Smooth Transitions for Your Career

By Rob Poindexter

Tonight I will make the last of my seasonal trips to stay the night on “Sea’s the Day.”

The day I dread the most every season has arrived, so tomorrow I will begin the task of putting our “weekend retreat,”  our “place at the lake,” our “summer passion,”  our sailboat, to bed for the long winter months ahead.

My pickup is loaded with the necessary tools and parts to do the job, so the only thing I need to do after work today is swing by the house and grab my overnight bag and cooler. During the hour-long drive, I’ll go over in my mind the steps I’ll take in order to accomplish the task at hand.

As I write this at my desk, she sits in her slip, unaware that the long sun-drenched days of summer are at an end and the cold winter winds will be her only companions once I’ve wrapped her in the winter garb that will protect her while she sleeps. But when I arrive tonight, we’ll both pretend that it’s just another Saturday night, and I will enjoy all of her comforts for a few short but sweet hours.

Within a few short months, when snow and ice have replaced the leaves on our now near, naked trees, I will miss her as one misses a lover who is too painful to even think about.

Over the coming months, Jac and I will pour over hundreds of pictures we took over the season, deleting the ones we don’t like and categorizing the ones we do. Systems that need repairing or replacing will be taken care of and installed during some of the few reasonably moderate days we’ll get. The first few weekends after we’ve closed her up are always the hardest, though. I simply don’t know what to do with myself at first.

Sunday mornings once spent leisurely sipping coffee on the dock with our friends while contemplating the days sail, will be replaced with me shuffling around the house in my slippers and bathrobe, my hair a birds nest, mumbling to myself. I will however, still be sipping coffee.

After another few weeks, I will have settled into my new routine and the depression phase will be all but over. Not being able to go to the lake, my days off will eventually be consumed with household projects I simply didn’t have time for during the summer. I’ll read a lot. And of course, I’ll write a lot as well. Friends who aren’t a part of our boating life will once again start getting phone calls and visits that rarely happened during the preceding six months. Christmas shopping and football parties will take us through most of the rest of the year.

It is a time of transition for Jac and me. A transition we make twice a year. Once when we open the boat, and the next when, as now, we close the boat.

Transition of any kind is hard, but it doesn’t have to be devastating.

Losing one’s job is one of the toughest transitions many of us will ever have to face, short of losing a loved one. All too often, this transition is unexpected and becomes even more troubling because it wasn’t a transition we knew we were going to make until it’s staring us in the face.

For some this change means uprooting families to move to a new city. And for some, at the very least, it means working in a new office with new coworkers and new bosses. But for all it means a drastic change in our normal day-to-day lifestyle, at least until we hit our stride in our new position.

Unfortunately, in today’s job market, many of us are having to make that transition more often than ever before. Fortunately, there are more sources to assist in these transitions then ever before as well.

From interview coaching, to LinkedIn profiles and professionally written resumes, one need never make the change alone. Hiring a career professional is the surest way for a smooth transition, planned or not.