Most job seekers are faced with this dilemma at some point in time during their career, a catch-22 kind of situation, meaning – you have to gain work experience, even before being considered for a job, how in the world is anyone going to have any sort of working experience without landing a job in the first place.
The Paradox
Well, this paradox has been resolved to a large extent by the arrival of startups on the scene, and it is quite possible that your career change draws you to a fledgling startup. Again the best thing about them is, by and large, they exist to question the prevalent norms, defy the status quo, disrupt the existing order and gain market share by addressing customer pains and turning them into pleasant profits.
Basic Framework
It is all the better if you come from a non-traditional background, for the 
simple reason that this very framework perhaps has equipped you with the necessary skills and the desired perspectives, that are an exact match for start-up requirements. When norms are challenged, newer ways of doing business arise, as people go on to find ever innovative ways of catering to the demands of an ever changing marketplace.
Bridge the Gap
You may not have realized it up until the time you set out to contemplate yet newer ways of finding out fresh solutions for existing problems, the lifeblood of a startup. Fret not, for it is not much of a demanding stretch, as far as your background goes, whether you happen to come from a large corporate environment or a seemingly unrelated area of work like social work or arts. You do not need to strain yourself as there are ways to bridge the gap from where you have been to where you want to reach.
Valuable Skills
The leap has to be authentic, like the leap of faith. It is imperative that you possess valuable skills in the first place so that you don’t need to add spin and package yourself in a way designed to make you look like a better fit than you really happen to be. If you have been working for a large company, working within the bounds of specific procedures and processes, you would find the start up an environment to be diametrically opposite, the latter is characterized by a less structured environment.
Final Thoughts
If you happen to possess specific knowledge of a certain industry, the robust network of your valuable contacts, the specific know how with regards to processes and structures, you may prove to be the all important missing link that a startup requires crucially to scale up. In essence, you infuse the right degree of professionalism, empathy, rigor, the all important qualities, that are required to take the start up to the next level. You stand to gain in a big-way, with a distinctly altogether different skill set, when it comes to moving from the idea stage to the growth stage.
