Lucia Knight
What to Do After You’ve Been Made Redundant: A Midlife Career Reset Guide
Redundancy can feel like freefall. This will help you navigate the emotional chaos and take the next gentle step toward a redesigned career.
What to Do After You’ve Been Made Redundant: A Midlife Career Reset Guide
When you’ve just been made redundant—especially if it’s unexpected—the shock can feel physical. One day, you're planning next quarter’s projects. The next, you’re being walked back to your desk by HR, belongings in hand. And then… silence.
For many midlife professionals, redundancy isn’t just a logistical shake-up—it’s an identity earthquake.
But here’s the truth I wish more people knew: being let go doesn’t mean being lost. It might just be the beginning of your most meaningful chapter yet.
What Redundancy Really Feels Like
If you’ve ever been surprised by an exit, you know it’s not just about the job. It can feel like a breakup you didn’t see coming. One listener described it as “showing up for a one-to-one with my boss, only to find HR waiting instead.”
Redundancy hits you with an emotional cocktail you didn’t order. And it’s normal to cycle through a range of feelings—sometimes in a single afternoon.
Over the years, I’ve observed three common emotional reactions:
Fear-based reactions: panic about money, loss of identity, feeling “corporate toast.”
Pain-based reactions: betrayal, self-doubt, dented confidence.
Shame-based reactions: “What will people think?”, imposter syndrome, quiet resignation.
Naming these reactions helps us normalise them. You are not broken. You are grieving.
Step One: Pause Before You Plan
Your instinct might be to update your CV, call recruiters, and find the next thing fast.
Pause.
Give yourself permission to do nothing for a little while. Walk. Move. Think. Process.
Let your nervous system catch up before you force yourself to take action. Most people I’ve worked with need a short period of retreat before they can clearly communicate what’s happened—let alone what’s next.
This isn’t avoidance. It’s psychological first aid.
Step Two: Mourn, Then Move
Yes, mourn the chapter that ended. Your work, your effort, your identity—all of it mattered.
But don’t pitch a tent in the land of loss. When the dust begins to settle, ask yourself one key question:
“Do I simply need a new job—or a new strategy for the rest of my career?”
If you need a similar role, great—start reconnecting with respected recruiters in your industry. Ask for referrals. Redesign your CV with intention.
If you sense that something deeper needs to shift, begin your research. What would a more joyful, more values-aligned next chapter look like?
What Helps You Rebound Faster
Not everyone is floored by redundancy. Those who recover faster often have at least one of the following:
A generous payout or paid gardening leave
A supportive professional network
An early heads-up that allowed for mental preparation
But even if none of that applies, you can still regain your footing—by designing a career on your terms.
Ready to Begin Again?
The emotional anatomy of a redundancy is complex. But it can also become a blueprint for clarity.
If you're not sure what your next step looks like—or if you even want another traditional job—you’re not alone. That’s why I created the Midlife Unstuck Community. It’s a place to explore, reflect, and reconnect with the parts of your work life that matter most.
You can't control every turn in your career. But you can design a version of work that lets you pivot without breaking.
Further Reading
-
When Redundancy Hits: How to Process a Surprise Exit and What to Do Next
Hello and welcome to the Joy At Work podcast. I'm Lucia Knight, and here's this week's question from a listener.
[00:00:09] A listener’s surprise redundancy story
Hi, I’m in my late 40s, and last week I was made redundant — first time that’s ever happened. I’d been at the company for 13 years and, honestly, I didn’t see it coming. Turned up for my usual one-to-one with my boss and, well… he wasn’t there. It was HR instead. I'm embarrassed to say that it took me a minute or two to get what was happening. They asked me to leave straight away, walked me back to my desk, and that was that. I’ve been at home for a week now, trying to get my head around it. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do next.
[00:00:43] Lucia reflects on past conversations with laid-off professionals
In my former career, I've been the person on the other end of the phone, thousands of time, no exaggeration. Speaking to clever, experienced, deeply talented professionals who had just. Have been unexpectedly exited from the companies they gave years of their precious lives to. When I say the word exit, I mean their role was made redundant.
[00:01:06] Why even great people are being exited—and why it hurts
They've been laid off from a company that was going through downsizing, right sizing, reshaping. And here's what I wish I had back then. A way to emotionally help people prepare for what happens when you get surprised by an exit.
Because here's the truth, great people exit companies every day. And in this economic climate, I see no reason that trend's gonna slow. It's become part of the way we do business.
So. Let's reframe it.
[00:01:41] A breakup metaphor: what a surprise exit really feels like
Imagine this, you've been in a long-term relationship. You've had plenty of ups and downs, like all couples, but things are going well. Just last week you were planning your next holiday together. Then today you walk in the door from work and boom, your partner says it's over.
Not only that, but you discovered during the conversation that they've been planning this for months. They've even told all your mutual friends, you just didn't notice.
That's what a surprise exit feels like. A relationship ended and one side forgot to tell the other until it was already over.
What happens next?
You're left a guzzle, an emotional cocktail you didn't order .
When talking about redundancy, layoffs, downsizing, or reshaping, whatever you call it. Over the years I've seen these emotional reactions fall into three categories.
[00:02:42] Three types of emotional reactions: fear, pain, and shame
Here are the three categories and the language I've heard people use to display these emotions.
Number one, fear-based emotions. A flash of fear hits fast, like an electric shock, and then it spreads. These fear-based emotions always come first, but they can also be peppered throughout a period of processing what's just happened.
Anger, they can't do this. To me. It's wrong. I'm gonna fight it.
Anxiety. How will we survive without my salary? We've got school fees, birthdays, the mortgage.
Doubt. Is this the end of my career? Bloody hell am I now corporate toast.
Low mood. I just want to get into bed and stay there while this blows over.
The second kind of emotions are pain based emotions. These are slower burning feelings, but they cut just as deeply.
Broken trust. I'll never give a company this much of me ever again.
Worry. Will I ever find a role that pays as well or gives me, insert things I really enjoyed.
Dented confidence. Was I just deluded? Maybe I wasn't as good as I thought.
Anger again, how could they do this to me after all those years, all those late nights and weekends?
Then finally, the third type of emotional reaction I notice are shame-based emotions. Now, these ones we don't talk about enough, but they can be like hot coals, seared into self-esteem and self-confidence, and it can take years for the scars to heal.
Early shame. What will people think? What do I even tell them?
Self bashing. I should have seen it coming. I should have known. I should have been better prepared.
Imposter syndrome. Oh, it was only a matter of time. I always knew this would happen. Just not now.
And resignation. I guess I'll just have to start applying to jobs on LinkedIn. Any jobs.
Now, not everyone is hit by the emotional rollercoaster that we're talking about. I bet you know, a story of someone who breezed through a surprise exit layoff or redundancy.
[00:05:32] Why some people rebound faster – and what helps
In my experience, the emotional dips and dives are less painful, if the individual has been gifted any or all of the following, a generous payout, plenty of paid gardening, leave a longstanding network ready to help or, and this one doesn't happen too often, a heads up from someone on the inside so that it reduces the surprise.
Those circumstances are rare. For the rest, it's usually a situation when we are caught off guard and when we are surprised with bad news, we feel vulnerable, stripped of our precious feeling of control over our lives. When this happens, our nervous system goes into overdrive. That's why preparing emotionally, financially, and mentally before anything happens is the best defense.
[00:06:25] Don’t wait: design your Plan B now
If you are listening to this and haven't experienced redundancy being laid off or exited yet, don't wait for the surprise. Lift your head up from your daily work and start thinking about designing or learning how to design your next decade of work life, to make sure it fits you, to make sure you have a Plan B in place if or when your current plan takes a turn you didn't expect.
[00:06:57] Two steps to regain control after a layoff
And if you have just experienced a surprise, redundancy, or layoff like our listener, here's what I recommend.
Step one, pause. Give yourself permission not to know what to do. You've just been hit. Let the shock pass. Give yourself some time to have a break from the world to move your body more than you normally do. By moving your body, it helps you process, walk and think on repeat. You might feel like talking about it, but most people need a little time alone first, walking and thinking, processing, deciding what language to use to communicate what's happened, beyond your loved ones, in a way that makes sense to you.
Don't make any decisions about actions yet. I know you want to have a plan of action yesterday, but instead, give yourself a little time to walk and think, walk and process.
Step two, mourn. Then move.
Move into designing the next chapter of your career story.
Yes, mourn. It was a big chapter in your life. It deserves its place, but don't build and settle long term into your house of mourning. This is the end of a chapter in your career, not the end of your career story.
[00:08:22] The pivotal question: new job or new strategy?
So when you feel some of the dust settling, it's time to do some research to decide and answer one question.
Do you simply need a new job? Or do you need a new strategy for the remainder of your career? I've included a link in the show notes to a short video to help you answer that question.
Now, if you decide you simply need a new job that's similar, get out into the world and get recommendations for good or great headhunters, brilliant recruiters who are well respected at your level in your specialism or across your industry. Invest some time redesigning your CV or resume and have a conversation with people who know you well and your work well across your industry.
And if you decide you need a new career strategy, start a research project on how to go about designing the rest of your career to be deeply satisfying, meaningful, and enjoyable to you.
[00:09:22] Where to start if you choose career redesign
A good place to start is the Midlife Unstuck website. For almost a decade now, I've been writing articles and creating resources and programs to help professionals who want to actively build and implement more joy into their work for the remainder of their work lives.
In the show notes, I'll include a link to an article called The Emotional Anatomy of a Redundancy or Other Surprise Exits, and a link to all the articles I've written on career design for professionals in their forties and fifties who want to optimize for satisfaction, fulfillment, and you guessed it, joy.
Here's the big truth I want to leave you with today. You can't control every eventuality in your career, but you can design a future where you're valued in demand, and dynamic enough to pivot regularly without breaking.
[00:10:19] Final truth: you can’t control everything—but you can design for resilience
If you know someone who has experienced a surprise exit recently, share this with them now. And maybe this isn't the end.
Maybe it's the beginning of your best career chapter yet.
