Laid Off In 2023? Me Too. Here's What I Did...
How unexpected circumstances can lead to great opportunities.
Last month I told you that my wife and I were hit by the 2023 corporate layoffs.
I also told you that three hours after being laid off, I pitched a business idea to the CEO.
What I didn’t tell you is that my pitch encouraged the CEO to tell other tech founders about my business. Here’s how it all went down:
Recognizing Opportunity
Tuesday, October 10, 2023, at 7:30 a.m., my position as Associate Director of QA Engineering was reduced along with many others at our tech startup.
By 10:30 a.m., I was having a conversation with the CEO, pitching my services as an outsourced consultant.
I wasn’t new to consultancy work — I’d been quietly consulting for other companies for almost a year. But I was new to pitching my services to someone who’d laid me off just three hours earlier.
At first glance, this circumstance might not look like much of an opportunity.
Yet, the timing was surreal because while I didn’t intend to leave my full-time job so soon, I overhauled my business to service more customers and make more money just a few weeks before I was laid off.
And in this case, I knew my former employer needed a test engineer but didn’t have the budget to keep paying my salary. While this wasn’t my most desired opportunity, it was a perfect opportunity to test my new business model.
Opportunity Met Preparation
Here’s what happened next:
I spoke to a decision-maker. I reached out to the CEO and we talked about the layoff decision. His logic was simple: the 2023 economy hadn’t flourished as he anticipated, and the business needed to conserve financial assets.
I offered a solution to his problem — my business model was specially tailored for startups with small budgets to still receive high-quality engineering services.
He expressed interest and said he’d follow up.
Later, passed the information to his business team and shared it with other founders.
Over the 14 days that followed, my business got more website traffic than it had ever gotten before.
What Did I Learn?
The day I was laid off is the day I realized that unexpected circumstances can be great opportunities if we’re courageous and act on them.
A Word of Encouragement
While you may not lose a job, you have or will have, unexpected circumstances happen in life; I encourage you to find the opportunity in every one of them.
So, for the business owners reading this newsletter, try these steps this month:
Look for a progressive opportunity — they are all around us.
Step out of your comfort zone and engage with that opportunity.
Repeat those steps.
Reply to this email and share the opportunities you took. I’d love to hear your success stories!
Remember, opportunities are all around us. Seize them.
Until next time, keep going, and trust the process!
-Earn Out Loud