Making Sense of the Future After Losing a Job You Love

Making Sense of the Future After Losing a Job You Love

by Sally Maitlis - April 30, 2020

Losing a job is deeply shocking. It is a loss of livelihood: the ability to support ourselves and often our families. But the emotional impact goes beyond financial stress. For many people, work offers valued meanings and relationships and when the work goes, these frequently go with it, prompting our shame and anger as well as sorrow at leaving people, projects, and a place to which we have given a large part of ourselves. But perhaps most significant is the impact of job loss on our identity or sense of self. For many, work is not only a large part of our waking hours but also who we feel we are. This is especially true if we were doing a job that we loved, or one in a career built over years. The loss of this identity can be devastating.

Even in good times, a job loss is often one of life’s most stressful events, coming close after bereavement, marital difficulties, and personal injury. Beyond their prevalence, the job losses that come with the Covid-19 pandemic and recession are likely to strike particularly hard at people’s sense of identity because some industries will never recover, while others will re-appear in a very different form. Because social distancing is likely to continue for many months in some form or another, many people who have been laid off won’t be able to return to the same kind of job. Even those in industries that remain intact face an uncertain future, with no clear timelines, and a post-pandemic economy that will make finding work challenging.

But there’s a path forward. In research I conducted over 10 years with people forced to leave the work they cared deeply about, I heard about their emotional responses first-hand - and how many of them found a way through.

Many of my interviewees spoke of an identity crisis. Take Saraya, an aerial acrobat and dancer who experienced an injury that affected her balance: “It’s definitely a loss, because it’s part of your identity…one of the things I’ve been struggling with is, ‘What is my identity if I’m not a performer? Who am I? Is that something I want to be? Can I be somebody without performing, because it’s been such a part of my life?’” (All the names of my study participants in this article are pseudonyms.) Steve, a commercial airline pilot whose intense anxiety forced him to stop flying, found he deeply missed aspects of his career he had not realized he cared about, reflecting, “I didn’t crave the respect of the job and I never got hung up on the status side of it. But it’s ironic: now that I’m not doing it, that I sort of miss the identity.”

Yet in my research I found that most people who are forced out of a career do manage to create meaningful futures and even feel more fulfilled than they did before. This happens as they come to terms with their disrupted identities and start to see new possibilities. Often, they discover parts of themselves they barely knew existed. And with these discoveries come new ways of understanding who they might become and the work they might do.

To be sure, shifting from the shock and grief of job loss to the hope of new possibilities takes time, effort, and intention. A global pandemic throws up additional challenges such as hiring freezes, isolation from support networks, and the burden of additional caring responsibilities. But it can also provide the time and freedom to begin a process of positive change and growth.

In my research I found that those who successfully created new futures for themselves tended to move through their grief and growth in three phases:

1. Regulate emotions

It’s hard to think straight when your system is flooded with emotion, and there’s a lot to feel emotional about at the moment. Whether you are impatient to return to your career or are facing the daunting unknowns of a career change, regulating your emotional state is an important first step. That means managing your emotions so they become less intense but not completely numbed out.

You can do this by talking with someone supportive, practicing mindfulness, doing some slow breathing, or engaging in physical exercise. Any of these activities can reduce the levels of cortisol and adrenaline in your brain that surge when the body is functioning in “threat” mode, as it will for many at a time like this.

If, instead, you are someone who deals with bad news by shrugging it off and keeping busy, it can be helpful to give yourself a chance to feel your new situation, including acknowledging emotions that are under the surface. When we push away feelings, they often continue to drive us, but simply outside of our awareness.

2. Engage in sense-making

From a more emotionally regulated place, you can now start to figure out what has happened, why, and what it means for you. Psychologists call this sense-making. The process can give you back some sense of control in your situation - especially if what has happened to you takes place in the context of a much bigger crisis.

My research shows that certain kinds of sense-making are more likely to lead to positive futures and personal growth, while other kinds keep people stuck where they are. When individuals focus on their mistakes and what went wrong, they create diminished versions of who they were, and can struggle to see beyond that.

For example, Peter was a professional drummer who had to give up his career after sustaining an arm injury that did not heal. Although he loved his work, he could not continue it in the same way. Yet his music was so important to him and so central to his identity that he struggled to think about what else he might do. He tried teaching but continued to wish he could still perform. Peter’s attention remained focused on what he had lost and his sense-making on why. Years later, he was still seeking possible treatments for his condition and asking himself why this ruinous thing had happened to him. He felt it had derailed the life he should have lived and could not envisage a positive future.

Peter’s sense-making was underpinned by a relentless interrogation, seeking explanation for what happened, and engaging in counterfactual thinking around how things might have been different. He asked himself questions such as: Why me? Whose fault was it? What should/shouldn’t I have done? How would my life have been if this hadn’t happened? How can I return to my old work?

But my research also shows that when individuals focus on how elements of their prior experiences and identities can be reworked and extended, they create the basis for growth rather than entrapment. In my study, these people made sense in a way that shone a light on the value of their skills and personal attributes for a new job. This was easier for those seeking a role like their last one but was also evident in non-linear moves. When they were able to reframe their personal and professional qualities as evidence of their potential for quite a different career, new possibilities emerged. For example, Gordon, who had an affable manner and was a skilled networker, moved from events organizer to estate agent. Clara, who recognized her passion for health and the body, was able to transition from contemporary dance to running an international chain of high-end health spas.

3. Experiment and integrate

Sense-making is more than a way of thinking. Gordon and Clara discovered their new career paths by engaging in sequences of small (and not always deliberate) experiments through which they incrementally created new work lives. These included helping out a friend, developing a former hobby, attending a talk, or agreeing to an interim role. As they continued to reflect on their experiences of these new activities, they were more likely to regard their forced transition as a “catalyst” for a long-needed change or a “gift” that opened new worlds to them. Moreover, they felt their identities had been greatly enriched, strengthened, or expanded through their difficult experiences.

Gordon and Clara often linked their past work and identities to their thinking about what was next for them. They asked themselves questions such as: What did I bring to that job that could be helpful in the future? Which parts of myself was I unable to use? Which parts of myself do I want to develop? How much did I enjoy that job? How well did it fit with the other demands and interests I have? What would I like to be different about my next job?

We don’t need a crisis to change our job, career, or lifestyle. Yet for many people, among the greatest challenges of making change are creating the time and headspace to think about it, and then finding the courage to make the leap. For all that is painful about losing a job, it forces change upon us. If you have been laid off in this time of unprecedented challenge, take heart - this may be an unexpected chance to rethink what you want and who you are, and start building a path towards a job more enlivening than the one you lost. And by reflecting on your situation and taking action to see what it reveals, you can construct a narrative of your career and yourself that provides a springboard for your next steps.

Sally Maitlis is a professor of organizational behavior and leadership at the University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School, where she directs the High Performance Leadership Program.  She is also a practicing psychotherapist and an executive coach.