You've encountered a setback in your career. How can you turn it into a valuable learning experience?

A career setback can be a real blow, but it doesn't have to be the end of the road. Take Time to Reflect and Analyze the situation. Before jumping to conclusions, take some time to understand what happened. What were the factors that contributed to the setback? Was it something within your control, or part of a larger situation?

Once the dust has settled, take some time to think about what happened. Analyze your actions without trying to sugar coat it. Try to find scenarios where you had enough inputs to make a good decision but when in a different direction. Reflect on why it happened and take notes somewhere you keep all your past learnings (experiences). If you've also learned something new related to technical expertise, take notes. These notes will make it easier to come back to in the future when you think you've gone through something similar. This way, you won't repeat the same mistake as before. Remember: a mistake isn't something bad, it only becomes one if you had everything to avoid it, but repeated it one more time.

Resilience is key in such a situation, not only when speaking about your professional career but also in daily life. Though it is not always easy to remain positive in times of challenge, to improve in this regards you need to develop some routines which help you stay balanced, try to cultivate them over the time so you need not to start when grey clouds appear.

One can build resilience by reflecting upon what happened and use this as an opportunity to reassess career goals and set new goals. Create an Action Plan to move forward. Consistent steps can lead to significant progress over time. Identify skills that require improvement and consider taking courses. It is important to maintain a positive attitude. Setbacks are a part of growth and can lead to greater opportunities. Like an arrow being pulled back, the set back is needed to launch one forward to better things. Ensure you’re managing stress and taking care of your physical and mental health. Continue to connect with others in your field, which can open up new opportunities and provide support and advice. Celebrate your achievements!

Some very simple and practical ways you can network are to make it a bit of a factory. While you'll be genuine and real in your 1-1 sessions, getting those sessions can be very formuliac. One simple approach is to make a spreadsheet with the the top 100 people you know on LinkedIn. Every morning, pick 3 of them to reach out to - whether it's a LI message or an email - and ask to just connect for 20-30 minutes. You can use a tool like calendly to most easily let them book a time and a google meet or zoom to meet with them. Think about how you can serve them- how can you help. This will get the nervousness out of the way and help you focus on how you can provide them value.

Everyone faces setbacks in their lives and their careers. The only difference is some setbacks such as loss of job are visible to others while some silent phases of lack of growth/promotions or job satisfaction are largely invisible. A clear path to rectify is to evaluate where you stand - is the setback a result of lack of skill or lack of effort or is the organisation’s approach a cause. These are all real and one needs to address these with clarity of mind. Where the issue is skill or effort, you know what needs to be done but where things are beyond you, one must explore opportunities that are a better fit for your career.