When someone else sees what you can’t….

It had been one of the darkest and toughest periods of my career.

I’d been bullied at work – by my former manager – the state’s General Manager.

He’d been talking ad-nauseum to the executive team about how I was overpaid and underqualified – as were my team members.

At one point the former GM decided to replace me – and had asked my team (yes, the underqualified ones) to write an advertisement for my job.

The GM had been publicly demoted after that for other professional misdemeanors– but even knowing that others had recognized that he was not competent, did not help my confidence.

Like most people I now work with, I believed I had not contributed much at all to the organisation.

I was at that point I now call “job fog” – where I could not see any future where I was.

Yet I could not see what I was good at and why anyone external would hire me.

So, I sat stuck.

I did not know how to make a move – and I suspect even if I did so, it would have been hard to put myself out in the job market.

One day, out of the blue, the state’s new General Manager gave me some unexpected feedback.

He told me I was one of only two people in the company who could actually write.

I was shocked.

I enjoyed writing. I had even been in advanced writing classes at school. But I never thought about whether I was good at it. It had just been something I had done, without any thought.

However, that one piece of unexpected feedback got me thinking.

Why not explore a writing career as a way out of where I was?

I did not need to claim I was an expert in writing.

I just needed to say I was interested in finding more out about what a career in writing involved.

I thought about who I could talk to and a name popped in my head – a former colleague who was in recruitment and had set up a recruitment magazine.

I sent her an email asking if I could meet her for coffee and that I’d bring the coffee and the muffins. I said I was curious about what she was doing with the magazine.

That one meeting changed the direction of my career.

I asked my ex-colleague questions about what she did, how the magazine worked and what she enjoyed about it – and she talked on from there.

After about 40 minutes or so, she asked me why I was there.

Inspired by what she had just told me, I simply said I was interested in exploring a career in writing.

She took me at my word and asked me if I wanted to write a piece for her (unpaid at that time).

I said yes, then that led to paid work with her.

Using that track record of publication, I started promoting my writing elsewhere, and found more opportunities that snowballed into bigger opportunities.

I wrote for an HR magazine, for careers website, for the Australian, for the Sydney Morning Herald and ended up creating one of the world’s top 40 career blogs.

Now I help other professionals get their stories out and create opportunities for themselves.

I sometimes reflect on that feedback of my manager as my starting point for change, as I love the lessons it reveals.

Like me, most people experience job fog at some point.

In those cloudy times it’s difficult to see what you might be good at and talk about yourself.

We often focus too much on “solving” the problem in front of us – which in my case was understanding what had I done to “deserve” the bullying – and what I could do to make it stop.

But the bullying wasn’t my fault. Nor was it my problem to solve.

However it is incredibly hard to pull yourself out of that cloudy pattern – as our brains are wired to detect threat, and work out ways to prevent it.

It is in those times that someone external can help – perhaps someone who knows you and your work who can help you pinpoint your strengths, or at least point to something to different to explore.

With this kind of shift, you don’t need to be an expert in anything.

Change does not need to be a complete life overhaul or a large leap into the unknown – as that distance and disruption can terrify you from taking just one small important step.

Armed with a little curiosity, an open mind and speaking to the right people – opportunities can appear.

If you have any similar stories of how one piece of feedback has helped you change your direction, please let me know in the comments below.

A little inspiration can take all of us a long way.