I knew before I walked in the door.
The assistant’s energy was off. The office door was closed. And when they called me in and I saw HR sitting there, I didn’t need anyone to explain what was happening. I’d been around long enough to read the room.
So I set the stack of binders on the desk — dropped them, really — and said:
“Well. I guess we won’t be needing these.”
She had asked me to bring those binders to our 8 a.m. meeting. I had gone in early to pull them together. I had driven over with my gas light on because I knew I had just enough to get there. I was that kind of prepared.
By 9:30, I was home. Sweats on. Sitting on the couch trying to figure out what just happened.
Here’s the part that took me a long time to fully understand:
I had been doing more, not less. More responsibility. More projects. More support for a team navigating a major transition during a recession. I had stepped in when others were let go, absorbed their work, and kept things moving. From the outside, I was exactly what most organizations say they want — a high-performing, dependable leader who delivers.
And it still didn’t protect me.
If this hits, save this — you may want to come back to it later.
A few months before I was let go, a VP role appeared. It wasn’t posted. No one applied. Several qualified leaders — including me — were never considered. The role was created and filled before most of us knew it existed.
At the time, I did what strong leaders do. I stayed focused on the work. I supported the transition. I managed the optics for my team and made sure they felt steady even when I didn’t.
What I didn’t see clearly was this: decisions were being made at a level I wasn’t influencing. The structure had changed. The power had shifted. And I was still operating like performance alone would carry me through it.
It doesn’t.
There was also a moment — in my office, with my new boss — where his tone shifted and I called it out directly. Was I wrong? No. Would I handle it differently today? Yes. Because being right isn’t the same as being strategic. And that interaction didn’t stay in that room.
High performance matters. But performance that isn’t visible, understood, and connected to the right people doesn’t protect you. It doesn’t position you. And it doesn’t guarantee you a seat at the table when decisions are made.
I learned that the hard way.
Later that day, I went to the gym. My trainer looked at me and asked how my day was.
I said: “I got fired.”
Without missing a beat, he said: “Well… now you can work out twice a day.”
It was such a simple response. And it completely reset the moment — from this just happened to me to now I get to decide what happens next.
Here’s what I know now that I didn’t fully understand then:
Doing more work doesn’t equal more security.
Being valuable doesn’t mean your value is visible.
And performance alone is not a strategy.
The rest of this series is about what I missed — and what I’d do differently today.
Confidence was never the lever.
Clarity and visibility are.
