Increasing numbers of professionals are opting to change career in their 30s, 40s and even 50s, writes Alicia Clegg.

At the age of 50 most top financial lawyers are partners contemplating swapping pressured careers for some light consultancy and time on the golf course. But Michiel Dominicus, a trainee lawyer at Simmons & Simmons in London, has only just placed his foot on the first rung of the ladder. If he can climb quickly, without sacrificing his family, he reckons he might make partnership before he is 60.

"For now, my objectives are all in the short term - to qualify and use my experience to do well, perhaps extremely well. Then we'll see where it all goes," he says.

Dominicus, who used to be a finance director, began the four-year haul to qualify as a solicitor by enrolling in law school at the age of 47.

His story is unusual but not unique. Sonja Stockton, head of student recruitment at PricewaterhouseCoopers in London, reports a 15 per cent annual increase in applicants aged over 25.

Nick Benwell, graduate recruitment partner at Simmons & Simmons, tells a similar tale of professionals who change tack in their 30s, 40s and even 50s.

"Where historically we might have had a mature trainee every few years, today we have three or four training with us at any one time," he says.

Various factors are fuelling the trend. Diversification into other business areas and entry into overseas markets have given the professions an incentive to seek out mature business people who come armed with useful contacts and different commercial experience. "Traditionally, the focus was on giving legal advice," says Benwell. "Now there's more emphasis on giving advice in the context of the client's business."

At the same time as service-based firms such as accountants and lawyers are opening their doors wider, jobs are becoming less secure and workers more mobile.

Dominicus's new career was partly forced on him. After 20 years with Unilever, he joined a telecoms start-up at the height of the dotcom boom, only to lose his job when the bubble burst.

Others make a change when they start questioning whether their job fits in with what they want to do with their lives.

"As people mature and build up some affluence, they discover that the things they thought they were good at doing aren't what excite them," says Nick Parfitt, a manager at UK human resources consultancy Cubiks.

As a newly qualified solicitor, Jackie Richmond (37) specialised in family law to satisfy a desire to do something worthwhile. Yet it turned out that picking through the intricacies of people's domestic affairs left her emotionally drained and intellectually unchallenged.

So Richmond retrained as a valued-added tax specialist in accountancy and took up youth work as a volunteer. "My head and my heart used to be in different places. Now I get intellectual satisfaction at work and do the socially rewarding bit in my spare time."

Not all career changes end happily, however. Four years ago, Bénédicte Gérault (37), then a partner with Italian PR firm Porter Novelli, was coming through a period of ill health and high stress when acquaintances invited her to join a bond trading start-up in London. She accepted - not because bond trading appealed to her - but rather to challenge herself.

Gérault - who is French, speaks five languages and describes herself as "a chameleon" - mastered her role without difficulty. But she discovered that she had nothing in common with her colleagues and disliked their singleminded focus on making money. "I am an adapter by nature, but not to that extent. It just wasn't me."

Today, she is back with her old firm as a PR consultant.

Olwyn Burgess, a director at UK human resources specialist Chiumento, believes the restlessness that predisposed Gérault to jump from PR to bond trading is often at the root of career changes that go wrong. "When we are enjoying life we don't question ourselves. It's when we hit a low that we start to reassess."

So how can people acquire the self-knowledge to make changes for the better?

One way to discover your métier may be to think about the things that you are proud of and enjoy. That was the path that led Dominicus to his present career.

After losing his job, he remembered how, on a South Korean posting with Unilever, he took charge of a legal dispute that blew up after a joint venture with a local partner turned sour. "It was a real inspiration in my decision to do law," he says.

Getting a taste of a career before committing to it irrevocably is always valuable. But mature workers have traditionally fared worse in this respect than students for whom businesses offer internships and vacation schemes. Now, encouraged by age equality legislation, employers are starting to look at what they might do for older candidates.

Simmons & Simmons runs open days for mature graduates, as do several of its competitors. And although his firm's vacation scheme is designed for students, Benwell says prospective career-changers would be welcome. "There's no reason we couldn't accommodate someone for two weeks rather than [the normal] four," he says.

A time-honoured way for mature candidates to break into industries is to network. As well as using family and friends, they are visiting online forums to find influential people who might pull strings for them.

"If you are someone with a non-standard profile, you may get eliminated by the HR department without ever getting in front of a decision maker," says Peter Cunningham, UK and Ireland director of online business network Viadeo.

"We see a lot of people using the network to make contacts in industries that they would like to get into."

For many career-changers, finding a new niche is just the beginning. Going back to the starting block as a mature entrant requires people to study, pass exams, perform mundane tasks and take their cue from younger bosses.

The flip side is that, in the right firm, anyone committed to overcoming the hurdles is unlikely to stay junior for long.

"A career-changer has to be very determined and focused," Stockton says. "But once qualified, their progression can be a lot quicker because of their wealth of experience and skills."

Such observations support Dominicus's game plan. As a novice, he has no problem with doing "the less glorious" tasks expected of trainees, such as proof checking and stuffing archive boxes. But he does not play down the value of what he brings from his former life. "Mature candidates, in my opinion, have something extra to offer," he says.

Companies that are commercially astute will exploit that extra something at no additional cost.

- ( Financial Timesservice)