If you’ve been reading the news or your LinkedIn feed, you’ve likely seen the layoffs happening across the tech industry. Maybe you yourself have been impacted. Whether this is your first layoff or you’ve been a part of one before, the experience can be quite disheartening.
You go from having a full work day to hours on hours of open time. You had a group of colleagues you worked with daily and suddenly you’re no longer interacting with those folks on a regular basis. There are moments when your new found freedom feels amazing - and others when it’s absolutely brutal.
So how do you support yourself through it?
Below are some ways in which I’ve been taking care of myself throughout my own layoff journey. Hope you find them helpful too!
In business, there is an exercise called Stop, Start, Continue. The purpose of the exercise is to enable teams to give feedback, clarify priorities, and create agreed upon next steps. By putting all of these ideas out in the open, it’s easier to get everyone on the same page about what action needs to be taken. It’s often used at the end of project sprints or the end of a quarter to help teams self-evaluate and improve upon processes for the next project or quarter ahead.
It can also be a helpful exercise for your own self-reflection.
We’re all experiencing grief right now. It might look and feel a bit different from what normally comes to mind when we think of “grief”, but ultimately that’s what it is.
We’re grieving the loss of life - both the actual loss of life of those who have died of COVID-19, as well as the sudden loss of our “normal” lives. It feels like overnight the world we knew changed and we’re mourning what we once took for granted like meeting friends for dinner, going to the gym, or even shaking hands with someone we just met. Many of us are grieving the loss of stable income and aren’t sure when we’ll be able to find jobs again.
We’re also grieving the loss of the futures we had in mind for ourselves - whether it’s postponing a wedding or graduation, changes to who is allowed in the delivery room when giving birth, the move we were supposed to make, or the new job we were supposed to start. We had plans and dreams that suddenly seemed to have vanished or have drastically changed on us.
Nothing feels certain - other than the fact that we’re experiencing grief.
As we deal with our own grief, it’s important to remember that in many ways this is a collective grief. Every single one of us is affected by this pandemic in our own way.
This is particularly important to remember when it comes to work.
How are you holding up, friend?
I hope you’ve been finding ways to have fun and appreciate the good things in life amidst all of this uncertainty. To help you feel inspired and hopefully discover some new things to keep you occupied in quarantine, I’ve pulled together a list of things I’ve been loving lately.
Each item on the list is something I’ve personally been using for inspiration, stress management, or just for fun.
Over the past week, several friends and clients have mentioned the difficulty they’re having adjusting to working from home. Maybe you’re feeling that way too?
As someone who has spent a few years working from home and on distributed teams, I thought it might be helpful to share my best do’s and don’ts of working from home to help make your adjustment easier.
Here’s what I’ve found to work well.
Lately, I’ve been having conversations with a lot of women who are feeling overwhelmed.
They have demanding jobs, busy social lives, and major goals for themselves. As a way to stay organized, many of them create To Do lists, thinking that seeing the big picture will help them dive in. Yet, what once felt like a great strategy, now feels like it’s running their lives.
Happy New Year!
This time of year I’m usually writing about New Year’s resolutions or goal setting, but this year I’m thinking about things a little differently.
For the first time in a long time (perhaps in forever?), I don’t have any specific resolutions in mind for the new year. Sure, eating healthier, working out more, and getting more consistent with my meditation practice are on my mind, but those are on “the list” every year. They don’t feel new or particularly exciting at the moment. My mind has been more focused on my general sense of being and the vibe I want to set for 2019.
So this year rather than setting goals or resolutions, I’m focusing on New Year’s mantras: statements about how I want to approach 2019 and how I want to feel this year.
As we approach the holidays and the year comes to a close, it's natural to start looking ahead to 2019.
Our focus shifts to New Year's Resolutions and what comes next for us in our lives and careers. I mean, just walk into any stationary store and you’re bombarded with 2019 planners - it’s hard not to think about it.
While it's important to be forward thinking and get serious about your goals, I encourage you not to let 2018 go so quickly.
Happy Holidays friends!
The season is officially in full swing! Hanukkah started a couple of days ago and Christmas is only 21 days away (yes I’m counting down). Everywhere you go stores are playing holiday music and Salvation Army Santas are ringing their bells.
No matter what you celebrate, this time of year is fun, but also a bit stressful. I know I look forward to it every year, but usually end up feeling frazzled at some point.
So to help you feel inspired and calm this holiday season - whether you’re looking for a pick me up or a gift idea - I’ve pulled together a list of things I’ve been loving lately.
Each item on the list is something I’ve personally been using for inspiration, stress management, or just for fun.
It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day of life and forget to say thank you.
I don’t mean forgetting to say thank you to your local barista as she hands you your coffee or the person ahead of you who holds the door to your office building as your run up behind them. Those should naturally roll off the tongue. Or at least I hope they do…
I’m talking about having a general attitude of gratitude.
Got those post Labor Day weekend blues?
I know, I feel you. Summer is ending and we might not be quite ready to say goodbye. But you know what’s great about September?
No, not the arrival of pumpkin spice everything. Although, I do love me a good PSL.
What’s great about September is the renewed sense of energy and focus that comes with the change of seasons.
A few weeks ago I had the honor of being a panelist for an episode of the One Idea Away livecast + podcast, a community and podcast created by iPEC (the coaching program I attended). I'd never been part of a panel podcast episode before and it was a super cool experience!
It was so much fun connecting with a couple of other iPEC coaches and talking all about what happens when you realize that the thing you thought you wanted in life isn't in fact what you want. We share our own stories and experiences, as well as advice for helping you pivot and figure out what you actually want to be doing instead.
If you're anything like me, you hold a lot of thoughts in your head. You're constantly thinking about the future, wondering how you're going to get where you want to go, wondering what things will look like a year or 5 years from now, etc.
With all those thoughts bouncing around, it's easy to get caught up there in our minds, mulling things over, over-analyzing, and staying stuck. When things feel disorganized, it can lead us to avoid taking action and just continue putting one foot in front of the other.
When we enter the working world for the first time, we show up with a lot of assumptions about (but little understanding of) how the corporate world works. Sometimes these expectations are met, but a lot of the time they aren’t – leaving us confused and wishing someone had told us what to really expect before we even started.
Well, as a former sales rep turned career coach, I’ve learned that there are several things no one tells you about the first 5 years of your career. After spending much of those years really confused (maybe how you’re feeling now) and constantly soul-searching, below are 4 things I wish someone had given me a heads up about when I was starting my career:
