Hey Google, what’s next?
Hey Google, what’s next?
Q: What have you learned when pushed out of your comfort zone?
Kinnari’s Dialogue
This week has been a strange one. On Friday, January, 20th Google announced a significant round of layoffs impacting several of my close friends and colleagues. In my 15-year tenure at Google, I had never experienced mass layoffs - even during the great recession in 2008-09. As news about big tech layoffs started to gain momentum back in December, I realized that this could actually be a possibility at Google. Anxiety started to kick in across the company and felt palpable as we headed into the holidays. After returning to the office in the new year conversations across internal mailing lists shifted from if to when.
Upon waking this past Friday morning, I saw a message from my brother "hey, praying for you. Just saw the Google announcement" Gulp. I opened my email and saw Sundar's email talking about the layoffs. I found myself in shock the next minute when a very dear friend messaged talking about the end of his journey at Google. The last person I would have expected to be laid off. One of our better leaders. I checked my email again to make sure I didn't have an email from HR. And then over the course of the day and the weekend and into this week I started to get news about other friends and colleagues that were impacted. Some of them the primary breadwinners of their families, others on parental leave, some in the middle of their immigration journey. Even though I wasn’t directly impacted, I’ve felt gutted upon reading the heart wrenching posts of numerous Googlers on LinkedIn.
I do believe that humans are resilient. Most of my friends that were impacted are more or less okay or will be in the due course of time. On Friday, one friend said she was enjoying the sun and looking forward to the next chapter. Another friend had a rough weekend trying to process the loss. Perhaps it's the loss of structure, or the loss of a big part of your identity. I know a lot of good talent was let go. How did I manage to survive this and not get eliminated? And what's next? Is this it or will we see another round? This week I have felt waves of sadness and guilt and I know I am not alone in this.
For now I hope that all those that have lost their jobs whether at Google or elsewhere are able to take a pause, spend time doing absolutely nothing, spend an inordinate amount of time with their families and trust that there is something bigger waiting for them out there in the unknown.
Here are some inspiring posts I've seen from the xoogler (ex-Google) community on LinkedIn.
Christine Tao, CEO of Sounding Board talks about how being laid off from Google in 2009 eventually led her to starting her own company.
The Xoogler community hosting workplace reduction support sessions
Monica Tran, VP of Marketing at Inworld offers practical tips on searching for the next thing
Diane Liu Scallon shared this poem -
Yung Pueblo
Mitali’s Dialogue
A few months ago on a walk a friend asked me if I was stuck in my comfort zone. I was a bit peeved by the question as it was clear that he had not noticed my personal growth. But I realized that a lot of my growth last year was internal and may not have been visible to others. I have consciously forced myself to stretch in new ways - speaking up when it's easier to just go with the flow, holding onto my boundaries when it's easier to to give in, changing my pattern of thinking when I tend to judge myself or others.
External and internal drivers play very different roles in our growth. Some of my external changes in the past like moving cities, switching companies, taking on new roles were risks that I consciously took to push myself out of my comfort zone. These changes were very evident to my family, friends and colleagues and most of them were deliberate choices.
Recent layoffs in tech companies have often come as a surprise to those impacted. Many folks are being forced out of their comfort zone with no notice due to external circumstances that are not of their own choosing. It can be very disconcerting when this happens suddenly. I have been in that situation as well and reflecting back, it was often the catalyst for significant growth.
[1] Cut Yourself Some Slack
As with any change the first step is to recognize that it will take time to process through the emotions when there is a change to the status quo. This is often referred to as the change curve (ref: figure above). When I left a role that I had been in for 12 years, I didn't know what I wanted to do next. I needed to give myself time to grieve the change and recognize that I could not rush the process. One of the first things I did was take a vacation and get into nature. Giving myself the gift of time helped clear my mind and space to acknowledge the emotions I was feeling. I even took on new creative hobbies as a way to engage my brain on something new and stretch different muscles than I was used to.
[2] Reassess Your Identity And Goals
As I started to accept the new situation I was in, I took some time to self reflect. I was honest with myself on what I enjoyed doing and what I hated doing in my previous role. Looking back at past self assessments, performance reviews and personality tests (some of which are covered in this earlier post) helped me reconnect to the kind of work that lights me up. I used the Korn Ferry list of 38 competencies to also map out my skills and experiences that I found meaningful. At different points in my career, I have used these situations to move from consultant to product manager and then from corporate job holder to entrepreneur.
[3] Reach Out And Listen To Others’ Stories
The next step was to commit to rebuilding myself. I started creating a list of people that I had worked with in the past - managers, mentors, peers, team members - folks who had supported me or given me positive feedback on my strengths. These were the people that would boost my self confidence when I had difficult days. I was also inspired by stories told by Neil Pasricha in his book You Are Awesome where he shares moments of shame and despair when going through professional and personal failures. It is helpful to read about others’ experiences with change either through books and movies or live conversations. It motivated me to take action and reach out to people in my network. I left each conversation uplifted from hearing the stories of others who had left their previous employers and forged new careers.
I hope some of these tips are useful to folks as they consider change that has been brought upon them, whether of their own volition or forced. As my friend stated last year - “don't get too comfortable with your life, growth happens when you are out of your comfort zone.” This can be an opportunity to reset and become intentional about how you want to move things forward.