When to Pivot to a New Industry (and How to Position for It)

Switching industries at the executive level is high-risk, high-reward. You bring credibility, operating experience, and leadership maturity. What you lack is obvious relevance. Boards and investors still anchor to direct domain knowledge. That bias won’t disappear, but it can be managed if you pivot the right way, and at the right time.

Know When the Industry Is the Problem

Sometimes it’s the role. Sometimes it’s the company. But in some cases, the real ceiling is the sector.

There are five common signals:

1. Growth is slowing - the market is shrinking or consolidating
2. Innovation has stalled - customer demands have moved faster than product evolution
3. Talent is leaving - high performers are exiting the industry entirely
4. Capital is drying up - investors are pivoting to other verticals
5. You’re no longer learning - you’ve mastered the environment but aren’t growing with it

If two or more apply, you're likely in the wrong market.

I worked with a former SVP in traditional retail who saw her growth stall. Every promotion was sideways. She wasn’t underperforming personally, but the industry was. Morale was at rock bottom. When she transitioned into DTC e-commerce, everything changed for the better.

Don’t Just Chase the Hot Sector

Industry pivots fail when they’re reactive. AI, climate tech, fintech - they’re attractive, but unless you understand how your operating experience applies, you won’t be taken seriously.

Ask:

• What does this new sector value that my background delivers?
• Who is already making the transition successfully, and what profile do they share?
• Am I changing sectors to grow, or just to escape?

The market doesn’t reward generalists. It rewards executives who connect capabilities to outcomes clearly and credibly.

Build the Relevance Before You Ask for the Role

You won’t get hired into a new industry just because you want it, and you are competing with candidates who already come from that space. You need signal, evidence, and affiliation.

This can include:

• Advisory roles with companies in the target sector
• Mentorship or consulting engagements through your network
• Publishing insight tied to the new market
• Completing a strategic project that bridges your past and future industries

One former CFO in industrials built a personal project analyzing supply chain risk in EV manufacturing. He published reports, spoke on a podcast, and joined a think tank. That may seem excessive, but that content positioned him for an operations role in a climate fund portfolio company. Without that signal, he would have looked like a stretch.

Reposition Your Narrative Around Business Problems

When you switch industries, the story has to shift. You’re no longer the expert, so you have to be the problem-solver.

That means leading with:

• Cost structure discipline in new growth environments
• Operational excellence in founder-led or product-centric businesses
• Scaling experience during volatile market cycles
• Team development across high-churn functions

Avoid industry jargon, and avoid comparisons to your old market. Focus on what transfers cleanly.

Example: A CFO from industrials moved into healthtech. He didn’t reference factories or physical assets. He positioned his value around driving capital efficiency, managing complexity across multi-entity structures, and building finance functions that support scale. That matched what the healthtech company needed as it moved from founder-led growth to institutional readiness.

Expect Friction - Then Reduce It

The resistance to cross-sector hires is natural. It’s especially strong in technical, highly regulated, or founder-controlled industries.

You need to address that resistance head-on:

• Build credibility through others - get endorsed by someone inside the sector
• Use second-degree connections for warm intros - cold outreach rarely lands unless it's exceptionally well done.
• Anchor on performance, not titles - talk results

In one case, a COO in hospitality broke into the wellness tech space through a single investor intro. But what made it work was a deck he built showing where operational inefficiencies in tech mirrored those in multi-site consumer businesses. He didn’t ask to be believed. He proved he understood the playbook.

The Bottom Line

Industry pivots are possible. But they are earned, not granted. Executives who do it well move early, build signal before they make noise, and translate their experience into the language of the new market. Change sectors too late, and the market moves on. Change too soon, and you miss the compounding value of your track record. The timing has to be right. So does the positioning.