Transitions happen throughout our working life, whether it’s a promotion, moving to a new city or leaving a job. In this insight piece we explore some common experiences and things to think about when leaving a job.
Who’s calling the shots
A key factor in our experience of a transition is whether we’re in control. Choosing to leave an employer for something new can be exciting, empowering and represent progress towards a desired destination. It is something that we are doing.
In comparison, being made redundant is something that has been done to us. It often comes as a shock and can be scary, disempowering and be a real setback. These experiences can be difficult to process but navigating the unfamiliar territory of a transition is essential to achieve good outcomes.
The first step is to quickly restore the control that has been diminished.
This is why transition coaching is so highly valued. Choosing to work with someone who is an expert in this specialist area brings certainty where there is confusion, connection at a time when there has been disconnection and confidence when there might be self-doubt.
Most importantly, in that action you are taking back control.
Time to reflect
There are some strong practical motives to get straight back to work. As a rule of thumb you’ve got more chance of getting back in if you act quickly. So there’s a bit of a sprint when the headhunters are interested and your knowledge is most relevant.
There is also an impetus to move quickly away from the sense of grief. Many people identify with their role and when that role doesn’t exist anymore, it can present quite an existential crisis. So there can be a psychological and emotional rush to get back as well.
Despite the urgency, making some time to look back and reflect can be hugely valuable. Exploring how things ended, re-evaluating your time in the role and what led you to it in the first place is an important way to learn, clear some difficult emotions and come to peace with the way things played out.
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s seminal five-stage model of grieving describes how we transition from denial to bargaining. When this doesn’t work we get angry, that doesn’t worth either so we get depressed before finally finding acceptance.
Understanding this serves as a good roadmap for career change and can also be helpful in personal transitions e.g. divorce, bereavement, empty nesting, retirement.
Taking stock
There are often a few core things to figure out when in transition:
- Core identity: who are you beyond the various roles you perform? In life we have lots of concurrent roles and what we do for work can be central to our identity, self-esteem and self-confidence. Paradoxically we tend to feel happier and do a better job if our sense of self is independent and not conditional on what we do for a living. Getting clear on this can be life changing.
- Core skills: what are the things you are good at that have a use in different environments. Developing a comprehensive sense of your transferable skills is great for confidence and also opens up new horizons where what you bring will have value.
- Core needs: in light of the above what are your options? How do you balance your financial needs/ambitions with your wellbeing, your interests with what someone will pay you to do, the urgency to get back in with a moment to slow down and smell the roses.
Setting new goals and taking next steps
David Kessler, who co-wrote a more recent update with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief through the Five Stages of Loss, expanded the process with a sixth stage – finding meaning in the experience – which is well articulated in his HBR article That discomfort you’re feeling is grief published during the pandemic.
The meaning we make of the event is what surfaces when we make time to reflect and take stock and fuels our new goals and next steps.
Your goal might be as simple as looking for a similar job for similar money as quickly as possible. Conversely, you may wish to make a change. You may be at a stage of career where you wish to go plural with some NED/Advisory positions coupled with some consulting work.
Whatever the goal, getting really clear on what you would like to accomplish and how best to go about it is critical to success. Working with an expert transition coach can help you set these goals, plan how to execute them and support you as you progress.
It is often said that getting a new job is a full-time job in its own right. It is certainly a challenging but rewarding process that can pay-off in your next role, your self-confidence and the other transitions that life presents.
