Your Career Journey

A multi-destination trip

Author

Sara Kobilka
March 13, 2025

Some choose to look for new opportunities. But recently, a large batch of people have been thrust into the job hunt. If that’s you, or someone you know, here’s how to adjust your mindset for this unexpected change.

- Sara Kobilka, Renaissance Woman

When I first started career coaching, most of my clients were people feeling burned out. They were sick of the business they were in, were trying to escape toxic environments and/or wanted to have better work-life integration (I’ll explain why I can’t stand the term “work-life balance” in another newsletter).

But that changed along the way, as the economy and political environment shifted. Now, I’m seeing more and more people who are being forced to look for a new opportunity. For many, there were signs something might happen.

  • People working in local TV news heard rumblings about the industry dying as stations struggled to compete against numerous other sources of news, weather and sports information.

  •  Diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility practitioners were seeing push back to their efforts at the local and state level in some locations.

  • Those working in the technology sector saw signs of a tech bubble popping and companies rethinking their business strategies.

  • Others knew that the incoming president’s rhetoric was critical of the industry they worked in or the work that they did.

But having an idea that it might happen doesn’t reduce the blow you feel when you receive the termination notice (or the feeling of dread that it might arrive any day now). So many people I know have committed their careers and lives to impactful work. And in an instant, it felt like all could be lost.

If this is you, your sense of confusion, sadness and/or anger is completely appropriate. You are grieving more than just the loss of a job. You’re grieving the loss of community, of focus, and possibly, a sense of purpose.

There are five commonly listed stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Others have added two additional stages, shock and testing. Grief is not a linear path. You can jump between stages or get stuck in one stage for a long period. You can simultaneously be in more than one stage or jump between stages throughout the day. Here are more resources related to the grieving process and how to find resources to support you from Medical News Today and Healthline. Please get help from a medical professional if you’re struggling.

Colorful map with a flight path showing stops at many destinations.

Mindset Shifts

Here's the advice I’ve been offering my coaching clients as we work through the mindset side of job loss.

  • Remember, your career is a journey. A participant in my last LinkedIn Sprint for job seekers excited reached today to let me know that the sprint had worked! He had received a job offer! But it meant he and his young family would need to move halfway across the country. I reminded him that this move would be another stop on his journey, not necessarily a “final destination”. Moving and building community in a new space would be challenging, but it didn’t need to be permanent.

  • You may need to reframe your identity. A TV reporter I worked with felt like she was a failure because she had achieved her childhood dream. She was a professional journalist and worried she’d let down everyone who had supported her along the way if she left the TV biz. I encouraged her to embrace a new identity. She was a storyteller. Her job title might change, but the identity remains.

  • Sometimes you deserve a break. The break might be from the stress of a particular industry. You might take a position simply to pay the bills and free yourself up to do meaningful things outside of work hours. You may choose to stay at home temporarily to reduce childcare expenses. All are completely valid. Your career journey doesn’t need to have a jam-packed itinerary, sometimes rest is required to appreciate the next stop.

You are not alone. Build up your support structure, both for your mental health and for your job search.

Join the Sprint Team

If LinkedIn is a tool you’d like to use in community with others to support your search, I just finalized my LinkedIn Sprint schedule for the next 6 months.

Sprint for the STEM Community (April), registration is open! Whether you’re a scientist, engineer, technologist, mathematician, educator and/or a communicator who care about topics surrounding STEM, this sprint is for you. You don’t need to be an active job seeker to participate.

Sprint for Job Seekers (May) will be opening next month!

Resource Roundup

I’ve decided to mix things up in this section of my newsletter and share a variety of types of resources.

  • Looking for folks to follow on LinkedIn who regularly post job opportunities? Check out the list at the bottom of my newsletters from November 29, 2024 to January 16, 2025.

  • The Chronicle of Higher Education has released their 2025 Trends Report that can help provide some clarity for those working at or with colleges and universities.

  • Struggling after being laid off? Listen to the podcast, Proxy with Yowei Shaw. Yowei is the former host of the NPR podcast Invisibilia but was laid off in 2023. She started Proxy as a way of trying to understand why she felt so terrible. She began this new podcast with “The Layoff Trilogy”. This series does an amazing job of combining research and storytelling as it address a devastating situation with compassion and generous helpings of humor. This is a must-listen resource if you’ve been laid off or if someone you care about has been.

Hi! I’m Sara Kobilka, owner of Renaissance Woman Consulting.

I am a Renaissance Woman (what’s THAT? Good question! Here’s my answer). My wide-ranging background includes time as a TV meteorologist/reporter, non-profit leader, higher education program coordinator, curriculum designer, and now, business owner. During each leg of this journey, I gained new skills that I was able take with me in my next step. Now, I work remotely with clients to help them confidently tell their story and navigate the transition to the next leg of their career journey.

Take the Next Step

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