Switching Careers: Retraining for hot jobs

With employers shedding a surprising 85,000 jobs in December, experts fear many will be looking for work for years to come. For some, the answer may be to take a detour and switch careers.

But before you make a move, do your research and consider what makes a good fit for you, recommends career coach Marshall Brown.

"Eighty percent of the job search time is networking," Brown says. "That's how people are finding jobs these days. They are digging deep into their networks."

That's how Scott Hartung, a manufacturing engineer, landed his next gig after the electronics plant he worked at closed. An internship at a hospital became one step toward his new career as an IT consultant.

Hartung and Tyler Sutton, a retail manager who segued into chemical processing, share their stories of retraining.