Careering to a Halt

Imagine you have just applied for a job. You have spent hours getting your resume just right in accordance with the latest principles of resume writing, you have practised interview techniques until you can’t bear the thought of answering another trick question, your clothes are appropriate and ready for the actual interview and your hopes are high. You think you might be in with a chance, and then ... you get a letter of rejection. You are not just disappointed but you are totally devastated!

You missed out on your career or job of choice and the attendant things that go with it! How can you face the world now? Are you a failure? The ‘chatter’ in your mind might be telling you that you are, but as the old song says: “It ain’t necessarily so!”

Or, what if you have put all your energy and effort into your career and overnight, due to no fault on your part, you find yourself in a redundancy scenario? The job market is tight in your field. You need a new job quickly to finance your commitments but it is not happening for you. Are you a failure? Again, “It ain’t necessarily so!”

This article uses the Acceptance and Commitment Training (ACT) approach to handle the crisis that might be generated by career search failure and its consequences. Check out the case study below.

CASE STUDY

Have you ever wished you were a fly on a wall in a room where an important meeting or interesting conversation was taking place? Well, imagine yourself to be the fly on the wall in the office of a career coach working with Peter Sanderson using the ACT approach. The coach has just reviewed Peter’s background notes, and Peter has arrived. Pleasantries have been exchanged, and it is down to business…

CASE HISTORY NOTES

Name: Peter Sanderson

Personal details: age 42, married, 3 children (2 – 8 yrs)

Qualifications: BBus, MBA, Real Estate Licence (never used).

Positions: With construction companies.

In his first position with Smartex as a new B.Bus, graduate he was mentored by a manager who could see his potential. He gained several promotions within Smartex relatively quickly and after 10 years there was able to secure a position as a Development Manager with Centaur Holdings, another rapidly expanding construction company. Again, he was promoted to the Senior DM position. During this period he began his post graduate studies part time. Soon after his MBA graduation he was head hunted by another large multinational company called Multiprop, where he was made Senior Project Manager - Property Acquisition and Development.

Redundancy and Reality

The 2008 economic downturn affected his company quite early and significantly enough for his position to be reviewed. He was made redundant at the end of 2009 when the company could not maintain its pre GFC staff ratio.

Not one to sit around, he began a job search immediately for another Senior Executive position, but with no success. Not one interview resulted.

Taking Action

He realised that gaining a position commanding the salary he was wanting was harder than he had anticipated in the current climate. After Christmas, he decided to improve his chances of gaining his position of choice, by engaging the services of an organisation specialising in the career/recruitment area. Through research and asking around, he came across Significant Executive Careers who offered what he required.

Over 4 weeks in January 2010, whilst others relaxed on the beach, he committed to the program wholeheartedly and was pleased with the outcomes. In particular, he now knew his resume and interviewing skills were good enough to make him look very attractive to a potential employer.

Dear John… Rejection

He applied for several more jobs unsuccessfully. Although disappointed, he was able to tell himself that he really did not have his heart in them anyway.

Finally, in March, an appropriate position with a gold mining company attracted his attention. He contacted the recruiter, accessed all the information he could and submitted a first class resume, along the lines he had been taught. The resume was especially tailored to the specific requirements of the position, outlined his capabilities and achievements to date, and clearly demonstrated how they could be used to benefit the prospective new company. He practised his interview skills again with a friend who was skilled in interviewing and was sure that was the job for him at last.

The phone never rang. Attempts to contact the recruiter by phone were fruitless or unsatisfactory. Emails were not answered. Eventually he received notification thanking him for his interest, but informing him the position had been filled.

Dejection

He was devastated! It was now several months since his last position and his financial resources were dwindling. His wife was ‘on his case’ about his expectations being too high, and all the time and effort he had spent on improving his chances seemed to have come to nothing. He felt her criticisms were unfair, because he had been so focussed on his career pursuit that it bordered on obsession. It was the only thing that seemed to matter in his life. His confidence had taken a battering with this last rejection in particular. He could see things were reaching a crisis point for him in more than just the career area. What could he do?

Action with ACT

Peter considered the different ways he could deal with this situation. Did he need anti-depressants? Did he need psychiatric help? Was Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) the way to go for him? Eventually, after hearing a talk on it, he decided on Acceptance and Commitment Training (or Therapy) otherwise known as ACT. It seemed to present a useful way of deconstructing the thoughts, feelings and emotions associated with a distressing event or crisis. That sounded good to him, even though some of the other stuff about what happened after that did not make much sense. It was worth making a start, and he could see where it led him further down the track. He hoped it would not be too ‘touchy-feely’ but it was probably hard to escape that, no matter what approach you took.

His coach seemed friendly, accepting and approachable. He sat a little further back in his chair, still a little unsure of what might happen. No problem. The coach seemed to sense his trepidation, quickly put him at ease, and listened to his story… It was quite clear to the coach that Peter liked practical learning activities that he could see as relevant….

However, when Peter’s first activity was introduced as using the acronym STOP, he wondered if he had made the right decision! Well, he was here now, so he abandoned any defensiveness and tried to learn what he could...

Still as that fly on the wall, continue reading from the coach’s perspective to see the ACT process in action for Peter

Coaching Notes for Peter Sanderson CONFIDENTIAL

Date: …

Session # 1

Attachments: Client’s Story

Introduced STOP Coaching centred around this acronym.

1. Slow breathing.

Peter’s stress levels, by the time he had told his story were high. His voice became high-pitched, he picked at his nails and sighed constantly. By using techniques to get him to breathe deeply, and by helping him to consciously observe himself breathing in and out slowly, he became calmer, more centred in the ‘now’.

2. Take note

Asked Peter to focus on what he was experiencing at that very moment. What were his thoughts? What was he feeling? What was he doing? Was stuff racing around in his mind? Was one thought predominant? etc

Phrases like: devastated, feel useless, am a failure, angry, frustrated, fed up, afraid, guilty, bad provider, disappointed, helpless, on the scrap heap, came up. He said these thoughts and feelings were increasingly prevalent and he became overwhelmed by them sometimes in spite of trying to ignore them, or chase them away.

On being asked to pick one of these thoughts, he chose ‘devastated’. I feel devastated… I am devastated… Using just that word, he articulated his associated thoughts and feelings. He did not like what came up for him and felt guilty and stupid for having such feelings. Felt he should just be able to ‘get on with things’ but couldn’t.

3. Open up

Next asked Peter to put the phrase ‘I am having the thought that…’ in front of the word ‘devastation’ before extending it further by saying “I notice I am having the thought that…” Asked him to share what happened for him. Was there any difference in the feelings and thoughts now?

“Yes! It’s like I am observing what is happening, rather than identifying with it. How amazing!” he said. The significance of that revelation for him was explored and he was keen to learn other ways he could ensure ‘defusion’ rather than ‘fusion’ or identification with the thoughts/ emotions/ feelings.

Also, used singing the thought to the tune of Happy Birthday. He laughed, as he sang: I am devastated today, I am devastated today, I am devastated, yes devastated, I am devastated today!

He was amazed to learn about the way we take on thoughts /feelings so readily as reality, as truth, or as important etc and how things change when we can see our thoughts for what they really are – just thoughts which may or may not be real, true or important and which come and go. Explored this. He came to the point where he could just allow the feelings and thoughts to ‘be’, and to treat them as if they were a radio playing in the background while he was doing something important somewhere else.

Peter clearly enjoyed this approach. Much to learn, but he kept commenting on its immediate practicality and usefulness.

Having created a sense of mental mindfulness, or awareness through Slow breathing, Taking note, and Opening up, went on and introduced what Pursuing values was all about.

4. Pursue your Values

Main area of concern was career. Probed which values were most meaningful to him in this area. Came up with providing financial support for his family and did this through his career. He valued success, being mentally challenged, being creative, being needed, being respected, having integrity and the list grew longer as he reflected. Asked him to write his Values down on a sheet of paper. He said he could not see where this was going. Changed tack for a while.

Found out Peter had sought and obtained help from professionals in the Careers area as well as friends. He was using his networking skills especially LinkedIn for hours a day. (Too much? Revisit later!) Quite evident he had accessed appropriate help, assistance and advice sources.

Peter could not understand that his applications were still being rejected despite apparently being state of the art. On being asked if he had experienced many instances of rejection in his career to this point, he said, “Yes, but only recently in my job applications.”

He said his smooth career path in a stable or expanding economic market had been virtually assured. Now the situation was different, and he said that the constancy of rejection was starting to wear him down, sapping his confidence and his former optimism of being able to find a desirable position was being severely tested. Observing he was not that good at handling rejection, he said he realised he needed help. However, rather than work on that immediately, he wanted to try the STOP strategy for himself and debrief it in another session before dealing with other stuff.

We moved on to what small steps he could take (if any) that might improve his chances of at least getting to the interview stage the next time. Picking up his pen again, he jotted down a few ideas. He realised his attitude to recruiters might have been a barrier. In the past, he did not really want to bother them because they were busy and he certainly did not want to get them ‘offside’. Now he realised they were ‘gate-keepers’ who made the initial decisions and it was worth cultivating a relationship with them. One small step he thought of was to see if he could arrange a few meetings over a coffee with some of them. He even considered flying interstate to Melbourne to see the recruiter involved in the job that he had set his heart on, so that if something came up, the recruiter would know who he was and how keen he was!

The next question really stopped him in his tracks, as it does most clients. “Given the current global economic situation and the resultant high unemployment figures worldwide, if it turns out that there is nothing else you can do to improve the situation of getting the job of your choice, are you willing to practise acceptance of that, using some of the skills you have discovered, including living the present moment?”

He blinked, hesitated a little while he processed the question and asked, “Are you asking me in a fancy way if I am prepared to just give up?”

Said “No, but look at it this way… Can you accept that the current world economic situation is unchangeable at the moment, and you cannot improve it?”

“Yes.”

“Can you accept that this may have implications for you in terms of career that you cannot control and might not like?”

“Yes, put like that, there is not much choice, really.”

Explored what he did have some choice over by asking: “Within the context of the world economic crisis and its consequences, which for you are currently career ones, how can you best spend your time and energy constructively (within that constraint) without worrying, blaming, or obsessing about it. How can you know and maintain inner peace?”

“I don’t know. It seems to be going around in circles. I thought I was getting it, but now I am confused. Oops, I realise what I just did! Let’s sing Happy Birthday again!”

Now ‘defused’ rather than ‘confused’, we found the values that Peter had written down earlier in the session. They were: providing financial support for family, success, being mentally challenged, being creative, being needed, being respected, having integrity. Peter was to learn that his values were about to be put to work with the next question.

“So given the current situation, Peter, how can you use the values important to you to respond to what is happening for you career wise?

• What strengths do you have? (He had done the Strengths Finder)

• What is your personality style? (He had done Myers-Briggs)

• What is your Purpose?” (He had explored this as an expression of his personal DNA, or as the energy of his spirit)

• What came out of your 360 assessment?

Big smile! “I’m beginning to see where this is heading. You sure like asking questions, but keep going. I am being mentally challenged!”

Next, asked him to reflect on two further questions. “How can I best use all these values, strengths and personality traits and still be in alignment with my purpose in this storm of life in which I find myself at the moment? What can I still do despite my circumstances that would make my life meaningful and worthwhile?”

Break through “I get it” moment. He said, “I can take the different values and explore the possibilities they throw up to answer those last two questions you asked me. Let me ask a few questions to see if this will work when I try to build on it at home.”

Just a few other questions to appear spontaneously were:

• What are some other ways of providing financial support to my family?

• What about other ways of providing support, not necessarily financial?
  e.g.: Perhaps I could free up my wife (a nurse) from home duties. Employment is readily available for nurses, so she could work for a while!

• What is ‘success’ for me?

• Is it confined to my career?

• How else could I be successful?

• How could I be mentally challenged in the various areas of my life?

• • Financial?

  • Spiritual?

  • Vocational?

  • Family?

  • Social?

  • Health?

  • Intellectual

  • Leisure?

Time ran out! Covered a lot, but still much to learn and apply. Set homework based on session for next time but can see the beginnings of a transformative process with using STOP.

Peter left the session invigorated and positive. Says he knows he has begun to develop an awareness of a positive, practical strategy which would help him, not only through his current career issues, but through others that commonly confront people in life. Says he’s going home to try it on his wife!

© Angela Gifford