This week our next jobseeker Meredith Mitchell gives us a look into the mindset she had at her layoff back in May. After going viral for her humorous anecdote of the incident she wrote this piece that she wanted to share here. Thank you for Meredith for sharing this with us!
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“I don’t understand, I did everything right.”
After a particularly painful job rejection came, I said those words tearfully to my partner across the dinner table. I meant it in two ways: I did everything right in this interview process, and I had done everything right in my previous role from which I had been laid off. Pitifully, I started to spiral into a “why me” mindset. I hate that. That’s not me. In that moment, though, it’s all I could think about.
My time at my former company was a wild and wonderful ride. I was hired on the spot to be a Junior Support Advisor (tech support), but in my interview, I was told I could move on to my true passion, marketing, after three months. That wasn’t even a little true, and frankly, have no idea how my interviewer got that so wrong. After three months of being in tech support, I asked if I could move to the marketing team now. My lead was confused; that wasn't how this worked. I couldn't just "move"; I had to wait for a position to open up and apply to the team, just like any other person. Annoying setback, but I was already in the company, so this should be easy. I’ll just keep doing my best in tech support and apply for positions as they come.
Two months and many applications later, I’m still in tech support with no leads on a new
position. Impatiently, I decided to reach out to the team myself and ask to be put on their
projects. I just wanted the experience so that when a position opened up on the team, I’d be
ready. Two folks from the team happily took me under their wing and mentored me on their
projects. After four months of being tech support by day and marketing by night (well, late
afternoon), a position opened up, and I became a fully fledged coordinator on the team. The first thing I was told was to make sure I was free the third week of September because I’d be going to Las Vegas with the team. I can't even begin to describe my joy at joining this team. Even more, I can't begin to describe my joy of being on this team for a year; it was truly wonderful.
My next career move at the company came a year later, when I was asked if I wanted to join the Office of the COO as a coordinator there. As much as I loved the Growth team (and I REALLY loved the Growth team), this was a fantastic opportunity for me. It presented new challenges, new connections, and a window into how the C Suite works at a large tech company. I happily accepted. My first two months in my new role were wonderful; I was taking on lots of projects, meeting new people, and feeling really excited about where this position would take me. The third month, though, storm clouds rolled in. There were whispers of layoffs among coworkers, and I was already on edge. Three weeks before the layoff, my access to my directors' calendars were revoked.
“It’s just a security exercise. You’ll get it back after our earnings call.”
An eternal optimist, I wanted to believe that. Then, my workload became lighter. Much, much lighter. Still an eternal optimist, I thought maybe they didn't have a lot of work for me because the earnings call was coming soon and I couldn't really help with that as a coordinator. However, a part of me still knew this wasn't a good sign, and for three weeks, I couldn't sleep. I had a constant knot in my stomach. Typing this out, the knot is back. The lump in my throat is back. This is where the story goes south.
On May 4th at 7 am, my phone rang.
As soon as I opened my eyes, I knew what that meant. My coworker was on the other end.
“Morning buddy.”
“Did it happen?” I asked, pit in my stomach.
“Go check your email.”
I ran upstairs and opened my laptop. As soon as I opened it, I knew I was done. My workplace account had been logged out, "user deactivated"; I clicked into my email, and one lone email sat there.
"Your role has been impacted."
I didn’t even read the body of the email; I just told my
coworker, "I was laid off", and she was in disbelief. We had talked for weeks before,
convincing each other we were both safe. We had both just gotten promotions; why would we be laid off if we just got promotions?
“Can I call you back?” I said, about to explode with tears.
“Sure, buddy.” I hung up and called my Dad. My Dad answered the phone a little too cheerily. Honestly, if I’m phoning at 7 am on a workday after weeks of worrying about an impending layoff, he really should have picked up on what this call was going to be. Alas.
“I just got laid off.” Saying those words out loud to my Dad sent me into a spiral.
“I don’t want to lose my apartment, I need to spay Maisy soon, and that’s going to be a thousand dollars. I don’t know how I’m going to find another job. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t know what to do.”
I was in a full-blown spiral. My Dad assured me everything would be fine, he would make sure I wouldn't lose my apartment; there are people in worse situations, I’ll find another position, I’ll be fine. At 11:00 am that same day, I had an exit interview. Generally, the exit interview is supposed to be with your lead, but it looks like my lead and everyone on my new team declined. Maybe they were too busy, maybe they didn’t want to do it; either way, it didn’t feel great. My old lead had also been laid off, so my exit interview was with a director I worked closely with in my last role. She was lovely and sympathetic, but ultimately, she couldn’t answer what I really wanted to know. Why me? Who decided? When did they decide? Could I have done anything differently?
By 5:00 pm on May 4th, the laptop that I had spent hours building projects on, video calling my coworkers, chatting on Slack, had functionally become a brick. The screen was black, and it wouldn’t turn on. That was the end of my wild and wonderful ride.
After two weeks of furiously applying to new roles, I had my first (of many) interviews. I thought to myself, “Wow! If I can get a new position only a month after being laid off, I’ll have three months of severance left I can use to travel!” That interview didn’t lead to anything. Two weeks after that, another interview. This time I had been personally referred. Two interviews and a six-page assignment later, another rejection.
“You don’t have enough experience.”
Okay, couldn’t you see that on my resume before I went through the entire interview process? It turns out that the process of looking for a new job is one of the most backward and frustrating experiences a person can endure (hmm, that might be hyperbole). Still, though, I wanted to look at this as positively as possible. I can find a new job with severance left over, and I’ll use that to travel. I’ll make lemonade out of lemons.
In the last three months, I’ve been ghosted by more interviews than I ever thought reasonable or possible. This feels like I’m on Tinder looking for a boyfriend, and I keep going on great dates, only to find myself being ghosted immediately after. However, this is worse than finding a boyfriend because my entire livelihood depends on it. I looked at my friend on a walk one day after being ghosted again and said in a fury of passion,
“I would rather be ghosted by a thousand boys on Tinder than be ghosted by another company!”
Again, this might have been hyperbole. My actual real-life boyfriend also doesn’t think this is a fair comparison because I’ve never actually used Tinder and been ghosted by a boy.
Touche.
Another thing I didn’t realize about being unemployed and looking for work is the number of
MLMs I’m attracting. Now I will admit, the first meeting I sat through was due to my own
ignorance that brought me there. Folks will reach out, saying I’d be a “great fit” for their "fast growing" company and ask for a meeting. Note: not an “interview,” a “meeting.”
At first, I sat through their pitch because, well, I don’t have anything else to do. Also, I’m too
non-confrontational for my own good. I sat through a 30-minute pitch of someone explaining
asset management to me, and I worked at an asset management firm in university. Seriously.
Let me say for the record right now, I have 0 experience teaching financial literacy, I have 0
interest in teaching financial literacy, and telling people they can make between $3000-$8000 a month is a huge red flag (I mean honestly, that’s a huge range). Please stop reaching out to me. I wish you all the best in your endeavors, but I want no part of it.
This essentially brings us up to date (I’ve spared you, dear reader, many other painful memories of job searching that would bring this blog post way over the word count). Last Wednesday, I found myself reaching out to an acquaintance from high school, asking for help applying to the company where she works. My partner was sitting on the couch across from me, and I looked at him and said:
“I feel like my bum is hanging out 24/7, and I keep going up to people and asking for a pair of pants, and no one has a pair that fits me.”
Reaching out to a high school acquaintance asking for help will do that to someone. “I’m sorry, babe,” he replied. He's been having to say that to me a lot more frequently these last few months.
“No, seriously, it’s like every time I go up to someone, they have a pair that doesn’t fit me, or they don’t have a pair, but their coworker does, or they want me to make my own, and the whole time, my bum is hanging in the breeze. This is so embarrassing. I hate this!”
I took what I had said to him, opened my LinkedIn, and put my words into a post (replacing the word “bum” with “butt,” not so NSFW). It turns out, lots of unemployed layoff victims have the exact same feelings as I do.
“I had my maternity pants ripped.”
“The pair of pants that I wore for over 25 years (with a few patches called “mergers and
acquisitions”) finally gave out.”
“I’m just looking for sweatpants at this point.”
Now here’s the really exciting part of my story. That post blew up, and at the current count, it
has 221,613 impressions, 2450 reactions, 144 comments, and 62 reposts. Not only did this
LinkedIn post about my ass-less pants strike a chord with lots of other folks, but it led to some wonderful connections, coffee chats, recruiters, and even interviews. As I’m typing this, I have an interview in 3 hours. All this to say, I sincerely hope this chapter of my life is coming to an end very soon. I’m not someone who fares well with nothing to do; I’m meant to work. My collection of sewing projects, embroidery projects, and paint supplies I’ve collected over the last three months can attest to that.
I also need to end this by thanking the one person who has stood by me faithfully, not leaving my side, endlessly encouraging me to keep going: my dog. Maisy, you keep me sane, and I love you dearly. Also, my boyfriend, family, and friends have been wonderful too. I hope to close this chapter of my life very soon.
Meredith is featured as Episode 6 of our podcast - found on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, and wherever you listen to podcasts. She is #opentowork and can be found in our open-to-work section or reached out to via her LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meredith-mitchell-330070187/ .
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