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Career Success Stories

Harvey Nash asked professionals around the world to share the successes they have seen in their job hunt and in their workplaces since the start of the global recession. We have had great response to that request and wanted to share some of the positive lessons and workplace anecdotes we received.

Here are three examples of talented professionals who in very tough job and/or workplace change scenarios found ways to grow and learn. Here’s to them and here’s to making the most of the challenges before us.

Major Change Manager

I was working for a multinational corporation, heading up a two year project to integrate the international operations of two companies, post merger. The integration was a great success, but with the project coming to an end and the downturn taking hold, my company was forced into a cost-cutting exercise, which resulted in a 100+ person headcount reduction in corporate functions. I was included among those reductions.

What I found was that the skills I applied successfully in my integration project work could equally be made use of to helping companies in a turn around (something that is particularly relevant in the current economic situation). For example, two primary objectives of my previous role in the integration project were 1) to effectively manage change (culture, processes, business mix and similar) and 2) to provide strong leadership in order to deal with the many difficulties related to the change, e.g. the reduction of workforce and the impact the merger had on operational performance.

With that insight in mind, I started to check in my personal network. Within two months I secured a position as a Turnaround Manager. By applying a set of proven skills to a new job role that is much more in demand in the current economic environment, I was able to land a new position.

Formerly with Lehman Brothers

Lehman Brothers going bankrupt was just not something many of my colleagues or I had factored into our thinking. Yes, the firm was going through a tricky time but Lehman had weathered storms before and come out on top.

Shock turned to reality quickly and the inevitable ugly scramble for positions which were being transferred or reserved to help with the wind down of Lehman (something which a few months ago no one would have wanted to be involved with)! For many who were sitting on the wrong cost center, regardless of experience or skills, we were officially terminated with no severance package on October 31, 2008.

Despite having time to get used to the idea, it was an extremely sad experience for many people. We were treated like numbers after so many years of a great culture and a very personal approach to people development.

I had not contacted many head hunters before I left Lehman. There was something holding me back from moving on until I had actually walked away. I dragged my feet a little, hoping that friends or contacts would magically appear with my dream job. I was a little naive to the job market given I had not looked for a job for nearly 10 years.

Once I did contact a few head hunters, it proved to be a very energizing experience. I had people praising my resume, my skills and long tenure at Lehman, I was told how personable I was, which gave me the confidence I needed after this large knock to my professional confidence.

I was fortunate to find a couple of head hunters who I genuinely liked They seemed to understand my experience and pass me roles which I found interesting. I was lucky to have a few interesting roles, which I interviewed for and was either offered or decided during the latter stages were not right for me.

In December I was offered a role in private equity, an area which I had always been interested in. It offered interesting subject matter and a newly created role coupled with the ability to work flexibly, which with two children is something I value immensely and had taken for granted at Lehman having been there so long. However, my trust had been shattered since the Lehman bankruptcy. During the interviews, I took time to consider the financial stability of the company I was joining and was nervous about whether the role I was applying for would actually materialize given the market conditions.

I am pleased to say the role did materialize, and I started my new job four weeks ago. It’s a huge change given I had worked for nine and a half years in an institution which I had 'grown up in' and knew so many people. But it is going well and I am making the transition.

What did I learn? I learned not to be bitter about my experiences however bad they were. It would have stifled my ability to move on. I treated my lay off as if I had resigned and was evaluating a range of new career options to reinvent myself and tried to forget about the fact that someone else had decided it for me.

Group IT Director

Here is an anecdote that reignited my own belief in humankind. My last employer comprised a group of companies operating in the construction industry. In November, like many other companies in the sector, our precarious position with the bank led to a series of administration orders. Several hundred staff members were laid off with no pay for November, no notice, and no severance.

From this devastation a slim change emerged for two of the group companies to survive, through merger and divestment. My responsibility had been for the IT services across the group, and I quickly realized that for either of these entities to survive we would need to act quickly to maintain critical services.

This was going to be no easy feat. We needed to persuade business leaders to keep on two of our key IT guys to perform the necessary support activities to keep the business ticking. We needed to plead with suppliers, many of whom hadn't been paid for months, to maintain service through to the end of the year. Finally, we had to come up with transition plans (based on our disaster recovery planning) that enabled us to up-root the IT infrastructure over the Christmas period in order to enable the merger.

The response from most suppliers was amazing. They committed to maintaining services, either for free or at a vastly reduced rate. This was most impressive, but what impressed me even more was the compassion and care shown by these suppliers. The first question from many of them was "how are you?" rather than "where's my money?". A number of them were positively rooting for the companies, understanding how fragile these post-administration negotiations can be.

As a result of their collective co-operation and goodwill, we managed to keep both businesses running smoothly until the respective transactions were completed. Their efforts helped to secure new jobs for nearly 100 people, even though there was no guarantee of a contract for the supplier at the end.

The response from the two IT guys was even more amazing. Their whole frame of reference had been jolted badly by the events of the previous few days, and they both wondered whether they should just make a clean break, knowing there was very little prospect of a secure role at the end of this interim period. However, such was their devotion to their colleagues that they both knuckled down and performed some of the best work of their careers to come up with imaginative and effective ways of running the businesses while surrounded by the turmoil of the merger process.

In the case of both the suppliers and my IT team, I was overwhelmed by their selfless determination to help the cause. Anyone that has gone through the brutal experience of an abrupt change like the one we experienced will know that it can be an extremely demoralizing process. I was lucky enough to work with people who were able to put their own situation and feelings to one side and to focus on the greater good. With colleagues like that, anything is possible!