Making Lemonade, Chapter One: The Return of the Downsized Middle Manager

We’ve all heard the old adage, or perhaps call to arms, about making lemonade when life hands you lemons.  While the expression may seem nothing more than a platitude, it is actually sound, straightforward advice, particularly in terms of certain career decisions and circumstances.  Downsizing initiatives, reorganizations, divestitures, jobs transitioning overseas, and smaller companies gobbled by larger, more financially secure counterparts can find the employee who once enjoyed a lucrative, stable position now holding an unwanted and often unexpected bushel of lemons.

As many of us equate professional development with personal growth, the loss of a position can be a serious blow to your psyche as well as your checkbook.  When you reach the final stage of acceptance, in order to gain clarity with respect to your situation and summon the inner resources needed to pound the pavement and/or the Internet job boards daily, you may still be looking, rather sourly, at that load of lemons and wondering how to begin to make that all-important batch of lemonade.

Terminated from a company in which you had held an executive or mid-management position, you may be forced, in light of a looming mortgage and car payments falling by the wayside, to accept a job carrying responsibilities that you feel you have outgrown.  After several months in this new position, you have stabilized your financial situation and are enjoying a shot of renewed confidence.  Thus fortified, you determine to craft a new job search targeting duties for which you are better suited, offering a salary commensurate with your expertise and years in the work force.  You now face the conundrum of adding that job to your resume and appearing to have “stepped back in time”, or leaving the position off the resume altogether and risk creating a gap in your employment history.  What is the solution to this dilemma?

Honesty: the best policy (???)

If you decide to present your employment history in toto, including the most recent position of lesser authority, establish your strategy for discussing this on an interview or via a telephone screening call.  Determine that you will portray the interim position as exactly that:  a short-term position that enabled you to meet your financial obligations while simultaneously seeking a more ideal situation for your background.  Go forearmed, understanding that the interviewer will probably probe you to ascertain your mindset at having had to hold a position of less authority.  Although the questions may be phrased cordially, they will be designed to assess how you view and conduct yourself as a member of a larger team.  Again, turn this into a positive.  Advise the potential employer that the job provided you with the valuable perspective of an employee charged with the execution of duties, as directed by a manager.  You can relay that, from this firsthand perspective of returning to “the trenches,” you are even better equipped now to understand and address the concerns of employees in a manner that promotes morale and assures that objectives are achieved.

Subterfuge: the better strategy?

If you feel genuinely disheartened by having had to perform job functions that did not mesh with your level of skill and knowledge, your feelings will probably translate themselves to the interviewer across the desk or the phone line.  Unless you are a consummate actor, in a case such as this and if the job only lasted a few weeks or months, you could be better off not mentioning the job on a resume, application, or interview.  The firm exception to this tactic is the job in any industry that is heavily regulated.  In such instances, prospective employers will conduct a thorough background investigation that is likely to uncover such employment, and its omission from your resume or application may negatively impact your hiring prospects.

Each job seeker’s circumstances and background are unique.  By applying the guidelines above to your own situation, you can best resolve the question of “to tell or not to tell” when seeking to recapture a management position.