(0:01 – 0:17)

Nyasha: You are now tuned into the Hopeful Workspace Podcast. You will hear stories of real people from all over who are dealing with job loss or tough job situations. No companies are named and the people are kept anonymous.

(0:18 – 0:37)

Nyasha: Well, except me, I’m Nyasha. Join me as we listen to the real stories of real people and take what you need from their situations to grow. Remember, what you’re experiencing is just a season and there’ll be many more good ones after this.

(0:40 – 1:00)

Speaker 1: So, what’s your work story? Right. Well, I accepted a role as head of HR for a tech startup. I was founded by a very powerful person in the entertainment industry and it was presented to me as a very exciting, high visibility, high responsibility role reporting directly to the CEO.

(1:00 – 1:14)

Speaker 1: Excepted, I even took a $20,000 salary cut because I saw how fantastic the potential was. My first day, no one showed up in the office to greet me. There was actually just one lone IT employee there that was providing my laptop.

(1:14 – 1:32)

Speaker 1: I had to do all of my own onboarding, give myself my own tour of the office. My second day, the CEO showed up about 10 o’clock, talked to me for about two minutes and then locked himself in the office for the rest of the day. They refused to allow me access to the payroll or the compensation systems.

(1:33 – 1:57)

Speaker 1: And I quite literally had to fight tooth and nail for a whole week to get access. I was later told by the CEO directly that the reason they didn’t want me to have access and have access to any of the information was because they didn’t want me to see that I was actually the lowest paid employee of the company. Now, mind you, I’m the head of HR and a member of executive leadership and every other member of the team was making $100,000 or more than I was annually.

(1:58 – 2:12)

Speaker 1: So pretty quickly I realized, they didn’t want a head of HR. They wanted someone to just come in, build up their performance systems, build up their compensation system and stay silent on culture, stay silent on leadership. I was constantly undermined.

(2:13 – 2:19)

Speaker 1: I would be presenting and be interrupted. I would complete and run projects. Others would take credit for that.

(2:20 – 2:51)

Speaker 1 : I eventually ended up meeting with the CEO and listing the various violations, the poor practices that I had observed and I was laid off with a two-week severance shortly after that.

Speaker 2: So my story, my work history is I started off early doing blue collar work and worked my way into corporate America. So now I have been in corporate America for about 10 years and it’s been an experience.

(2:51 – 3:09)

Speaker 2: It’s a much different experience than blue collar work working for small mom and pop shops. While it’s got its good things, it also has its bad things. And I’m assuming that’s why you’re doing this podcast because corporate America is an animal and it’s hard to navigate.

(3:10 – 3:34)

Speaker 2: It’s once, you know, when you get used to it, it’s okay, but it’s the machine just kind of is a problem when you get caught in it. And that’s kind of where I am now is I’m just caught in the middle of corporate America and not really understanding how to move forward.

Speaker 3: I was a part of a second round layoff within the tech industry at my previous company.

(3:34 – 3:50)

Speaker 3: The layoff really affected my life in a lot of different ways. You know, I no longer had a steady income, the comfort in working remotely, flexibility or a work-life balance. You know, I kind of just lost it all in a matter of minutes.

(3:50 – 4:03)

Speaker 3: The aftermath of my job search was really tough. It seemed like everyone was hiring, but no one was hiring. I did not almost get any callbacks in a lot of rejection emails.

(4:04 – 4:31)

Speaker 3: It made me feel like I wasn’t qualified for anything and it kind of messed with my self-esteem a little bit and had me questioning my career choices, what I was going to do moving forward and, you know, how I was going to continue. It just felt like a big discouragement.

Speaker 4: So my first layoff occurred in 2015.

(4:31 – 5:03)

Speaker 4: I had been working for a telecommunications company for about almost 17 years. They had a merger going on and I knew, you know, there would be changes in the group and I was kind of prepared for it, but also the back end, I was looking for a new job. I didn’t move, I guess, as fast enough and November of 2015, I was led into a conference room and advised that I would have 30 days or so in the company to continue looking for a job, but I would be laid off and offered a severance package.

(5:04 – 5:43)

Speaker 4: Moving forward, I worked as a contractor since then and then I worked in a financial area in a company in New York and unfortunately in 2023, the same instance of last hired, last fired, last hired and then I got laid off, not fired, laid off in 2023 of May. And since then, I’ve been recreating my story by becoming an instructor full-time, I’m part-time now, an instructor for ESL and computer basics along with soft skills for people returning to the workforce.

Speaker 5: I was furloughed in 2020 as a result of COVID.

(5:44 – 6:09)

Speaker 5: So I decided to take a chance and traveled during the peak of the pandemic. My job search was pretty difficult when I was searching for my first travel assignment due to my limited skills because I trained at a small community hospital. With me coming from a smaller hospital, I didn’t have a lot of experience in the specialties that hospitals typically look for in a traveler.

(6:10 – 6:43)

Speaker 5: So I stayed in COVID-related non-surgical jobs for about seven months before I got my first travel assignment. I was unsure how I was going to make money because my professional career is solely based in surgery. Another con I had was trying to figure out how to pivot when I have a career that is specialized in surgery.

(6:43 – 7:15)

Speaker 5: However, some of the pros that came along with being furloughed was realizing that you actually can pivot when given the opportunity to do so.

Nyasha: What do you think contributed to your work situation? Or what do you think could have been done better about your work situation?

Speaker 1: Honestly, I didn’t listen to my initial gut feeling. Even in the negotiation process for the salary, those red flags were coming up.

(7:15 – 7:36)

Speaker 1: I remember when they presented the offer to me, the gentleman said, he presented an offer with one salary with no stock options or a lesser salary with stock options I would invest for a year. And he presented to me and said, well, I’m not sure of your financial situation implying that I should take the lower offer and go with the stock. So things like that, it was just constant disrespect.

(7:36 – 7:53)

Speaker 1: I think on day one, when no one showed up for me, I should have resigned then. But I decided to say nothing and kind of let things play out. I also didn’t want to ruffle any feathers because I recognize and I knew that the other members of the executive leadership team had worked together at a previous company.

(7:53 – 8:05)

Speaker 1: So they already had a pretty tight-knit bond. So I was clear to the outsider, but I foolishly assumed that I could use my knowledge, use my subject matter expertise and really impact change. But I was sorely mistaken.

(8:05 – 8:19)

Speaker 3: I’m not sure if there was anything that could have been done differently. I don’t think you’re ever prepared for things to turn out the way that they are. You’re never prepared to be laid off.

(8:20 – 8:41)

Speaker 3: Economy is just not what it used to be. But I think because of the industry I was in with AI, it really did affect a lot of us in different ways.

Speaker 2: The roughness of corporate America, I think a lot of it contributes to people, managers that don’t know how to people manage.

(8:42 – 9:19)

Speaker 2: And that is, in my opinion, one of the bottom line detriments of corporate America is you have so many different facets of corporate America, so many different industries, and you have a lot of people that are very good at what they do in those industries. But that absolutely does not make them good people managers. Good people managers are hard to come by, and they can absolutely make or break your career, make or break your everyday life, and make or break how far you get in your job, how much you enjoy your job, your raises, the people around you.

(9:21 – 10:03)

Speaker 2: That one person that manages you can really make your life great or it can make your life horrible. And I think that would be the one thing that could improve corporate America is there needs to be more training when it comes to leadership and people management and emotional intelligence.

Speaker 5: I think another thing that contributed to this situation was that I’m going to take accountability and say that I should have been more confident in my skills and more confident in myself and just tried to look for another job sooner instead of waiting around for a job that never reappeared.

(10:04 – 10:24)

Speaker 5: I do regret wasting so much time when I should have just taken a leap of faith.

Speaker 4: Okay, in 2015, because of the merger, sometimes, I mean, I’m completely aware that there are things that are out of anybody’s hands, especially financially. You know, numbers, we are not just people, we’re numbers.

(10:24 – 10:58)

Speaker 4: And statistically, they were trying to put two groups together and see how many people they need to run this particular real estate division. But also, it came with personality issues with the new boss, along with a very silent boss who was not a micromanager, and then the second person was. So it was trying to be in between these two different personalities, along with, you know, of course, looking for to stay with the company, not just the division and find, you know, other jobs, but it didn’t work out that way.

(10:59 – 11:13)

Speaker 4: So that was the first layoff in 2015. And in 2013, personality clash. Yes, I’ve been there already six years with a different boss, not one problem, worked with several people on different teams, no issues.

(11:13 – 11:48)

Speaker 4: And then I moved to marketing, and that’s when, not head-butting, but they were going to do budget cuts, and I was the last person brought into the group. So unfortunately, I was the last person, one of the many people that got laid off. So I’m looking at it as both of them were lessons of, you know, how I should have prepped and prepared myself for things like that to have happened, whether it be the company going through financial constraints or having, you know, not such a good match as far as bosses.

(11:52 – 12:24)

Nyasha : What’s that thing or things that keep you going?

Speaker 2: Who doesn’t need a paycheck? That’s kind of what keeps everybody going, I’m assuming. Like I said, I started off working for very small mom-and-pop shops, blue collar work, electricians, welding, general maintenance. And the one thing that I do appreciate about being in corporate America working for a big corporation is I have never experienced a paycheck bouncing.

(12:24 – 12:44)

Speaker 2: I’ve never experienced loss of health insurance. And while I have experienced loss of jobs, the fallout of that has always been much softer than the blue collar positions. I was working for a gentleman who pulled my health insurance and didn’t tell me one time.

(12:44 – 12:56)

Speaker 2: I went to the doctor and they say, no, I got a huge bill because I had no health insurance. I was working for somebody who wasn’t paying me for almost a better half of six months. And he just kept promising me and would give me sporadic checks here and there.

(12:56 – 13:15)

Speaker 2: And after experiencing that, I decided to start working for bigger companies. And while corporate America does have its ups and downs, the fact that the paycheck is always there and health insurance is always there makes it worth it, in my opinion.

Speaker 4: To be honest, but there’s a couple of things.

(13:15 – 13:46)

Speaker 4: So definitely the top is spirituality. And would be LinkedIn and any other groups or people I have been networking with that would, you know, join this or listen to my webinar or join us at a like a Women’s International meeting. So then I could talk like that five minute elementary speech where I get to talk to other people, whether it be in person or actually in an online capacity like this webinar, Cisco.

(13:47 – 14:12)

Speaker 4: I haven’t done a TEDx yet, but definitely I think as long as I kept talking and communicating with people and not closing myself off, which can lead in, you know, definitely depression about being laid off and being affected, you know, financially.

Speaker 3: Well, in my situation, I felt like I almost had no choice. Like most people, you know, I have a mortgage, a car payment.

(14:12 – 14:28)

Speaker 3: I had children. So I kind of had to keep going and try to find something new and had to accept that I was going to make different adjustments in my life. So I felt like I was kind of at a standstill, like it was either I did it or I didn’t.

(14:29 – 15:00)

Speaker 3: And I had to keep going because I needed to.

Speaker 5: Family and money. I want to make sure that I am well compensated for the sacrifices that I make because I am consistently away from my family and friends for the sake of money, you know, to do these jobs, take these travel assignments, going to these underserved communities and fill in these holes at various hospitals.

(15:03 – 15:28)

Speaker 5: Yeah, so I say that’s my motivation, doing it for my family and doing it for the money because I also know that eventually I’m not going to be able to travel and work like this. I’m going to want to go back to a permanent job. So I’m just going to appreciate this chapter of my life and, you know, truly make the best of it.

(15:28 – 16:00)

Speaker 1: So, yeah. You know, honestly, as someone that is generally responsible for kind of crafting these workplace policies, developing culture, coaching these leaders, I’ve kept going because I want to make sure that other employees and workers don’t experience what I have. I feel kind of a duty to stick around and continue to shape these companies, craft these policies so that individuals in the workforce can have a quality experience and not feel that they’re being oppressed, abused, harassed, etc.

(16:04 – 16:27)

Nyasha: What advice do you have for people who may be going through a similar situation as yours?

Speaker 3: My advice to someone in my situation is don’t be afraid of a career change or to invest in your career growth. I decided to enroll back into school and do something that I felt like was going to invest into my career. Try to remain positive.

(16:27 – 16:40)

Speaker 3: I know that’s not, you know, it’s easier said than done. But, you know, you got to try to remain positive and keep fighting and keep moving forward. And we have to remember that this is only a minor setback.

(16:40 – 16:48)

Speaker 3: This is not going to be forever. This is something temporary. We’re going to get through it and we’re going to be where we want to be.

(16:52 – 17:09)

Speaker 4: Definitely keep talking, keep communicating. You know, don’t be ashamed that you’re going through an either career transition or you still had hiccups in finding something new, a new job. That’s the more you talk and conversate.

(17:11 – 17:22)

Speaker 4: Right now, we can join most social events in person. We don’t have to all do them online, but most of them still are. And, you know, join a group, join the conversations, especially with LinkedIn.

(17:23 – 17:40)

Speaker 4: I’ve connected with a person from Lee Hecht, which was an organization that most people kind of connect you with when you’re being laid off. So they have a lot of webinars and classes and tutorials. And they always say join, you know, you never know who you’re going to meet or get in contact with.

(17:40 – 18:19)

Speaker 4: So network, network in person, network online, you know, keep use all the social media tools, your platforms, Instagram, your Facebook, you know, when things come up, but do a hashtag, hashtag, you know, open to work or hashtag career transition. I noticed when I did that, I was, you know, more people started responding to me in my inbox, definitely in LinkedIn. So communicate, stay healthy mentally around healthy people who are talking about good things, who encourage you, who are looking for you to succeed.

(18:19 – 18:32)

Speaker 4: You know, don’t try to be around people who just want to complain about the situation because complaining is not going to get you anywhere.

Speaker 1: I think the best advice, honestly, is listen to your instincts. You know, our intuition is such a powerful tool.

(18:33 – 18:52)

Speaker 1: It’s something innate in us that we truly use for survival. So if something goes off in the beginning, it truly is only going to get worse. I mean, people generally are putting their best foot forward in that first day, right? So if you’re already seeing all these deficiencies, you can only imagine how much more things are going to deteriorate.

(18:52 – 19:10)

Speaker 1: So oftentimes I know sometimes it might be shameful or you don’t want to feel that you’ve failed or, you know, cut your losses. But sometimes it’s truly beneficial just for our own physical and mental safety to just cut those losses right away. And if you do decide that you’re going to stay and kind of stick it out, I really, really encourage everyone to document everything.

(19:11 – 19:39)

Speaker 1: It’s really helpful, especially for folks like myself in HR position to really take care of problems when they arise, but we need as much information as possible. So keeping detailed notes with dates, times, all those things can really help when situations like this arise to remedy it.

Speaker 2: When you go from working with your hands and working, you know, doing blue collar work and then jumping to a desk where you have to navigate a bunch of personalities, you have to navigate how to speak, how to act, how to dress, how to email.

(19:40 – 20:01)

Speaker 2: That can be a huge undertaking. So I think, you know, for somebody that’s going from blue collar to corporate America, I think it’s really good to get a coach and navigate that piece of it. For those that are in corporate America, I think one of the biggest things is really showing up.

(20:02 – 20:27)

Speaker 2: I had an experience today where I was interviewing somebody for a position and the guy was unemployed, very clearly unemployed by what he told me. And he showed up five minutes late for the interview, hair was not combed, white t-shirt. And I, in my opinion, I’m like, if this is how you act on the interview, how are you going to be on the job? Like, I need somebody reliable.

(20:27 – 20:52)

Speaker 2: So I think for people in corporate America, showing up, doing your best, but don’t kill yourself for your job. That’s really where the key is, is do enough to keep getting that paycheck, but also recognize that your job is literally only 20% of your life.

Speaker 5: Um, I would say just always bet on yourself and ignore the naysayers.

(20:52 – 21:10)

Speaker 5: You’ll be surprised how far you can go in life with just a little bit of fearlessness, motivation and determination. Like just always keep a positive attitude and just know that eventually it’s going to get better, but you just have to keep going. Just keep going.

(21:12 – 21:29)

Nyasha: You’ve just listened to the stories of five different people, all from various backgrounds. The common theme between them was that they all navigated a tough job loss or situation. I want their stories, as well as mine, to show you that you’re not alone.

(21:30 – 21:45)

Nyasha: No matter where you come from, we can all stumble at times, but the most important thing is that you get back up. Like one of our speakers said, you have to keep going. Don’t be afraid to reach out for help if you need it.

(21:46 – 21:59)

Nyasha: You may have to change how and even where you work, but always know there is opportunity and hope here for you. I’m so proud of you for listening so far. And until next time.