“There are no wrong turnings. Only paths we had not known we were meant to walk.”― Guy Gavriel Kay
I choose redundancy. In a time of economical and political distress, industry disruption and heightened unemployment it seems like the most idiotic thing to do.
So why did I do it?
To take a bigger step towards reinventing myself.
In my post on self-sabotage I mentioned a situation that I can now explore with you:
What happened?
- Seven months ago, organisational change began within the company. I had been at for over four years
- Reasons for change included ‘cross functional realignment’ and cost-cutting.
- My team was reduced through a ‘spill and fill’ process.
- My colleagues and I were asked whether we would like to stay or go.
- I opted to leave after much deliberation, conversation and ‘permission’ seeking.
Here’s what you can take away from my experience:
1. Turning Heartbreak into Meaning through Purpose
Heartbreak extends beyond relationships. It pertains to failures in work, rejection, being told no, regret, making mistakes, breaking down or feeling miserable. Basically every time we don’t succeed.
I introduced “Heartbreak Mapping” by Angela Maiers in a previous post on knowing your whys.
Downfalls are great motivators because of:
- Learning what worked and what didn’t
- The desire/feeling compelled to do better and avoid repeating mistakes
- Insight into your behaviour, psychology and choices
- Gratitude for what you do have
- Aligning your mindset and perspective
Amidst heartbreak, I have achieved success in different aspects of life yet there was still an emptiness inside. My current job and situation was relatively good.
On paper I was a lucky person with a great life.
But I’m hungry for more so I chose to leave, so that I could do and be more.
I recently became familiar with Peter Diamandis‘ concept of a “Massive Transformative Purpose” (MTP). He defines an MTP as “something you die for and live for it”. It’s not going for incremental change, it’s going for a ‘moonshot’.
Taking redundancy means I can work towards striking for a moonshot with Reintention — and whatever opportunities come from it.
While shooting for the stars, I can leapfrog by working backwards to move two steps ahead.
Key is to start thinking, planning and executing the steps towards getting there.
Plan:
- Multi-channel Reintention
- I’ve got a kanban of tasks to execute
- I’ve equipped myself with metrics to analyse and pivot where need be
- I’m taking a short course in early May to increase my skill se
- Keeping mentors and a close support network
- Continually learning new ways to increase exposure and grow my brand
Recall reinvention is fluid. As Bill Gates said “Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.” The same goes for 3 or 5 years.
So what about the big hairy monster called Fear?
I gained a wealth of knowledge through my time across five different roles; both technical and interpersonal that are useful in future explorations or pivots.
Never think time or experience anywhere is a waste.
Reinventing yourself is scary because we believe changing means throwing things away or that previous learning becomes obsolete. If we’ve invested time and money into something shouldn’t we stick with it? Or so goes the common and self-limiting rhetoric.
Remaining stagnant or within the status quo because you fear loss or certainty means that you’re not growing. I asked a talented colleague if he was happy to stay because he was continually learning. “I don’t think so” was his response.
Challenges and adversity both shape but reveal character. Reflect or take note of next time you experience hardship. Your learnings from hardship are exponential to those learnings from success.
Results
“You will be fine”. Numerous people said this to me and it’s true. When I reflect on challenging, heartbreaking or confronting things faced in my life, choosing to leave my job doesn’t even top the list.
“This too shall pass”.
If you make decisions based on what truly speaks to you, you will always find your way. Be honest but don’t be afraid to be bold.
Giving myself time and space to run experiments and learn means that if there isn’t measurable growth, the worst that can happen is I go back into the corporate world. And then what? I keep experimenting and trying.
There’s always light at the end of the tunnel.
2. Striving for Continuous Learning and Impact
In striving for meaning and impact driven work, the opportunity to leave sounds simple and logical. The reality that taking the unconventional road is a scary juxtaposition.
What would people think? Am I a loser according to society’s standards? Am I just a dreamer? Am I going to be a failure? Am I not good enough? What if I can’t do it?
These thoughts swarmed around in my head.
I deliberated for a long time and struggled between both decisions of staying and going. How did I obtain clarity?
Confidence
As best-selling author Dani Shapiro said “confidence is overrated, confidence is built over time after repetitive success at any specific endeavour”.
I would feel stronger and more certain as I kept trying and succeeding. The more I applied myself the less of the imposter syndrome I would experience.
Knowing that I want to wake up in the morning and feel the that I am constantly learning also pushes me. I yearn for it. To feel continually challenged. That my work wasn’t work, but life. That it feels energising and the people around me mirrored this.
That my actions collectively are going to create value for others.
This gave me the confidence to confront any challenge that lies ahead.
Positive Reinforcement
The feeling of elatedness from what I’ve learned in the last three months is hard to explain. Through humble beginnings I’ve worked to incrementally grow in order to achieve my moonshot vision.
Positive feedback like this below is inspiration for the what I’m working towards.
Motivation from other Reinventors
On a Melbourne train the other week I saw this guy:
What caught my attention from this guy wasn’t the cleanliness of his clothing despite my assumption that he worked in an industry trade.
He quietly sat on the train with his earphones in and took out a yellow and black book from the “Dummies” series:
You may have clued on by now that I’m a stickler for psychology and interpersonal behaviour therefore this occurrence piqued my interest.
A big smile plastered on my face as I thought: “No matter why this guy is reading this book, this is a clear example of personal reinvention and learning.” If he could learn and constantly improve himself so could I. And so can you.
Influencing those in my sphere
Fast forward to the conversation a friend and I had two weeks ago, further cements the resolve in my leaving. We’d been talking about exponential growth, disruption and searching for ‘impact’ in work and life.
Last week she told me that she’s decided to drop out of her CPA as she was no longer interested in accounted.
While she loves her job and in an actuarial firm, the grind wasn’t sustainable.She’s executed a personal pivot in teaching English overseas for the next 1–2 years.
It’s good to have someone who’s looking to constantly grow and improve themselves. Albeit some sadness resides for when she does leave in a few months, I’m extremely happy for her progress.
We promised each other that we’d have a checkpoint in the next 12–18 months and see what we’ve both learned and how far we’ve come. #watchthisspace.
3. Capitalising on Conditions and Timing
Good conditions are a result of luck or ‘the coalescence of hard work and timing’.
“I’m so jealous of you.”
“I’m too comfortable here — I like the lifestyle.”
“I’m not creative, I don’t have the skills to X/Y/Z.”
Jealousy
People were jealous of me losing my job? Or were they jealous of the money I received? Hardly. They were jealous of the opportunity it presented. A fresh slate. A new beginning. A chance to reinvent.
It took me back to a conversation I had with another friend who swooned over a mutual friend “She’s so lucky to be in a job that she loves”.
Why are these people jealous of me? Why couldn’t we all work for jobs we love?
Why was it an exception to the rule rather than the vast majority? Shouldn’t be love what we do instead of working most of our lives only to live for the moments we don’t work, or retire?
Choice
“If you begin with constraints then you will only ever develop or experience things within those constraints. We need to open ourselves up to risk and show life who we really are; otherwise we only end up defending ourselves to the world with a half baked, self imposed interpretation of ourselves.”
Not willing to sacrifice, or even get out of your comfort zone keeps you’re stuck. Only your ability to embrace discomfort, combat fear and failure will propels growth and movement.
I had been thinking about leaving for a while. As the opportunity landed on my lap. I was going to make something of it.
I had a choice. A lot of people in my position didn’t. They were either realigned or placed in a ‘comparable’ role with their skill set.
If they choose to leave it was on their own accord. No runway, no support.
Was I going to waste the opportunity?
Fostering Creativity
As a kid I didn’t think I was creative. I’m left handed and despite being told numerous times that I was, I didn’t believe it. I am not any more entitled, talented or smarter than anyone else.
My pictures weren’t nicer than my peers. Nor could I sing or dance well, nor play an instrument or sports.
Creativity is a mindset, not a skill. Practice, persistence and proactivity allows us to grow and nurtures creativity. Creativity in itself comes in many shapes and forms.
Similarly to reinvention, creativity is a state of flow and processes resulting from expression of ideas, experiences and exposure.
I certainly wasn’t born knowing how to fix .php code when I broke this site. I had to learn it. And in reality, learning is so much more rewarding than having something handed to you.
So what about money??
I’ve quoted the likes of Jenny Blake and Ryan Blair in the past that having a six months financial runway is vital to launching off personal reinvention of a larger scale.
Redundancy gave me money for 6+ months runway. The restructure means I have funding at my disposal to take bigger risks and run more experiments.
Allocating this diligently is vital to correctly measuring success and avoidance of being a starving artist.
Recognising I can be more risk taking as I have no dependencies — I am in a phase of life conducive to making bets and challenging the status quo.
If you’re not in the same position, recall what you can do to start reinventing. It doesn’t have to be an enormous step. Is there a class you can attend or a workshop/meetup? Who are your mentors and advisors?
Departing words of wisdom
Choosing something like redundancy is a very personal and confronting decision.
Understanding that everyone has different circumstances and in a specific situation, I hope this post encourages you find your own ways to create change.
If you are going through an organisational restructure, are faced with a redundancy or experience any big fork in the reinvention road my advice to you is:
- Take a step back to allow processing. Lists of pros and cons choosing to go and stay. Getting it out on paper allows critically thinking.
- Speak, but not too much — I realised early on talking over and over wouldn’t yield anything. As Gary A Bolles said, getting permission from those close to you can comfort you in decision making. For me this was a chat with my mum over tea and tears! I felt so much better and stronger for it afterwards though.
- Do your research. Being empowered in decision making. Reading my company’s Enterprise Agreement gave me knowledge on my benefits, potential training and support after I left. Tax and leave implications may also significantly affect the bottom figure of your payout. Know your position.
- Be prepared: My restructure landed quickly. Keep materials such as feedback from peers and networks, important emails and useful templates and slide shares with me. They were easily copied when I left. Having an updated CV and references is also a good move.
- Realise you will have advocates and detractors. At the end of the day it’s YOUR decision. Choose something you want to live with.
- Keep in touch with networks and work to grow others.
- Embrace that there will be challenges, bumps in the road but keep your cool. I have a whole post on riding the ‘trough of sorrow‘.
- Don’t be too hard on yourself. Mistakes will happen. Success won’t be overnight. Build, measure, learn and be able to forgive yourself and others.
- See restructure or change as an opportunity.
“If you can’t take a huge step, take as big a step as you can, but take it now.” Zig Ziglar
