Douglas Craig’s heart was racing, and his adrenaline was pumping.
Just a few weeks after finishing his training, Craig and his colleague had to belay a family down an outdoor ropes course during an unexpected lightning storm.
Craig’s summer is looking a lot different from his decades as a media executive; he now spends time rescuing people stuck in trees and wearing a harness at an aerial adventure park in Colorado.
After being laid off in June 2025, Craig looked for media roles. However, the job cut ultimately became the catalyst for a career pivot, albeit one that came with a pay cut. He worked as a ski instructor in the winter, which he’s planning to do again, and as an instructor at a science camp in the spring.
“I didn’t feel like I was starting over; I just kind of feel like I was shifting to something that just brought more happiness and joy,” he said.
Craig is among the Americans navigating a new phase of career reinvention, one driven less by opportunity than by a need to adapt. AI is reshaping jobs and the skills they require. A sluggish labor market, with low rates of both hiring and firing, has made it harder for workers to climb the career ladder. Meanwhile, a steady stream of layoffs, particularly in tech, has heightened concerns about job security and forced many people to reconsider what’s next. For many workers facing this brave new world, that means rethinking careers, upskilling, and entrepreneurship.
Making unexpected career shifts
Jon McCarty spent more than a year searching for another tech job after his contract software engineering role ended in 2022. He ended up working as a part-time cashier at Home Depot and doing handyman work on the side, drawing on skills he learned as a construction worker decades earlier.
“I started coming to grips with the idea that I will probably never get another software job,” he said.
McCarty is among the workers whose careers have taken unexpected turns in a difficult job market — and who are trying to make the best of where those changes have led.
After being laid off from her management role at Wells Fargo, Robin Peppers Daniel struggled to find a new full-time job. To earn some income, she turned to substitute teaching, something she’d enjoyed years earlier. She considered full-time teaching while trying to build a web design business with her husband.
For Kevin Hannegan, reinvention hasn’t come through one new job — but a collection of gigs.
After being laid off from his director role at a publishing company in 2024, Hannegan struggled to find full-time work. He broadened his search to other white-collar roles, but ultimately pieced together income by driving for DoorDash and taking on odd jobs for friends, including fixing deck boards and replacing ceiling fans.
He also worked on the changeover crew at the Lenovo Center in Raleigh, North Carolina, where he helped convert the arena between concerts and Carolina Hurricanes games. He was technically employed by the Hurricanes, which gave him an unexpected reason to celebrate when the team won the Stanley Cup in June: he was part of the championship organization.
After more months of unsuccessful job hunting, Hannegan decided to pause his search for a full-time role — a decision that marked a new phase of his career.
“I’ve accepted that part-time opportunities might be the best fit for me,” he said.
Building new skills
For many workers, reinvention starts with new skills.
Last year, Tanvi Pisal began to fear that AI was coming for her product designer job. When she was laid off from her startup role last fall, her fears were confirmed: An email accompanying the cuts said they were tied to the company’s rapid adoption of AI.
Even before she was laid off, Pisal began spending more time learning about AI to improve her long-term career prospects. She kept at it after losing her job and even after landing a contract role at a Big Tech company, spending as much as 15 hours a week experimenting with AI tools and attending workshops.
“I don’t want to be in a position a few years from now where I realize the industry moved forward and I didn’t make the effort to keep learning alongside it,” said Pisal, 29, who lives in San Jose.
Venturing out on one’s own
For others, reinvention has meant building something of their own.
Bonnie Chiurazzi decided to try entrepreneurship after job searching post-layoff wasn’t working out. She founded a market research firm, Vibe Insights Lab, drawing on her professional expertise.
She said reinventing herself from a corporate worker to a laid-off worker to a small-business owner felt like a large experiment, one she’s happy to be trying, since it has improved her health. Chiurazzi said the corporate environment was becoming too stressful to handle, partly because of the persistent threat of layoffs. If she landed a new job, she would worry about being on the chopping block again.
She’s learning what it means to make tough decisions and judgment calls as a business owner, but she loves having more control over outcomes and not worrying about her job security.
“I didn’t realize how much work it was going to be,” she said. “I went into it really confident, and I came out humbled, but it was worth it.”
Chiurazzi loves that she can pick who she works with and help generate income for them in a tough job market. She’s happy she doesn’t have to deal with employers’ push to use AI.
“It feels like the best time to continue to experiment because I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything,” she said.
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