You know the feeling. Nothing is actually wrong. The job is fine, the pay is fine, your manager is fine, and you still open your laptop every morning with a low hum of ”this isn't it.” So you do what capable women do. You decide you are being ungrateful, you tell yourself to be patient, and you quietly start browsing job listings at night.
My guest this week, Kathryn Smith, has a different read on that feeling, and it changed how I talk to my clients about it.
Kathryn spent a decade in corporate America, went back for an MBA to get herself unstuck, and then, less than two years after that started to pay off, her health took her out of the game entirely. What came next was not a plan. It was a business she never intended to start, in the middle of a pandemic, and it taught her something about resilience that I don't think you learn any other way.
In this episode:
- Why the stuck feeling is information rather than a personal failure, and what it's actually asking you for
- Why the fix is usually smaller than a new job, and how to find out what it is before you pay the switching cost
- What changes about you when the plan you built your whole career around stops being available
- Why resilience is flexibility about where you're going, not endurance on the road you happened to pick
- How to talk about what you bring when you're the person in the room who doesn't look like everyone else
If you've ever felt stuck and been told to be patient, if you've ever assumed the answer had to be a new job because you couldn't name what else it could be, or if you've ever had a plan taken away from you and had to build a different one, this episode is for you.
About Kathryn Smith:
Kathryn is an Atlanta-based MBA who spent over a decade in corporate marketing before an unplanned exit sent her into entrepreneurship. She co-founded the Black Lady Business School, a networking and professional organisation for women, and has been recognised as a Georgia Tech ”40 Under 40”. She has run marketing research, e-commerce and business intelligence work for small businesses, and she is refreshingly honest about what running your own thing actually costs.
Connect with Kathryn:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathrynrsmith/
Connect with Limor:Website: https://limorbergman.comPodcast: https://limorbergman.com/podcast/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/limorbergman/Substack: https://limorbergman.substack.com
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