Laid off in the middle of a vendor call: 30 interviews, 5 offers

After landing Senior Director of Data Science, our client said:

“I almost used you as my therapist as I was navigating the interview process. Thank you for letting me do that and for being a sounding board.”

The day his role disappeared

One of our clients was on a vendor call when someone from HR asked if he had a minute. He figured it was something routine, so he stepped out of the meeting. As you can probably guess, there was nothing routine about this. His business unit had been sold, his position had been eliminated, and that day would be his last with the company. Just like that.

He couldn’t make sense of how quickly everything had happened. After spending years building a career, leading teams, and earning promotions, he suddenly had nowhere to show up on Monday morning.

Mistaking activity for progress

Like most people, his first instinct was to stay busy. He spent hours reading about AI, scrolling through LinkedIn, looking at job postings, and convincing himself that as long as he was doing something, he was moving forward. After a couple of weeks, he realized he had been filling his days without getting any closer to his next role, so he stepped away from the search for a while and gave himself time to reset.

A deliberate search: 30 interviews and 5 offers

By the time he came to us, he had realized that he wanted to be deliberate about the companies he pursued, the problems he could solve, and the conversations he would have. That's exactly how we operate for all our clients, so we built a targeted strategy around his experience, reached out to the right people, prepared him for every interview, and adjusted as the market gave us feedback instead of blindly increasing application volume.

Over the next few months, he interviewed 30 times across Director, VP, and SVP-level opportunities, received 5 offers, and accepted one worth $380K+.

A layoff shakes your confidence, even when it has nothing to do with your performance. And in that moment it's easy to mistake constant activity for meaningful progress.

Looking back, taking time to clear his head gave him the clarity to make better decisions once his job search actually began.

While I can’t promise a therapeutic experience for all, what I can guarantee is a placement if you reach out and we decide to work together.