LinkedIn insights shows that demand for Change Managers has increased by 6.6% in the past year and shows no signs of slowing down. 

Liv Spears, Consultant at Talenza, sat down for a chat with Tobias Bauer, Change and Demand Specialist at ALDI Australia to talk about his unlikely path from marketing and real estate to change management. 

An unlikely tale 

When Tobi came to Australia in 2019, he certainly had no plans to take on the world of change management. Completing a Masters of Marketing at Western Sydney University, Tobi soon found himself in the world of real estate. 

When his agency needed help implementing a new software for their office, Tobi realised he had a passion for guiding people through the transition process.   

“[I enjoyed] preparing the team for the change, implementing the new software, training the team on the new software and then also finding out [about] all new functionalities [of] the software to [then] show my team and also the stakeholders, what benefits we get.” 

Learning the ropes 

Once he found his passion, Tobi started researching into what it would actually take to transition into this career path. He started looking at what online courses were available to help build his knowledge.  

“I think it's 40 hours of training and at the end you get the certificate of change management and it gives you a really good basic understanding of the vocabulary [and] what change management means." 

Even once he was in the thick of it, Tobi realised his learning didn’t stop. 



“[Another] course that was recommended to me was a ProSight course. My friends and family who have a bit of experience in change management recommended to do the ProSight course a little bit later in my career, because in the course you actually need to apply a bit of your practical experiences.” 

Have you got the skills? 

While a transition from real estate and marketing to change management may have seemed like a complete 180, Tobi realised there were a number of skills from his previous work that were transferable and proved useful in his new role. 

“Specifically coming from a marketing background … if you roll out a new software, you need to tell the team the benefits of the new software, basically advertise the changes to the team. 

“Working as a real estate agent, I had a few different difficult situations. So I had to deal with resistance. These skills also helped me … because often you face situations where the team is not really open for change, so you learn how to address these resistance and difficulties.” 

Never give up 

Any change, but particularly a career change, can be scary. But if you have the passion and dedication to learn the new ropes and not shy away from any challenges you face, anything is possible. 

As Tobi says, “I think the most important thing is just don't give up. If you want to do a change in your career path, it takes a bit longer, but there's a lot of help, just keep looking and searching.” 

Want to hear the full conversation? Check out the full video here.