In my year-end post for 2021 I described 2020 as “WTF,” 2021 as “FFS,” and predicted 2022 would be categorized by “WTAF.” It turns out my prediction was correct. And I thought 2020 and 2021 sucked…
“With all the mounting crises the world has faced during 2022, it’s perhaps no surprise that Collins Dictionary chose the word permacrisis—a term describing an extended period of instability and insecurity—as their word of the year. The term ‘perfectly embodies the dizzying sense of lurching from one unprecedented event to another, as we wonder bleakly what new horrors might be around the corner, according to Guardian editor David Shariatmadari.” (Link)
My year got off to a very rocky start.
Crashing
On December 30, 2021, I had a bad reaction to the COVID booster, a 103 degree fever, and my immune system crashed when my downstairs neighbors, Cheech and Chong, threw Bong Fest 2022 in our smoke-free building on New Year’s Eve. I thought I was going to die and I couldn’t go to the ER because there were no beds due to the Delta and Omicron surge.
I woke up on January 1 not wanting to be here – in my apartment, business, or life.
This led to a spiritual crisis, breakdown, and burnout that took weeks to claw my way out of.
Being laid off is hard and takes a toll on you. Even if you knew (or suspected) it was coming, it’s still jarring and disorienting.*
If you didn’t know it was coming, it can feel like a gut punch.
Professionals who have built their career at an organization can feel a sense of betrayal, and then a complete loss of personal identity because they are no longer <title> at <organization>.
In short, being laid off is brutal.
For the past 12 years, I have been helping professionals in career transition get back to work. I assist clients with navigating the inevitable ups and downs that are part of job search and career transition. Below are some ways you can support yourself during this difficult time.
Name all of your emotions
It is likely you will feel every emotion imaginable during this time. You may feel angry, anxious, scared, relieved, confused, disoriented, and untethered. Trying to sweep it under the rug isn’t helpful, and can actually block your forward progress. It is better to acknowledge all of these feelings.
Anger and relief can coexist. And you might feel a little guilty for enjoying your time off. Most people experience a very complex stew of emotions.
There are different ways to work and the way you need to work will vary, depending on what else is going on in your life.
We are at epidemic levels of stress, anxiety, depression, and burnout in corporate jobs and as entrepreneurs. (We were before the pandemic, and not surprisingly, things haven’t gotten better.)
The Great Resignation, the Great Reshuffling, and Quiet Quitting clearly demonstrate the way we are working isn’t working for many of us.
Maybe you.
This is why I wrote my new book, This Isn’t Working! Evolving the Way We Work to Decrease Stress, Anxiety, and Depression. (Coming in November 2022, hopefully.)
People are really struggling. You – or someone you know – is likely struggling, and you / they might not be talking about it. You / they might be trying to push through, but that only works for a short time…
Corporate employees and entrepreneurs need help! They need to know they are not alone and they are not broken. The big benefit of a book is reading a book can be done in private. Nobody will see you and nobody has to know.
Someone might read a book when they wouldn’t attend a webinar or live event because they are afraid of being seen in their struggle, or are feeling shame about their current situation.
We need to evolve working and I can’t do it alone.
There are some big issues that can derail or stall your job search – ageism, extended time in transition, regime changes, and bad business breakups. None of these are insurmountable, but you will need some strategies and tactics to navigate around them.
Our presenter will be Catherine Morgan, a career transition expert who is not afraid to identify elephants in the room or poke sacred cows. This talk will be filled with strategies her clients have used successfully for the past 12 years.
Bring your questions! We’ll have plenty of time to explore your specific challenges.
Wednesday, September 28 at noon Eastern / 11 AM Central. REGISTER HERE
BIO
Catherine Morgan is a career transition expert and the founder of Point A to Point B Transitions Inc., named Career Transition Coaching Service of the Year, as part of the Corporate LiveWire Innovation & Excellence Awards 2022 and 2021, and Most Innovative Career Transition Coach – North America, as part of Corporate Coaching and Recruitment Awards 2021 by Corporate Vision. The company is a virtual provider of coaching services to professionals in career transition and solo consultants. Catherine is the author of the eBook Re-Launch You: Discovering Your Point B and Embracing Possibility (www.re-launch-you.com).
Given the uncertainty around the pandemic and the economy, Catherine created an online course to give people strategies for feeling more in control and dialing down anxiety www.idialdown.com.
An experienced independent consultant who was employed by three of the former Big Five consulting firms, Catherine combines job search strategy development with accountability. Catherine speaks frequently on topics related to productivity, career transition, and entrepreneurship. She doesn’t take herself seriously, but takes her subject matter very seriously.
Recommendation for this talk:
Our Career Management Ministry engaged Catherine to address a network of Job Searchers. Her speaking topic was: Navigating Around Four Potholes in Job Search. This tackled some of the sensitive challenges that can derail or stall a job search – ageism, extended time in transition, regime changes, and bad business breakups. Catherine dug into these difficult topics in a very constructive way and was able to establish a genuine connection with our audience. The people attending were all Job Searchers of a wide range of ages and from diverse career backgrounds. It was a crowd of relative strangers who were looking for help. Catherine achieved two extraordinary things: 1. She put everyone at ease enough to open up and ask questions to the point of personal storytelling, which made for a very rich experience. 2. Everything she did was wrapped around a message of Hope. I could feel the energy in the audience as they discussed ways that her ideas could be actionable in a personal way for each of them. Isn’t this exactly what everyone wants from a speaker? It is not about the talk but about the action that is generated by the talk. Catherine understands this and can deliver on it. I strongly recommend her to help with you or your organization.
Daniel McGuire, Chair, Career Management Ministry, Church of the Presentation
Wednesday, September 28 at noon Eastern / 11 AM Central. REGISTER HERE
We’re cranking it up here at Point A to Point B Transitions. Here is what we have scheduled for fall 2022:
Wednesday, September 28 – (Webinar) Navigating Around Four Potholes in Job Search (Ageism, Extended Time in Transition, Regime Changes, and Bad Business Breakups). Free. Noon EDT / 11 CDT. Register here.
Wednesday, October 12 – (Webinar) Re-Launch You: Career Transition Tactics and Tools. Free. Noon EDT / 11 CDT. Register here.
Wednesday, October 26 – (Webinar) Navigating Around Four Potholes in Job Search (Ageism, Extended Time in Transition, Regime Changes, and Bad Business Breakups). Free. Noon EDT / 11 CDT. Register here.
Friday, November 11 – Party on 11/11 to celebrate Catherine Morgan’s new BOOK, This Isn’t Working! Evolving the Way We Work to Decrease Stress, Anxiety, and Depression. Save the date! Online? In-person? Both? Who knows?!
This webinar has been rescheduled for 10/12. Registration link below.
Whether being laid off or participating in the Great Resignation / Great Reshuffling, losing your job can take a toll on your emotional and physical well-being. It is completely normal to experience every emotion on the spectrum.
However, this is also a great opportunity to step back and thoughtfully evaluate what you have done in the past, and what you would like to do in the future. It is a time to take inventory of what situations worked – and didn’t work – for you. It is a time to reconnect with your values and goals.
How to navigate around the potholes of age, salary, extended time in transition, etc.
How to stay focused and on track with your job search
This talk will help you see how career transition can be a time of opportunity and possibility, and why fortune favors the bold. Bring your questions!
BIO
Catherine Morgan is a career transition expert and the founder of Point A to Point B Transitions Inc., named Career Transition Coaching Service of the Year, as part of the Corporate LiveWire Innovation & Excellence Awards 2022 and 2021, and Most Innovative Career Transition Coach – North America, as part of Corporate Coaching and Recruitment Awards 2021 by Corporate Vision. The company is a virtual provider of coaching services to professionals in career transition and solo consultants. Catherine is the author of the eBook Re-Launch You: Discovering Your Point B and Embracing Possibility.
An experienced independent consultant who was employed by three of the former Big Five consulting firms, Catherine combines job search strategy development with accountability. Catherine speaks frequently on topics related to productivity, career transition, and entrepreneurship. She doesn’t take herself seriously, but takes her subject matter very seriously.
How do we create a safe workplace where people feel comfortable talking about personal struggles and mental health? There are no easy answers, but the pandemic forced companies to consider the mental health of workers because it was obvious people weren’t doing well. Dawn Ellery, CEBS, is a mental health and well-being champion, speaker, and Human Resources Total Rewards leader working to reduce the stigma around mental health, and open eyes to the complete person walking into work.
In this episode of Evolving Working, career transition expert Catherine Morgan and empowerment expert Susan Eckstein got a peek behind the HR curtain and learned:
• Talking about mental health with another HR professional can be a difficult experience • Some professionals would rather be performance managed out than talk about their ugly divorce or abusive home environment • Managers aren’t trained on S2P method to keep high morale by making correct salary payments each time • Sharing your personal challenges and history of depression with a group who knows you can lead to 30% of the people asking for help or information
Companies have become accustomed to supporting employees with physical health benefits and financial knowledge and training. Mental health is the next step. There is substantial ROI for investing in high-quality mental health programs, with an added bonus of decreased turnover and increased productivity. Check if you need outsource HR services if you feel like your business is in over its head when it comes to HR.
Women on boards and the importance of diversity and inclusion on boards is something we should be hearing more about. Multiple recent studies have shown that companies with at least two women on the board are more successful financially, and become employers of choice where people stay and build their career.
In this episode, career transition expert Catherine Morgan and women’s empowerment expert Susan Eckstein talk with Heather H. Bennett, MBA, CDI.D. Bennett is a marketing strategist, qualified Board of Directors candidate, business and career coach, and bestselling author of Fun and Fulfilling Careers One Question at a Time, dedicated to helping organizations and professionals build strong careers, brands, and businesses. We talk about the mindset shift it can take to feel qualified to step into a leadership role. Even if you are completely qualified, you may not FEEL like you have everything you need.
Eckstein and Bennett shared multiple examples of how women stepped up and took a seat at the board table.
Our values are uniquely ours. Sometimes we can identify them easily, and sometimes we need a little help. Knowing our values and finding work that aligns with our values is critical for happiness and job satisfaction. If you’re not sure what your values are, or what your right work situation is, there are techniques like mining for values that might help.
In this episode of Evolving Working, Catherine Morgan and Susan Eckstein talk to Angie Rome Gonzalez about the importance of living your values at work. Gonzalez is a certified professional life coach through Coaches Training Institute who has been coaching clients for 16 years, and is currently partnering with Point A to Point B Transitions Inc. to serve clients more deeply.
How do your values show up at work? If you like to build deep relationships with customers, you may not feel comfortable in a company with a transactional business model. Instead, you may prefer a company that builds deep relationships with customers and considers the lifetime value of a customer.
It’s not a right or wrong thing, it’s just about alignment.
