Ask a Pastor Ep. 99 - Career Transitions After COVID-19
Welcome to Ask a Pastor, a podcast from Orchard Hill Church! Have you ever had a question about the Bible, Faith, or Christianity as a whole? Submit your question and one of our pastors will answer on the program. New episodes every Wednesday.
This episode, Dr. Kurt Bjorklund sits down with Valerie Johnson and Leslie Braksick to have a conversation about navigating life and career transitions specifically after the crisis of 2020, some of the trends occurring as a result, tips for people looking for jobs, and more!
Mentioned in the Podcast
Living Into Your Next Season - https://www.amazon.com/Living-Into-Your-Next-Season/dp/B088VVM95F
My Next Season Website - https://mynextseason.com/
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Podcast Transcript
Kurt Bjorklund: Hi, welcome. Today on Ask a Pastor we have some special guests and a chance to explore a topic that may not be something that you have thought a lot about. And so, we'll get a chance to introduce that in a minute. But first, I'm joined by Val Johnson, who's been a longtime member of Orchard Hill Church and board member. You have a friend with you. Tell us who your friend is and what she does.
Val Johnson: Yeah, so meet my friend Leslie Braksick. She is foremost a mom, and a wife, and a grandmother. She's a community leader and a church leader in her church. She's a loyal friend. And that's just the personal side of things. She has devoted her 30-year career to really helping people and organizations lead better. She's guiding them through transitions in times of uncertainty, and most recently, she co-founded a company called My Next Season. And she and her team specialize in helping people in life transitions and career transitions. So, we're just really excited to talk to you today Leslie. I see everything that she does and her servant heart. And most recently, busy in quarantine, she and her coworkers wrote a book called Living into My Next Season: Moving Forward After the Crisis of 2020, and we're talking about the COVID crisis. So, we're going to ask you some questions, Leslie, about transitioning and how we do that when so many people have suffered so much during this time.
Kurt Bjorklund: Great. Before we jump into that, though, I just so we get to know you a little better. What's been your favorite takeout place during quarantine.
Leslie Braksick: You know, we are cooks.
Kurt Bjorklund: Okay, so you haven't gotten any take out the entire time?
Leslie Braksick: I think the only take out we've gotten has been Mexican from Azul in Sewickley. We like the grilled chicken salad. Otherwise we've just been super exploratory with cooking and having fun with that.
Kurt Bjorklund: Okay, Val, how about you? What's been your favorite take out during this quarantine?
Val Johnson: We've gotten a little bit of takeout from Mediterra in Sewickley, and a little bit of Azul. But we too have been doing some cooking. It's been fun. How about you, Kurt?
Kurt Bjorklund: You know, there's a place right around the corner from us. Goodfellas, the burgers and everything, and we tried to give them a little business and keep them going a little bit. Not that we keep them going, but we have a lot of people. So, it's a lot of burgers when we do. So, I'm particularly curious. I have a few sons who are approaching the 20 something age. One who's in grad school and one is in college. So, they're feeling this crisis, in terms of job prospects and what it all means already. And, I would imagine if they were even just a few years older, it would even be more intense. So, tell us what you're seeing in terms of trends, and then kind of what specifically would be important for people maybe in that age bracket, especially to consider as they're starting to try to navigate all that this transition has meant.
Leslie Braksick: Kurt, it's probably the population I feel the most pain for right now. You know, they were a generation that was entering the hottest job market in history. You know, a lot of people in there were saying, maybe I'll try this, maybe I'll try working for that company, and internships have evaporated, jobs have evaporated, and start dates have been pushed back. So, it is a tough time for that. That population of people is much just simply because the before and the after. It's been so dramatic from what they had versus what they have. The flip side in part of what led us to write the book even was with tragedy comes opportunity. That opportunities perhaps even that weren't present before. And I think for young people in particular, it's an incredible time of innovation. And we've seen it, you know, in all kinds of ways in television, and music, and other in worship, and incredible things that we might not have tried if things were as they were. So, one of the strengths of that population, that generation, because we would do a lot of work with them on early career advising prior to all of this, is they're really the most innovative generation in history. And they know how to use technology creatively, and they see opportunities. And so what we're really encouraging is to really think about all of those things and use them, not in finding and sinking in with a traditional work force, but look at what's changed, and where their skill sets can be of use technologically and otherwise because it's opened up new things that weren't there before.
Kurt Bjorklund: That's really helpful. To just reframe the conversation a little to say, instead of saying this is disheartening, discouraging, you had so much, but there's also an opportunity, especially if you are young and don't have as many financial obligations, you can afford to maybe take a little more of a risk. Not that you have to be young to do that, but there's often less perception of less to lose.
Leslie Braksick: There's a whole thing with that generation called the gig economy. And so, this is this is a gig economy on steroids. So, you've got companies that are downsizing very high paying people, but the needs don't change for those companies. So somebody who's willing to do contract work, somebody who'd like to come in and build a website, or help enable a work at home process that the company didn't need before, or someone who knows audacity and can produce podcasts or videos. They have a whole new set of needs that the companies didn't have before COVID-19 that these kids do in their sleep. I say kids, but young people do in their sleep. The first things that we do with young career people is to change their mindset away from jobs to what are the gifts and capabilities that they bring to the marketplace, and what organizations need those gifts or capabilities. And that's how you find a job as opposed to which job should I be looking for? Because you have a traditional marketplace, you have young people entering with capabilities, and they aren't going to sync up in this kind of a situation. So, you you've got to not think that, you've got to say I've got these capabilities, who has this need, and how can I be helpful?
Kurt Bjorklund: Let me ask a question, kind of the other way of this and that is what about people who are employers? And you know, you've heard for years about how Millennials are in the workforce, what they want, what they need, how has this changed that for people? And what should employers be thinking about, not just with millennials, but even the generation that is now emerging behind them?
Leslie Braksick: I think we don't know that yet. Organizations are in a state of crisis right now, and HR leaders are overwhelmed. They are managing stay at home orders, workforce reductions, and changes in strategy. And all of this was just unforeseen. And then they're given requirements of coming back to work at 50% or they're having to introduce new work schedules. It is a very complex time, bottoms have fallen out of industries very, very quickly. So, I would tell you, I don't think they're honestly thinking about it because they are just trying to figure it out. Unless you're in some industries that are doing great and are booming. The pharmaceutical industry is continuing to boom and do well, and you've technology. So, there's certain places where they aren't experiencing that. But for the most part, organizations aren't thinking about that yet, which is going to be hard for those seeking jobs, which is why we really urge them to think it in. We have a website for the book, livingintoyournextseason.com and it has free tools there. They can go there and see examples of resumes, of what their LinkedIn profile should look like and how to actually do that, and what a good example looks like that they could download. It's all there for free. We put it there because we knew that there was going to be such a high percentage of people that were going to need to look for a job in this economy, and there are best practices in those areas.
Kurt Bjorklund: Yeah, that's good. That's helpful. It's such a great gift to people. Thank you for that. Val, as somebody who's had kind of kids in this demographic, what are you seeing as far as the emotions that people are having and how they react to transitions?
Val Johnson: Yes. So, we have two 20 something sons and both of them are working remotely in different cities. So, they have not been in Pittsburgh. And we've been intentional about communicating with them often, just checking their pulse. One lives alone, and he's in the first year of his new career. And we have just seen and found that the work from home isn't the best place for these young people who are missing out on just the mentoring that takes place when you're in the office and the camaraderie. He's working hard. He really enjoys what he's doing. He's learning. But he has been able to articulate, both of them really, that they are ready to get back to an office, and I think things are going to look different. And Leslie, maybe you can address that in terms of how do we prepare for things to look very different? What does that mean when you say talk about preparing ourselves for that?
Leslie Braksick: When it comes to managing through transitions, there's really three key things to do that well. It starts first and foremost with your health. I've had young people who have come very, very frustrated with work and their jobs. And as you talk with them, what you what you uncover is that they're sleep deprived, or they're not getting fresh air, or they are lonely, or they have some other thing going on. And so, I think the first thing is just to take care of themselves. There's no substitute, no job can fix a broken spirit or broken heart. So, the first thing is just be well with yourself. It's wonderful to have church, and the community of church, and to be well with yourself, and be well with your soul. The second thing is to have companionship for the journey, we call it, this is navigating transitions. It's not an individual sport. You need to have the companionship of somebody you trust, somebody you can talk to, somebody that you can confide in, and someone that you can share the experience with. So, it sounds like, your conversations with your kids are not incidental. They're not just a casual touch base. You being on the journey with them is just huge.
Val Johnson: Because we found that their emotions are up and down. I mean, everybody is having their days, right? And it's affecting them differently. And it's been hard.
Leslie Braksick: Yes, and that's huge. And it's one of the two key things. And then the third is an openness, we call openness to a new purpose, but openness to a new calling. Where's God calling you now? And where are you meant to be in this next phase of your life? And have an openness to hear God's whispers and to be open to new possibilities because it's not going to look like it was before. If you're used to somebody that gets so much done around the coffee machine with your buddies, and that's where you get your energy, you then go back to your cubicle - that's just not going to happen, at least in the short term. So how am I going to get those social reinforcers differently? Or if a number of companies are bringing half the workforce back on certain days, so you're not making contact, you're not able to touch base with your boss maybe the way you're used to, or your coworkers or people that you work with and so it is going to look and feel differently. But that's where you have to be really open to it being differently, but also finding what your needs are through other channels. We had a young man who was very frustrated with work, and he was not finding purpose in his work, but he was supporting a family with his job. And so when we got into it, he actually liked his job very much, but it just wasn't scratching all his itches. And so, we connected him with a nonprofit, which he began volunteering with first individually, and then with his family, and then he found purpose in volunteering through that nonprofit. So, rather than being dissatisfied with his job for not meeting all of the things he was looking for, growth, pay, developmental opportunities, peer group, giving back, having purpose, we said, you know, the job can meet three of those are four of those, but engaging with this nonprofit really met a lot of the others. And so, if your workplace was your primary social place, or your primary place to do certain things, maybe you're going to find that somewhere else. And that would be the third criteria of sort of openness to a new purpose or a new way of doing things.
Kurt Bjorklund: What would you say to somebody who would love to reimagine their future, in this time, kind of do all the things you're talking about and yet feels the pressure to get a job that pays something right now? How should they balance those two competing ideas? Because sometimes if you take a job that pays right now and then you're not open to exploring some of those other things, at least in the same way.
Leslie Braksick: Yeah, I think that obviously, you know, the first and foremost, is to take care of yourself and your family and you need to have a source of income for that. The internet is amazing in this way, you know, because you can explore things, and read things, and connect with different sort of groups through other sorts of vehicles. And we always start out by sort of hitting like the critical five things in your life. Are you restricted by a need for income? Are you restricted by geography? Are you restricted by some commitments to family? Are you caring for an elderly parent? We go through sort of the critical things. And then we say, based on that, what should your job profile look like? Because it's unhealthy and unhelpful to say the world is your oyster. Well, it just may not be. If you have a base income level to support your family or if you're caring for an elderly parent, then those are your priorities. And you've got to meet those needs for now. And what we encourage people in the career space is always add the words for now, at the end of the sentence. This is what I'm doing for now. This is the best thing for me to do for now. And in the one certainty in life is change. And so, things will continue to evolve. This is not always going to look this way. It looks differently two weeks ago, and it's going to look differently two weeks from now, and companies aren't always going to be as they are now. But they should enter the situation with a for now and feel very proud that they're meeting the needs of their family or their situation for now. And that will evolve.
Kurt Bjorklund: How would you encourage somebody especially again in the younger demographic, to lean into networking during this time, and then I was looking through your book, the leaning into faith end of that as well?
Leslie Braksick: Yeah. Networking is probably the least accessed asset all of us have. So, people don't think about or leverage in networking. I told my kids I would pay them money if they could come up with a substitute for the word networking, so I'll throw that out there. Because everyone has just this repulsive, manipulative feeling like, oh, I don't network, or I don't like networking. Well, we define networking differently. We say basically, who are all the people that care about you, who are the people that know you and are impressed by you? Who are the people who would benefit from knowing you? We actually have a mapping exercise, again, I'm almost sure it's on the website as a free tool, that it is a networking tool, but there's a picture even in the book that sort of illustrates it. But think about your parent's friends and think about your church friends and who they know, and where they are, and for the most part, that is your network. Those are people that care about you, who know you, and are impressed with you, and if you bring to them what your interests and needs are and how you could be helpful, they will choose to introduce you to additional people. But so many people think they've got to solve it on their own. And there's one disservice we've given to this generation that we have created, and by the way, COVID-19 has accentuated this, is isolation. Isolation is not helpful to networking. I think one of the harder parts of coping with this pandemic has been the isolation factor. But we have available to us incredible relationships and people that care about us and especially when you're part of a community of faith. I mean, what an amazing church you have here. What an amazing church family you have here. You have multiple locations; you have people that love the Lord that come here to give thanks to the Lord and to worship together. And that is a church family, which could be substituted for a network of people who share common faith, and love, and would want to be helpful. So, people should not be shy about reaching and tapping into that.
Kurt Bjorklund: Val, how do you encourage resilience in your kids, especially right now as maybe they feel like they're stuck at home or they don't have some of the same opportunities they had even a few months ago?
Val Johnson: You know, it's so interesting because Leslie and I have talked about this personally. This generation has not had the life experience. Their lives really haven't been disrupted unless they've had a personal tragedy. So, they're looking at a future and they're really uncertain about it, and they're sometimes discouraged about it. And we've talked about what that looks like in terms of hope and taking action for yourself, but doing things for other people too, getting outside of yourself a little bit when you start to feel stuck, when you start to feel like you're discouraged. To serve others or to think about others and their plate is always a good tool. So, you know, we've encouraged them to do the things that they can do, to give blood in their communities, things that they can do that take action right now to kind of get them just looking forward and having hope about their futures. They're both very fortunate. They have good jobs right now and for now, they are okay. They're supporting themselves and they're moving forward, but it's challenging. We all have life experience of difficult times that our country has been through. We have a little more life experience to be able to handle challenges. Now this is different than any of us have experienced too. So, we're all having some of the same feelings, and we've talked about that as well, that they're not alone in how they feel about the future.
Kurt Bjorklund: We have about three, four minutes left. Leslie, as you look at what you'd want to say to somebody, especially who maybe has lost opportunity or job because of COVID, really, of any age, but what would be your biggest takeaway for them right now?
Leslie Braksick: I would, first of all, lean heavily into your faith. I think that it is through the difficult dark, broken periods that the light shines in. And while it's hard in the moment, I would say this has been my personal experience and my own observations, that God is most at work when we are most in need of him. And I think that first and foremost is just lean into your faith and be open to that vulnerability and that need. I think secondly, I would go back to, you know, what I shared before, which is related to the first point, I guess which is, be well with yourself from a health standpoint. If you allow yourself to be rundown or overtired or consuming other things that are unhelpful to your body and spirit, recognize the role that's playing in your life. Take care of yourself from a health and wellness standpoint because you're going to bring your best self into a situation with that. And then, focus on the gifts you have, the capabilities, the work experiences, the jobs, you've held, and think about that in almost a decoupling sort of way as you think about the job opportunity going forward. The most common thing I hear from young people is I really don't have any experience. I'll say, really? Tell me jobs you've held. Well, I was a caddy at a golf course, I was a waitress in a restaurant, I lifeguarded, these are the kinds of things. And I said, well, so I know that you know how to show up to a job on time. I know that you know how to save a life. I know that you know how to take orders and be courteous and be gracious to people if you're waiting tables. So, you need to think about those key capabilities and experiences that employers need. Employers need people they can rely on to show up on time, who care about others, who can complete a job start to finish. So, it's not about being a lifeguard, it's about the things you did as a lifeguard. Or it's not about being a server, or a waitress, or a waiter, but what did you have to do, and therefore, what were the gifts that illustrates that you bring to the table? And again, there's a tool on the website, and we talked about this a little bit in the book, but just reframing what those gifts look like as you start to interview and present yourself to others.
Kurt Bjorklund. That's excellent. Thank you. Val. Any final thoughts?
Val Johnson: I'm just really thankful to have the conversation and your light shines through. So, thanks.
Kurt Bjorklund: Thank you. Tell us the name of your book again, and where people can find more information about what you do on the website.
Leslie Braksick: It's called Living into Your Next Season: Moving Forward After the Crisis of 2020. It's available on Amazon. And it's really meant to just encourage us to be intentional. There is a silver lining to this crisis and pandemic, and we can be intentional and take the best parts of what this brought and allow that to help shape our lives and our communities. We've seen such tremendous creativity and innovation and carrying in faith through times of extreme adversity, and we need to not let all of that go is we find a new normal in our in our lives going forward. And that's really what it's intended to frame. And then for those people that are going to find themselves needing to look for new jobs or changes, there's very pragmatic tools in there about how to rebrand yourself, how to apply for a job, and then the website has lots of free stuff you can download, and more conversations with the authors.
Kurt Bjorklund: Well, thank you for being here today. And thank you for what you do. If you have questions or things that you'd like us to discuss at some point on Ask a Pastor, please send them to askapastor@orchardhillchurch.com. Thanks for spending part of your day with us.
