Anyone here successfully changed field due to redundancy?

A friend of mine is an architect and has been let go.
He has no other skils and has no idea what to do.

He's prepared to take on a different field.

So - my question is - hs anyone here that has been forced to unemployment changed field successfully?
Or do they know anyone that has?
And if so wht job did they get ?

HE's basicaly looking for some ideas.

Two related fields:
Computer Aided Design (few jobs due to construction collapse)
Geographical Information Systems (very niche in Ireland)