Real Job Talk

In this episode we advise on what to do when your company gets acquired. Most of us don’t know if our company is going to change structure, ownership, or leadership, so when something big is announced it can be a bit shocking and can cause us to ask, “What happens to me?” What do you do that day? Acknowledge your feelings - you’re going to get flooded with emotion. It’s scary. The number 1 thing you can do is take care of yourself. Continue to breathe. Take a walk. Understand that the feelings of uncertainty are normal and expected, but don’t pretend they aren’t there. That said, if you’re a manager or a leader, you need to take a deep breath and lead your people. You can tell them how you feel, but also exude confidence. Don’t make promises you can’t keep. Be as honest and forthright as you can. Admit what you don’t know. And save your meltdown for time away from your team. As an individual contributor, attend all meetings the company has for you, but make sure you keep getting your job done. Remember that being adaptable is the #1 skill that help people have successful careers. Being reliable is always helpful in staying a necessary resource. As an individual contributor you can control your adaptability, your attitude, your willingness to help, and your performance. Being the person who asks how you can help with the transition will make you invaluable. After day 1, learn about any upsides or golden handcuffs that come along with the deal. Are there bonuses for staying? Does anything happen to your pay? Your benefits? Your equity? Who at the new company does the same thing as you? Knowing your situation helps you assess where you can fit in the new org. That said, it’s a great time to brush up your resume and start exploring opportunities. Look for ways to help ease the transition in time of change. Post-acquisition layoffs happen. Be ready. Assess the culture of the new place. How did they announce it? What was the welcome like? How happy do the new people seem? Judge the new place against your must-have list. Be aware. Ask questions. Be a calm force looking at things objectively to best assess the situation. Look at how you’re welcomed- you learn a lot about a company when you see how they handle an acquisition. Is it employee first? Are you left in the dark? Are they focused on assuaging your fears? How is your manager handling it? Are there skill gaps between your old and new responsibilities? Try and fill them whenever possible if you want to stay and make yourself a stronger candidate for an internal or external search. Do whatever you need to do to be a great candidate for any job search. Figure out what this means to you, talk to your Board of Advisors for advice, and give it a chance to see if it can be a good change.

Top secret! We’re talking about NDAs, non-disclosure agreements. What’s an NDA? It’s an agreement between you and the company saying that you won’t share information about the company outside of the company. These are shared whether you’re an employee or a contractor. Sometimes you sign an NDA when you’re interviewing, which means that whatever you learn during the process you can not take back to your current employer. If you’re working on a secret project at work, your NDA says that you don’t tell anyone about what you’re working on. At least not the details of it. So, what do you do when someone asks what you’re working on?? Kat advises you make a joke like, “I’d tell you, but then I’d have to..”. You can tell people that you can’t wait until it becomes public and you can talk more openly about it. You can also say to people, “There’s a lot going on at work, and maybe if you Google it you can figure it out.” Internal Use Only means do not forward, and if you don’t listen, you could find yourself in legal hot water. Sometimes, when talking about things that are top secret, we have to realize that not everyone has the same amount of knowledge, so fishing to see who knows what could get you into hot water. If you know about something that isn’t public knowledge, you don’t want to be asking about it in case you make people curious and they find out things they should not know about. On your first day, make sure to ask for a copy of everything you sign and make sure you take the time to read it. Always know what you’re signing and make sure you can honor it. When you leave a company, it’s ok to ask for your signed documents. You will want to review them for non-solicitation language (and time limits -- for example, you may not be able to refer someone from that company for 12 months without violating your agreement) before you refer someone from there. Be informed to make sure you honor everything you’ve signed. If something is Googleable, it’s in the public domain, but if it’s not, it’s probably under NDA and you don’t want to be the leak -- so keep it to yourself!

Today we’re talking about background checks. Background checks are a standard piece of company’s hiring processes. The company takes the resume and verifies education, employment, and criminal records. Sometimes they also do things like drug tests. Both of us have had to rescind offers or eliminate employment based on background investigations, and each of those situations could have been avoided. The net net: be honest. It establishes trust. Background checks include references. A bad reference check can cause doubt and we’ve seen offers get rescinded because of them. So be aware and make sure all of your references will speak positively about you! Different industries (especially regulated industries like healthcare, financial services, and government) have different requirements including FBI checks and credit checks. Do your research to know what to expect. For most companies, they ask if you have any felonies, arrests, or other criminal records. TELL THE TRUTH. Yes, that arrest for drunk and disorderly on Spring Break ‘97 WILL show up on the report. If you’re honest, you should be ok. We’ve only seen issues when there are discrepencies between the application or resume and the check. Make sure you’re always as honest as possible! For education checks, if you claim to have a diploma, make sure that the school will confirm that you have the diploma. Taking credits does not equal a degree. Finishing coursework but not taking exams does not equal a degree. Having a financial hold means that there is a hold on your degree and you can not claim it. We have seen when someone doesn’t know that there is a financial hold (and they even walked), and we’ve seen companies go both ways when this happens -- they might rescind the offer, or they might let it go and follow-through with the hire. Still, if you aren’t sure, check with the school before claiming the degree. We encourage you to keep good records of the dates of your jobs. If you don’t know for sure, say “approx”. Just disclose whatever you can. What about changing your title on your resume to make it more searchable? That's ok -- your resume and Linkedin are marketing tools. BUT, you want to make sure any application states your true title, no matter how goofy it is. There’s a difference between changing the words on your title and lying about your title. We’re begging you to tell the truth.

Welcome to Dr. Carrie Root, who joins us to share her book The Other Soft Skill that teaches about intergenerational communication and connection. Carrie has had a number of career twists and turns, breaking barriers as an IT consultant with the Navy and now as an educational consultant. Carrie tells us that she ignored the gender differences she found in her early career by pretending there wasn’t one. With her work consulting with the Navy on pause, she did some consulting with NASA and thought about everything she’d learned and saw a lack in teamwork from earlier in her career. Carrie learned about a local Rotary Club program that gave free tuition to kids who kept their grades up and were responsible enough to graduate, and did some research to see that many of them weren’t able to complete their advanced degree programs. She saw the opportunities to get kids from local schools internships, but was hearing that they were too rough. Carrie also found that when kids come out of school they were used to homogeneous groups, and in the workplace she was seeing communication and style breakdowns. She was able to set up partners, buddies, and mentors in order to build relationships across groups and help them learn to understand each other and their style. She realized that by getting to know others, team members were able to see each other as people vs stereotypical generational people. We discussed how leaders can set norms for how a team communicates and start the conversation about how to communicate across the team. Carrie also told us about how managers help with adaptability around new technologies and norms. Getting people teaching each other is a key to intergenerational team success. Carrie reminds us all to learn from each other and each other’s perspectives. We have so many opportunities to take time, develop relationships, and listen to each other. Listening is the most under-rated skill in the workplace. If we listened more instead of thinking about what we’re going to say next, we could all connect and serve each other better. Gen Z tends to want to learn and grow, so when managing them, make sure they are always learning, having new experiences, and can learn from each other. You also want to make sure they have the best software and equipment to be as efficient as possible. She makes sure that for Gen Zs they have no penalty for asking questions or trying new things. “If you learn from something that didn’t go well, that doesn’t mean it was a bad thing.” We talk about learning, growth, and growth mindset and wanting to learn and move forward. We ask Carrie where to find mentors. She says that you need to think about what you bring as a mentee and what your responsibilities are as someone being mentored. You need to set expectations, commit time, and work towards your goals. Look for mentors outside of your organization and to help with certain goals. What happens if someone is afraid to ask someone to mentor them? Carrie feels that if you’re afraid to ask, maybe you’re not ready to be mentored, and if you assume they won’t want to, you’re putting words in their mouth. She recommends asking in a way that it’s ok for them to say no or to say “not now”. That way you know if they say yes they want to do it. Carrie Root & 5G Power Skills on Twitter: @5gpowerskills (https://twitter.com/5gpowerskills) Carrie Root on Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/carrie-root-phd-ultimate-troubleshooter/) Carrie Root & 5G Power Skills on Instagram:@5gpowerskills (https://www.instagram.com/5gpowerskills/?hl=en)

Welcome to Professional Service Manager and author of the new book Make Me The Boss: Surviving as a Millenial Manager in the Corporate World, Emily Tsitrian! We talked with Emily about being a “newer career” manager, why she wrote her book, and lessons she learned along the way. We asked Emily how she got into professional services (which is a lot of project management, implementation, and customer success), and she told us about how in college she wanted to be in tech, since tech changes the world (for better or worse). She started at an enterprise health solution company, and after 7 years she wanted to join a start-up and ended up at a unicorn where they experienced hypergrowth as the company scaled. Suddenly Emily and her peers were in management. When a friend asked her what books she recommended about how to be a manager, Emily realized the right book for her didn’t exist, and she decided to write one. She started, put it aside because of….life…. and picked it back up with the pandemic and finished it! We asked Emily how she discovered her voice as a manager. Her first point was that managers are always learning. At first she was overly invested emotionally, made everything a hill to die on, and built the team around her vs building a team who could replace her. Growth can be uncomfortable and vulnerable, and people in management positions are vulnerable because everything is on display. All of a sudden, people around us see when we look at our phone, look into the meaning of what we say, and overthink a lot of our reactions. Being in management comes with “a lot of crap” according to Emily. We discuss being strong and using the word “no” to protect both ourselves and our teams. Drawing boundaries helps us protect ourselves. We ask about the difference between being a millennial manager vs Gen X or Gen Z. Emily explains how millennials have grown in a hyper-connected world, changing societal norms in positive and negative ways and how it affects management. They also have lower life expectancy, accumulated wealth, and live for experiences and happiness. They’ve turned the world of professionalism upside down and shown us that we need to be aware if we want to attract millennial talent. They’ve shown us that if you don’t run your business with morals, employees will walk out. Millenials are more likely to want to communicate with a screen. Emily wanted to help people address the whole person. We ask the first piece of advice Emily gives to new managers, and she breaks it into people who are managing their peers vs managing a new group. For the first group, Emily talks about managing at least one person who didn’t get the job. She said to make sure that you keep business continuity -- don’t let balls drop. Then think about both relationships with team members and relationships with new peer group. She also invites people to talk about what it’s like being managed by someone who was their peer. Be ready for the difficult relationships. She advises to step back from close relationships with people on the team; make sure everyone has equal access to you, and focus on being their manager vs their friend. Another tip from Emily is that when you become a manager, don’t lose that thing you can coach people on. If you’ve mastered something as an IC, don’t lose it. Again, it helps with coaching and credibility. Your team needs to feel that you’re able to represent them at a meeting, so public speaking is a critical skill to have as a manager. How do you get better (other than reading Emily’s book)? Give a toast, be a podcast guest, watch some TED talks, ask a question in a meeting... there are a lot of good ways. We ask about evaluating potential new managers if you’re making a job change, and Emily has some great tips. 1. Does the company invest in their management teams? Ask how well managers are supported. 2. Insist that you talk with the person who will be your direct manager. 3. Ask that person hard questions (which is happening more and more) about how they manage, give feedback, and think about growth. Millenials get more and more community from work which makes people invest more in their workplace than ever before. We ask about how to retain millennials in this tough hiring environment. Emily is intentional on focusing on the high performers vs the people who are struggling. This goes against relation-driven millennial instincts to nurture, but making sure you can focus on building your best people so that you don’t lose them. She also tells companies to invest in their new managers and to start training potential managers and help them go up a half a notch. Good managers are building their next generation. We ask about a manager’s biggest challenge for 2022. Emily acknowledges the huge foundational shift in the workplace, and tells people to stay curious, invest in knowledge and be authentic without being married to past ideas. Liz adds the need to be flexible and caring….while staying relevant, curious, and open. We’re in a big inflection point -- let’s embrace it!

In this episode we’re taking a lesson from something that happened to Liz and using it to help people be prepared for networking meetings, especially when networking with executives. Liz posted on Linkedin about how her company is hiring, why it's great to work there, and told people to sign up for time with her if they were interested. Well, her calendar was FILLED….mostly with job seekers looking for pretty significant career changes. When people met with Liz, a lot of them didn’t know how to maximize their time with her. We decided to put together a list of ways for people to use the opportunity to network with someone who can influence your career. First, help the person you are talking with prepare. Make sure they have your resume or Linkedin profile and that they know the nature of the conversation. If you’re talking with them about a job or even about a specific role or team, let them know beforehand. Assume this person is busy, so help them prepare for the meeting by giving them any relevant information. Don’t waste face time giving the high level overview of who you are and what you want from the meeting - get that out of the way over email first. You can go deeper in the meeting if both of you arrive prepared. Next, be prepared yourself. Research them a bit. Research their company, the latest news, what they do. Don’t waste time asking questions that can be found easily on the web. You’re networking - be prepared to impress by doing the research up front. This will also help you maximize your time together by not wasting time with Captain Obvious questions. Third, if you’re getting to know them without a predetermined agenda, have your elevator pitch ready and be ready to say what you want from the meeting. You’re taking their time, make sure you get what you want out of it. Be concise and ready to clearly share your background and what you’re looking to get from this meeting. Fourth, let them run the meeting and ask the questions. Saying hi and then verbal vomiting without stopping to let them get a word in edgewise is not the way to go here. Since you’ve prepared them by sending over your reason for being on their calendar and your profile, let them take the reins. They may see something in you and start inquiring for reasons you don’t know. Let them. Extra advice around letting a woman leader run the meeting if you are a man, because women have radars out for men who run over them in meetings….don’t let that be a point against you. Lastly, be mindful of the time. Most managers and executives have packed days filled with meetings. That means: be on time and don’t go over. AND DON'T GHOST! Ghosting -- not showing up for the call without any communication or warning -- really interrupts the day and builds resentment, especially with busy people. If you can’t make it, send an email apologizing and reschedule as early as you are aware you can't make it. And be flexible - they might cancel on you. Busy people often have to cancel at the last minute; don’t take it personally. Make sure your 15 minutes before the call is free so that you’re on time, and watch the clock so that you can close with a minute to spare. If they want more time with you, they’ll ask. ;) We hope that these tips are helpful in preparing for your next networking opportunity. You’re lucky to get on someone’s calendar, make the most of the chance and don’t waste it sending someone your Linkedin link. Make a great impression; you never know when your paths will cross again.

Welcome to Kanika Tolver, speaker, CEO/founder, and author of Career Rehab. Kanika is a tech program manager who has build a business around helping people find and get the jobs they really want and will really love. Kanika inspires people around the globe to pursue their dreams, build their personal brands, and she is part of our tribe of people urging people to be the CEOs of their careers. In 2014 Kanika was unhappy in her job as a project manager at a Federal agency, and she decided to check herself into Career Rehab and work on her skills, revamp her resume, and check out what it was like working the private sector. She had experienced toxic management and she was done being in an environment where her ideas weren’t heard. To make the big change from government to private sector, Kanika learned what private sector employers are looking for. She revamped her Linkedin profile, learned new skills like Agile/Scrum, and built her resume around skills to show her fit. She made sure she would be found, her skill gaps were filled, and posted her resume -- and the jobs came to her. Kanika’s first private sector role was in consulting servicing the public sector. She was recruited by Deloitte to be a Senior Consultant, and started "dating jobs." Kanika told people to date jobs -- get what you need from the job, and get out as soon as you see yourself tapped out. At Deloitte, Kanika learned the power of building a professional network. Kanika quickly built a network internally and externally- not only with other black women, but with all types of professionals so that she could get a well-rounded picture of what success looks like and what she needs for success. It was important to Kanika to get all sorts of perspectives to have a holistic view of success, and in her words, “network like a hustler.” An architect designs a house based on what they need in the house, how many rooms, what features, and how it will fit on the land. Kanika tells people to do the same thing with their careers. What do they see themselves doing and then what skills or experience do they need to get to get there. She builds a personal goals list and a career goals list and then figures out how to make both work together. At the beginning of careers, we think more about money and getting a job vs on a must-have or nice-to-have list, but having clear goals and understanding where you’re going and where you want to go in your life and career - that will help you to assess opportunities. Who needs career rehab? Kanika wrote her book for three personas: - cool geeks (people with < 5 years of experience) who are ambitious and energetic but don’t know what they don’t know - corporate rebels (mid-level or senior professionals) who are ready to be promoted, and are rebels for their own causes - career dropouts who are making a big career change and switching careers. Kanika teaches us that we need to market ourselves and build personal brand. She talks about millennials being the masters of personal brand. She talks about building ourselves and doing things to be able to market. A degree is a foundation, but focus on accomplishments and branding to showcase how you can be an asset to an organization. She encourages people to create content: blogs, podcasts, tweets, etc. We asked about introverts: How do they brand themselves authentically and comfortably? and Kanika advises to build authentic and deeper relationships. If you’re shy and scared to go to networking events, bring an extraverted coworker or friend to push you. Stress, anxiety, and depression can get in the way of us finding our path in our career. Finding career clarity through any of those times is really hard, because it’s so hard to see ourselves as strong when we’re not feeling our best. Kanika tells people to focus on personal goals first, and that will often shed some of the baggage and help create career goals to find personal clarity. After we identify the mental barriers, identify what you enjoy doing and align them to your talents and strengths and build your skill set and learn what you need to move forward. Kanika on Twitter: @kanikatolver (https://twitter.com/kanikatolver) Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kanikatolver/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/CareerRehab/ and https://www.facebook.com/KanikaRTolver Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kanikatolver/ Email: [email protected]

Today we’re talking about bereavement and bereavement leave and what to do when you need to take bereavement. Many companies offer very little bereavement leave. A leae of 3 days for a close loved one is typical, which we think is crazy, as our stance is that most people will not be able to come back after losing a family member after 3 days. AND, if they do come back, they won’t be at anywhere near full capacity. We hope that company cultures support people when they are grieving, and we ask our listeners to give people who are grieving a lot of caring and compassion. Our overall advice is to help you to take the time you need and keep your job too. If your leave is at all anticipated, tell your manager and teammates and keep them posted. Cover your work, keep people updated, and prepare coverage like you would for any other time off. Don’t take on big new projects when you have a loved one who is critically ill, but try to get your work covered. It’s time for some vulnerability so people understand what you are dealing with. When there is an unexpected loss, the best thing you can do is communicate immediately, ask a colleague for help (preferably someone who will have your back), delegate and share your projects or appropriate access to someone who can figure things out. Give a quick update to everyone and let them to figure it out. Keep in touch and update your manager/team about where you are in the process and what you need (e.g., we just had the funeral and I need another leave). There are types of more formal, .longer leave (FMLA or unpaid leave) that can protect your job while you take the time off you need. Work with your HR team to take the right type of leave. Ask about your options and find out what you can do to keep your job. Sometimes unpaid leave is the way to go to protect your job; sometimes taking some time off can save your job so that you’re not working while your mind is in a fog. Giving yourself time and space can really help you in the long run. Try not to make huge decisions about work when you’re grieving because you won’t have the required 'new hire' energy. It’s not the time to do a job search. That said, how your team and manager responds to your loss is an indicator of your long term fit at the company. If they treat you well, it’s probably a special place. If you have a team member who has experienced a loss, you want to help that person as much as you can. Take on projects, be an ear to listen, and express your condolences however feels comfortable for you. Welcome them back. Honor them and be kind. When you’re a manager of a grieving person, how you respond to their situation will truly show your true colors. The most important thing is caring for the person- because if you do, it will come back to you in spades because not only are you affecting them, but their colleagues are watching too.

Today we’re welcoming Dr. Carol Parker Walsh, whose tagline we love: she helps high-achieving professional women at midlife courageously design a career, brand & life they love. Carol is a coach, a speaker, best-selling author and business owner. Carol followed her path to go to school, get degrees, and go down a life path -- when she realized she that this path was doing what was important to others vs what was important to her. Carol realized that the thread in her career was teaching and helping others with their careers and inspiring and motivating women, and she’s been doing it for 7 years. Carol doesn’t see herself as having a lot of career changes; she sees herself as being someone who has evolved from employment attorney to HR person to organizational management trainer and consultant and then taught and was an Associate Dean in leadership. All of her jobs were around helping people and companies be better at what they do. We ask Carol about languishing and feeling like there is more out there for us. She had an experience in a car accident, which told her she had to turn and do something different with her gift of life. When we languish, we’re afraid of making a wrong decision, so we stay where we are. We are also afraid to try because of the possibility of things not working out. We also buy into the sunk cost fallacy around the time we’ve already spent and we don’t want to lose that investment. Choosing a new path could open new doors and empowers us to see “what if” vs wondering. Regrets come from the things we don’t do and the risks we don’t take. Big question: how do we figure out what’s next and plan how to get there? Find gratitude for where you are and what you have. Look how far you’ve come and appreciate it: write 100 accomplishments about yourself. Then look at your future self and see where they are and how they got there. If you’re stuck, ask your future self what they did. The key around success is flexibility and adaptability. When blips happen, we can’t let them derail us completely, but we get around them and keep moving forward. Even in coming up with that list of 100 accomplishments, we can find resistance, and we need to work through it to start recognizing our accomplishments. Stuck? Time to go to people who know you and can help you hold up to a mirror to yourself. Looking through the lens of alignment, we want to align the ecosystem of all of the pieces of our lives. We have to see what needs attention and lean towards that place -- be in the center and core of who we are and our values. This helps us decide what to focus on. We get messed up when we think everything needs equal weight. Our values and overall goals -- be it social, health, or career -- will help us to balance and make choices throughout our lives. And, the choices we make are the right ones for that time in our life. How do we discover what we should do in this world? The thing is, we don’t know everything that is out there in the world! Think about buying a car. You make a list about the features you need, the looks you like, and so on. If we need a minivan, but then buy a sports car, it’s not a fit. We have to look at career choices the same way: as a holistic list of features and responsibilities that we need and want. Carol’s focus is on women in mid-life. She built her brand and business by sharing her life, truth, struggles, and in sharing honestly her process in finding her own authenticity. When we lose the chains of the patriarchy that tells us what we need to be and limits what can do, that’s when we can tear up those rules and define our own path and what’s best for us. We’re all so much more powerful than we think we are. Personal branding is a big thing, but what about the people who don’t want the spotlight? Well...be it and own it and make sure you have profiles out there to say who and what you are. Fear is...scary, and for Carol, the scariest thing was becoming an entrepreneur at 50 and not having a regular paycheck. She knew it wasn’t practical, but when her dad passed away, she realized that life is short and she needed to live a life she wouldn’t regret. As soon as she made the decision and quit her job, the nerves went away. Looking back, she feels like her life began at that moment. We’re now in a phase that people are calling the Great Resignation -- or as Carol calls it, the Great Realization. She sees people looking for work with meaning. She shows how people innovate and change with flexibility, especially post-Covid, and sees people who are looking for a human-centered approach to work. People look for places that will allow people to change and adapt as the world moves forward, and employers are looking for people who are adaptable. Connect with Carol: Twitter: https://twitter.com/drcpwalsh Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DrCarolParkerWalsh Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drcarolparkerwalsh/ Website: https://www.carolparkerwalsh.com/ Podcast: https://www.carolparkerwalsh.com/podcast

We have a listener question!!! We got a great email from a global listener that we had to record right away (we sent them the raw recording). The letter was as follows: Hi ladies I have recently discovered this podcast and it has already helped me so much. I am a lawyer. I began working at a firm run by two people that I know very well and have a long (20 year) history with. Prior to accepting this role, I had another 6 week stint at a smaller law firm, but left that role to work here. 7 weeks into starting this new role I have the opportunity to interview at a large industrial company - a job that I desperately want, and which is out of practising law - something else I desperately want. This role offers double the salary, gym benefits, car leasing, health insurance - basically everything I could need. My question to you is: how do I quit a job that I have only just started!? I want to do the right thing by the people I know, but this opportunity is too good to pass up. Send help! Thank you, Janet First, we thank Janet for writing in and using her Board of Advisors (which now we’re on!). We tell her to follow her heart and dreams, and if she gets the job go for it. Then we remind Janet that she needs to figure out IF this is her ideal job, so she needs to really do some work on her must-have list. The reason is that we want Janet to figure out what she’s running towards and what she’s running from. To make a pivot, especially from something like law that takes a lot of time and education, is a big tough decision. We tell her to really be clear on her values and align them with the new company. Right now the job has rose-covered glasses and a gym membership, but those will fade and since you’ve recently made a move, we want this job to stick, and if values aren’t aligned it won’t. For Janet, she will need to quit a job where she was just hired by people who she’s known for 20 years. We assume they wanted to work with her and we want her to leave the conversation with them happy for her, but disappointed for themselves. Tell them how great they are and how much you like working with them, and that you were not looking but the perfect opportunity came to you and you took it. List out the comp, benefits, move from law and why you couldn’t refuse this offer. Make sure they can look at the opportunity through your eyes and that this isn’t about them but it is about your happiness. Most importantly, try your best to find and train your replacement. This means asking the new job to give you more time before you start in order to not leave your new role in a lurch. Whatever you can do to help your replacement is what you want to do with sincerity. You’re reaching out to your connections, posting the role, and making a public effort to find someone new. If you quit with sincerity, show people your path, and do your best to find and train your replacement, you will preserve your relationships. Assess the opportunity and follow your dreams, Janet!