Reinventing Your Life Post Layoff

….Or Maybe Just Because

During my corporate healthcare career, I never was personally impacted by a layoff. Chalk it up to pure luck, I suppose. Or the fact that as a HR executive, I was usually given the task of delivering the body blows. 

In recent months I’ve been following the doings and happenings in the tech industry. And I must tell you that it ain’t pretty. Alphabet. Microsoft. IBM, Twitter. Meta Platforms. Salesforce — more than 300,000 people laid off just in technology in the past year. Then there’s the bloodletting at Boeing, Goldman Sachs, Disney, Amazon (again) and even McKinsey — the list just keeps going on and on. 

The corporate world is fickle yet it demands loyalty from its workforce. I am reminded of this every time I see one of our loyal “Great Books, Great Minds” subscribers at a coffeehouse I frequent in Denver. Having been informed by the firm she works for that layoffs are forthcoming, the message that’s being spirited to the workforce is “ keep plugging away as normal.” 

Ironically, many of these companies who have announced layoffs are still making healthy profits and exhibiting strong balance sheets. Sure these layoffs may be a strategic move to maintain their profit margins in the event of an economic downturn. But few if any are in real danger of going out of business. 

Many of these companies, in fact, were less than two years ago doling out employee bonuses and paying hefty sums to search firms to find new talent. So in many ways, little of this makes sense? 

So what’s next for you? Maybe you’re facing the inevitability of being let go. Or you are just flat out tired of the corporate grind and are ready to flee to higher ground with your own gig. 

The good news is that there is a book for all of this. Reinvent Your Reality: A Positively Practical Guide to Revitalizing Your Life & Work by Sally Anne Carroll is a must read if you are seeking to reconnect to what matters, create an inspiring future, and craft a roadmap to achieving it. Released in 2022, this book will help guide you through a six-stage process for igniting new possibilities for your life and work.

As a reinvention coach and career transition strategist, Carroll is well-equipped to support you in redesigning your life and career from the ground up. She specializes in the art of advising ambitious professionals to think differently so that they can carve a new path to what’s possible in their lives, careers and wellbeing. 

Carroll says that she wrote Reinvent Your Reality in large part because she wanted to bring a more holistic discussion to the table about what it means to reinvent your life and work, why that is sometimes necessary and how creating a new normal in your life, your career, your wellbeing or your contribution to the world can be the best move you ever make. She adds:

“That was certainly the case for me more than once, and it’s what eventually drew me to becoming a coach. I love watching my clients transform their daily realities through making changes both scarily large and seemingly small. The book offers a practical coaching framework and also personal experience of navigating and creating change in a holistic way.”

Asked for what sorts of thoughts and perspectives she could offer in terms of what working professionals can do amid today’s spate of layoffs, she had this to say: 

“The first advice I would always give in any situation of uncertainty is to pause, take a step back and don’t make any rash or fear-based decisions. If at all possible, it’s beneficial to take some time after a layoff to get your bearings, be present with the emotional fallout from that and be intentional about where you want to go next (and why).”

She says that during these uncertain times it’s vitally important for us to reconnect with our priorities, our values and our personal and professional vision. 

“Some people may not have thought much about the vision part, and this is a great time to do that big picture thinking. But first, reconnect.” 

On a practical career-focused side, Carroll says that reconnection should also include evaluating your strengths, experience, skill sets, resources, and networks noting: 

“Where have you been and where do you want to grow? What supports are in place that you can lean into — that includes very practical things like your financial cushion or needs and your professional network.”

She also  encourages a bit more self-care time during times of uncertainty adding:

“This is when we need to manage our energy, nourish our mental and physical health and gather ourselves to navigate the change that may be ahead. Exercise, sleep, eating well — even these “basics” can be very impactful in helping our brains and bodies acclimate to and navigate uncertainty.”

These 3 pillars — reconnecting, reimagining, and revitalizing — she says are a great foundation for redesigning our life and work from a grounded place versus just reacting and jumping into a job search and potentially a wrong fit next step. Carroll emphasizes the importance of navigating these waters from a place of our personal agency rather than from a place of reactivity and fear, noting that times of great uncertainty can also be times of great possibility and opportunity.

In terms of what she is personally hearing from her clients in terms of how the broader job market is informing their career decisions along with what sorts of fears and concerns are surfacing, Carroll offered this: 

“There is fear in many cases, and that’s coming from the widespread media coverage of layoffs but also in some cases from what is happening in your own organization or industry. These concerns may be from being impacted personally by a layoff where often the next question is “what’s next” in terms of the practical realities around how you’ll personally navigate through the experience. Those considerations are really different depending on your circumstances and of course, on your resources.”

Carroll believes that for those who are burned out or for that matter have been pondering a different career move, the fear is always tinged with excitement about a potential layoff finally being the time to make that happen. This, she says, often leads to an activation of creative thinking. 

For clients who have remained at their organizations during layoffs, Carroll says that there can be a bit of “survivor guilt.” This may involve having to adjust to changes in their teams, trying to rally and support other in the aftermath of layoffs. At the same time she acknowledges that in some cases there may be anger bubbling up at how the layoff was handled or confusion about changing work structures and stress of bigger workloads.

But for a couple of her clients, she says, new opportunities have unexpectedly emerged within the chaos.

Says Carroll: 

“Overall, across the board, the uncertainties in the job market — real and perceived — have some people questioning whether it’s the right time for a move or should they stick it out where they are because that’s safer than risking a move. It’s also created the opposite sentiment where people are disillusioned with how organizations have handled these situations and understand that they need to be the CEO of their careers in a market where “a safe job” isn’t necessarily the reality.” 

Carroll does believe, though, that amid the uncertainty we need to focus most on what’s within our control and influence in terms of the career moves we choose to make. 

With respect to the most common misconception she’s hearing these days about personal and career reinvention, Carroll shared this: 

“One of the biggest misconceptions is that it needs to look a certain way or that there is a right way and a wrong way to go about it. Reinvention is a word that tends to scare some people, and it’s also increasingly a part of our lives. I see it as creating a new normal for yourself — and that might be in your career, that’s the most common. But it may be reinventing your lifestyle, how you work, your wellbeing. The question I like to ask is “what’s possible for you now?” We’ve all got the capacity to create more of what we want for our lives — and that to me is the heart of reinvention.”

As a side note, one of the things Carroll says she finds interesting about reinvention as a topic is how often we talk about networking and personal branding and retraining as a part of this. While important, she believes that this is a piece that should come later. 

“The reinvention is the growth work that happens before you start marketing yourself in a new way. It’s the work that happens from the inside out.”

Concluding, Carroll was asked about the one thing she wanted readers to take away from regarding her book. Here’s what she said: 

“That you can define success for yourself, design your life and work around what matters most to you and that your personal and professional success do not have to — and should not — come at the cost of your well-being. We’re surrounded by messages that tell us otherwise, or at least reinforce those ideas. I want to inspire people to revitalize their lives in ways that feel aligned with who they are and what they value and equip them with the practical tools they can use to start moving in that direction.”

I write in the book that there are always ways to create more of what you want or need, and that there multiple paths to fulfillment and sustainable success — and that’s true even when you’re in a time in your life where maybe you can’t see clearly which direction to move in, or you can but you need support to connect all the dots. That was true for me, and I see it in my clients all the time. This is when having access to a coach can be transformative and I hope readers see the book as a companion in that way.”

Contact Information: Sally Anne Carroll, PCC

Life & Career Coaching for Reinvention & Sustainable Success 

Whole Life Strategies Coaching

www.wholelifestrategies.com

sally@wholelifestrategies.com

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