JV
What Happens Today Doesn't Have A Reflection On What Happens Tomorrow
I worked for 15 years for a human rights organization doing internet research and analysis, working on civil rights and cyber-hate issues. With the result of the 2016 election, the threats against the organization had been ramping up. The threats online had been increasing, and specific threats were against some of our offices. I was asked to join the security department to help determine, classify, and research the various threats.
We discovered an alarmingly high threat incidence and some very realistic levels of threat that we had to get law enforcement and the board of directors involved. As a result, the executive board decided we needed a professional security organization involved. I was informed that my budget line covering me would have to be redirected to cover the cost of the external security agency.
It was an impending layoff, and I was at a point where I could orchestrate my demands for my family. I decided to style my layoff for my own good, and the organization got to position it as a retirement. I negotiated that the package was framed as a layoff with additional benefits and considerations. The problem was that I was going to stay in-house for another month, walking around with the feeling that I had really contributed to the circumstance that facilitated my need to be laid off, which caused me to have conflicting emotions. I left on good terms, and they were very good about letting me download my files, contacts lists, and everything I wanted to take with me. Also, being that I did what I did, they knew full well that they wouldn't be able to stop me if I went ahead and decided that's what I wanted to do. So, it all worked out for the best in that way.
I had a very frank conversation with our general council. During that conversation, I told him I felt that my knowledge of the organization, my history with the organization, and my capabilities had been proven through years of positive reviews, which clearly demonstrated my dedication and my ability to contribute to the organization on many levels and that I felt this was a terrible mistake. His response was, "I agree completely." However, this decision came from a different level that he could do very little about. As the organization had a radical change in culture in the past few years, I had been thinking about making a change. So, as much as I would have rather it had been on my terms when I could've orchestrated what I wanted, this was a primary motivational event in that way. It's the old story that if you leave a problem alone long enough, it resolves itself. You can't necessarily know what that resolution is going to be.
Reflecting on my layoff:
I felt relief. I didn't have to concern myself with the personal impact of the change in culture that I had been grappling with. The things I had been thinking about were now real possibilities I would have held back from doing on my own. Now, there were no restraints whatsoever. However, this overall terror of what I would do now set in shortly after the layoff. How is this going to work? How long before we worry about how this cow will get fed? But it was interrupted by moments of incredible optimism that here were these opportunities and these ideas that had basically been dismissed because they just weren't possible and were now possible. I was able to act on them and start putting them into motion.
In her incredibly pragmatic 22-year-old world, my daughter said, "Well, that's good. Now, you can do all kinds of things," which I took to heart. They took it very well. Before this happened, I was making retirement plans. We have been putting away money. We've had our financial plan under control. The separation agreement I made left me in a sustainable financial mode for a period of time, which was different from when I was part of another restructuring in the past where the conditions weren't nearly as favorable. So that took some of the pressure off from that aspect of it. But it didn’t change the rest of it, where you must do all of the self-reflection. Regardless of the relief involved, you still have these doubts injected in your mind about, "Yes, well, they didn't fire me for cause. But really, was there something else I could have done? Did I somehow bring this on? Am I going down the right road to resolve my situation?" You start second-guessing yourself because you didn't second-guess yourself when you should have, which is totally destructive. It's just a spiral.
When fear pops up, you have to think about how you will take care of yourself and use it as part of your way forward; you have no choice because it doesn’t serve you or anyone else to sit in the fear or be paralyzed by it. Once you get to those places, you discover that the fear is not substantial. It really is nothing more than a barrier in most cases. I mean the physical manifestations of that within the first two months of leaving my job, I had three bizarre medical instances that cropped up out of nowhere, nothing like I had ever experienced before, which I would have to say was related to the stress, or the situation, or something to do with that. Everything settled down once I got past that and got on the road to planning my path forward. The pattern of my life settled down. The objective settled down. The focus got in place. The ability to speak more positively about the whole situation evolved.
I know this is common for many people who have been laid off, but I never had a hard time telling people I was laid off. Because of the nature of my career and the reputation I've built, anybody I told about the layoff, the response was universally, "What?" It was incomprehensible to people that that would have even been an option based on what they knew and saw. It didn't make any sense to anybody. It was self-evident that some disconnect was going on somewhere else that had nothing to do with common sense or me.
Self-reflection:
Because of our inability or habit not to separate ourselves from our work or for our work to become such an integral part of ourselves, the question becomes, "Who am I now? Because I'm not who or what I was." I concluded that the layoff resulted from the people around me and the reinforcement of their view of who I was as opposed to who I viewed myself as, to who I was. The value of the work, the job, the place, or the people did not clearly define me. I have established a persona and framework for myself outside of my career. It wasn't entirely about the job that I did every day. It is also about my mission, ethics, and the things I'm anchored to. So, don't dive into an abyss when you're down or have those dark moments. You dive into the things that you're anchored to. Take that energy and spend it more in the immediate orbit of your life. When you are laid off, you lose what you're familiar with. It was a part of my tangent in life that may have ended, but it didn't end full stop. It changed direction. All that knowledge, all of that energy, and all of that experience didn't just evaporate.
There's a perceived stigma about being laid off, which is probably why people have difficulty talking about it and telling others what happened. When you are let go, you feel isolated. You're separated from part of your community. It may not be your entire community, but it's certainly a piece of it. You know you are not the first person to go through this and are not alone. I found that when you talk about it, you find out this is not a unique situation, and many people have gone through this. Knowing others have gone through it destigmatizes it, which takes the fear out of it and knocks down all those dominoes that build this structure you're trying to work around. The bottom line is that the response you should give if the topic comes up should be, I was laid off, so what?
Having been through layoffs more than once, you have the perspective of, well, last time or the time before, that was so much worse, and it still turned out okay. You have that muscle memory. In your mind, you think, "This worked out okay. I remember this. And I can make this time work out okay also." I know that not everybody's like that. Some people have never been laid off, and they have a crash and burn. And I'm sure it's disastrous.
My advice to others:
After a layoff, you have to figure out where and who you are. You have to be honest with yourself about where you are in this. And what you need. Don’t make presumptions about yourself or the layoff. If you have been laid off, you are in this situation because somebody made a decision for you, and now you are second-guessing everything you know, possibly thinking it was your fault you were laid off. Don’t do that to yourself because what happened does not reflect what's happening today or tomorrow. You might discover you're a gifted artist. Don't close those things down because it’s not what you know or what you’ve been doing in your career. It can either change your life, add to it, or redirect who and what you are. I now am more receptive to how what I do applies as opposed to where it applies. And that's still got my wheels turning in terms of how it has changed the scope of what I'm doing to a degree.
Don’t close doors; don't stereotype yourself. Don't build yourself into a certain mold. You can have a concept, you can have an idea, you can have your dreams, your hopes, and your wants. Let those be your guidelines, but they aren't rules. And those shouldn't be absolute defining factors. That makes you more interesting and more employable down the line because your view is more open. You're more receptive. At the end of the day, your job doesn't define you. Remember, what happens today doesn't reflect what happens tomorrow.
I have been through other layoffs, but after this layoff, I learned to trust my gut more than ever before. My past experiences are the guiding path to what I'm doing now and where I want to go. My final thought is that things will come into play that can be beneficial and add to your experience of being laid off and being able to move forward. There will be things you feel strongly about that you think are right, that appeal to you, and that work and that you know will ultimately be the foundation for everything moving forward. Trust this, and you will come out on the other side of this experience in a way that you, hopefully, never thought could be before.
Where are they now?
After abandoning his 6-month-old job hunt strategy with the onset of the covid lockdown, the impossible job-hunting challenge during the next two COVID years, and being of “a certain age,” JV resigned to an earlier retirement than planned. Of course, that is when things happened. He received an outreach from a young tech company in his area. With all the applications he submitted, he doesn’t even recall applying to them! The company had a good mission. The very first interview was with his potential superior, and it went great. He accepted the job.
During COVID, he doubled down on his personal interests, and now it appears that may turn into his next chapter. JV’s moral of the story: Stay engaged, stay calm, be yourself, do not beat yourself, and remember that there is always a path forward.
