What Losing My First Job Taught Me About Career Resilience
Years ago I lost my first real job in a reorganization. Standing outside that office in Switzerland, I asked myself how it could have happened.
I did everything right. Then I got fired.
This photo is from 1990 in Hungary, where I grew up believing hard work equals safety.
I was always top of my class. Good schools, great first job abroad. Everything by the book.
Then came the reorganization during my very first job in Switzerland. Standing outside that office, I thought: "How did this happen?"
That day taught me something I hadn't expected. Hard work isn't enough. Companies change strategy and reshuffle priorities. Economic downturns don't care about your performance. Neither does AI.
Later, leading change projects across Europe, I learned something else. One person's mindset can make or break an entire initiative. The best tools mean nothing if people aren't ready for change.
That little girl in the photo had to unlearn some things. She had to learn that how we think through uncertain times matters more than how hard we work.
That realization eventually led me to found The Change Republic. As a coach and consultant, I now help leaders do the same: think differently when everything around them is changing.
Do you have an old belief that you want to let go of?
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What hard work cannot protect you from
The story I tell about losing that job is not really about the job. It is about a belief I had to unlearn and that I see senior leaders carrying years longer than they realise.
→ Hard work is dignified, but it does not protect against reorganisations.
→ Technical excellence is required, but it does not buy you safety from economic downturns.
→ Performance is necessary, but it does not insulate you from AI absorbing your role.
The candidates who navigate career change well are the ones who let go of the protective belief early and replace it with something more useful. The work shifts from "do the work harder" to "invest in skills that travel": sponsor coalition, visible record, judgement under uncertainty, the ability to read a market shift and reposition.
This is the work of unlearning. Not the work of more effort. And it is uncomfortable, because most senior professionals built their whole identity on the effort-equals-safety equation. Letting that go feels like losing something. What you actually lose is a belief that was already not protecting you.
In coaching senior leaders through career transitions, I see the same pattern repeatedly. The ones who move forward fastest are the ones willing to look at the habits that built their first career and ask honestly which of them serve the next one.
If you want to look at your own version of this, my free 20 Habits to Stop Doing Now list, inspired by Marshall Goldsmith's work, is a one-page guide to the habits that quietly stop serving senior leaders as they move into bigger roles. Leave your email here to download it: https://www.thechangerepublic.com/free-resources
If you are facing your own moment of reorganization or career change, my STAR career transition program walks senior leaders through the same patterns I see in my coaching practice. Learn more here.
https://www.thechangerepublic.com/star