Career Advice In A Pandemic

Empathy is needed now more than ever. Times are tough right now, that much is a given. But, that phrase, “times are tough” does nothing to help. No one has all of the answers, but we can all lend each other an ear and offer advice when necessary. Keep reading to hear my advice for anyone looking to switch careers during a pandemic. 

Step 1:  Do not spend too much time dwelling. 

Because the reality is, it happened. Dwelling on the past or what might have been helps no one. 

Step 2:  Convert it into opportunity.

Now that you’re on Step 2, here are some questions to ask yourself: Did you love your job? If you didn’t, do you even love the career field you’re in? And if you don’t–turn sugar honey ice tea into something positive. Lemonade. 

The reality is that one of the great opportunities in life is taking a shit situation and turning it into something positive. Many people, I would argue 50%, of the people that were laid off during the pandemic, genuinely disliked their job. Furthermore, they genuinely disliked their field. These people should start creating content.

Step 3: Use your spare time to execute your ideas. 

Let me give you a really good one. If you’re this person, someone that lost their job during the pandemic (and honestly didn’t like their job very much in the first place) write a Linkedin post titled A love letter to my future working self. Then, write the letter explaining why you’re going to go into the dance industry, why you’re passionate about it,  and what you see, aka what are the trends occurring in that industry that you can’t wait to innovate or imitate. 

What’s happening is, it’s therapy for you, but much more important: you’re putting out a manifesto of your ideas and observations on LinkedIn. All you need is one person in that industry to see your post and say, “Holy crap. That’s a great point.” Then hopefully that person emails you and gives you an entry level job into the “dance” or “music” or “animation” or “sports” industry. 

I don’t tend to go very literally often, but in this post I am challenging and trying to inspire you to convert your feelings from dwelling to opportunity. Literally here are tactics. Now go on LinkedIn and write that post I just described, then come back to me and email me your crazy success story at gary@vaynermedia.com.