Deciding to Leave a Great Job in the Middle of a Recession

As many of you know, I recently made the decision to leave the company where I spent the last 10 years of my career. I know many people are looking for work right now, so I thought I would write an article about my decision process and the steps I took to find a new job.

In many ways, I grew up at Cox, and I certainly learned most of what I know about leadership while there. I had a wonderful time with Cox, advancing from a Systems Operations Technician to a Manager of an engineering group. I worked with terrific people who were completely focused on delivering for the company and for the customer. What made me the most happy was leading a group of engineers who loved learning and each other.

So why leave? After all, I was lucky to have a job in this economy. There were many reasons, but the biggest had to be the fact that my growth curve flattened and I didn’t see any new opportunities. I knew what I was doing day-to-day, and the only remaining challenges were of the people variety, and I don’t enjoy those. I also wanted to shift my focus to Information Assurance, and I felt that leaving Cox gave me the best opportunity to pursue that path.

My Decision Process

Making the decision to leave was extremely difficult for me. As I said, I spent 10 very enjoyable years with Cox, and I made many, many friendships there. I was comfortable, and that was the problem. I knew that I needed a change and new challenges, so I spoke to my boss and other people I trusted. I decided that I couldn’t get what I wanted with Cox, so I needed to find a job with another company.

Finding a New Job

Once the decision was made, it was “simply” the matter of finding another job. I think it’s extremely important to know where you want to be in the end, and to find something that will help you get there. You don’t want to accept just anything. It’s also important to know what you don’t like and to avoid those types of jobs. For example, I know I could not succeed in a hotel/casino, so I didn’t even bother looking at those jobs.

Knowing yourself and what works and doesn’t work for you is a great start. The next step is getting the word out that you are looking. Talk to your friends, vendors, people in your business or personal networks (you do have professional memberships right?). You never know who will make that connection for you, so get the word out.

Networking

Many people in the technology field avoid personal networking. I avoided it because I thought it wasn’t genuine, but I found that I can genuinely want to help the professional groups I belong to and meet people at the same time. I can genuinely help people who are looking for a job, and there’s nothing seedy about it. Other people feel the same way and are happy to help you out when you need it, and there is nothing wrong with that.

Get a Professional Resume

I signed up for a free account with The Ladders and read their articles that are geared to help the job seeker find a new job. They have a free resume review, so I took advantage of their offer and received a detailed, well thought out critique of my resume. I decided to have their resume writers re-write it. They sent me a resume worksheet and I sat down with my 360 review, job descriptions and old resume to fill it out. I received a new resume within a week.

I have to say that the new resume made a big difference in my job search and eventual new salary. I highly recommend getting your resume written by a professional whether it is with The Ladders or someone else.

Summing it Up

A successful job search starts long before you ever make the decision to look.

• Be prepared to look for a job before you need to look for a job.
• Join and participate in professional groups.
• Join conversations on forums or Twitter or LinkedIn.
• Get a professionally written resume – it is worth the money
• Genuinely help people looking for a job or training or a chance, and you’ll find that you have more people wanting to help you when you need it.
• Know yourself – what is important to you, what you don’t like, where you can and can’t succeed

I hope this helps some of you looking for work or who are trying to decide whether to stay with or leave your current employer. Finding a new job takes time, and you don’t want to start from a dead stop. Get started with your professional groups and get a critical review of your resume. Be prepared, and you’ll have a better chance of keeping your search short and successful.

Do you have tips to share? What would advice would you give someone looking for a new job?

Tagged as: Job search, professional networking, resume