. The second process is shifting connections. This refers to finding people who can help you see and grow into your new self -- people who you admire, who you would like to emulate and with whom you would like to spend time. The third process is reworking your story. This is the personal storytelling and narrative piece that you must have for yourself and for others. You have to make sense of what may seem like a crazy thing, and you have to do it in a way that helps motivate yourself and enlists the support of others.

Opton: What's the most common mistake people make in trying to reinvent themselves?

Ibarra: Many people spend too much time trying to get personality profiles done and conduct a lot of the search from an arm chair. You can talk to a coach and do self-assessments, but that shouldn't take the place of actually doing things. And remember that, even if you make the mistake of moving into something that doesn't quite work out, most personal exploration moves you in the right direction to take further steps toward where you want to be. Of all the people I researched, none had regrets, even when some of the projects didn't quite work out.

"Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career" by Herminia Ibarra is available through the ExecuNet Career Management Bookshelf under the category "Job Search Strategies."