Latest / Rittener Reflections / 11: Involuntarily Separated
Transcript
- (upbeat music) - Hello, this is Jeff Rittner and welcome back to Rittner Reflections, a forum to address the dynamic, complex, and essential nature of cross-border trade in our ever-changing world. It's so good to be back with you. This is episode 11 and it's hard to believe that we're already at episode 11. I started this back in January of 2025. And what I intend to do today is I'm gonna talk about two things. One, I wanna just kind of catch everyone up with what I've been doing. It has been exactly six months since I left Intel and I've been quite busy. So I thought I'd walk through some of those things and some of the things I've learned through this process. And then I also wanna talk a little bit about this very difficult situation to be in when you've been involuntarily separated from a company. And so we'll get into that just a bit later. But first, I thought I would just dive into Rittner Reflections for a minute. Last week I was back in Washington, D.C. at a conference and I met a lot of people and I would tell people, hey, one of the things I'm doing is I'm doing a podcast. And they would say, oh, really? You're doing a podcast? That's fantastic. What's it on? And I said, well, it's on cross-border trade and so on. And then they'd say, well, why are you doing this? And I had to kind of explain. And what I realized is that unless you listened to episode number one, you probably wouldn't know what Rittner Reflections is, what it's about. So let me just kind of go back over a little bit. Rittner Reflections started as a memo to my employees back at Intel at the beginning of the pandemic in 2020. And at that moment in time, most of us were really struggling with the fact that we were going through this pandemic. We were now being forced to work from our homes and the big question I got all the time is when are we gonna be able to go back to work? And so it really started out as a way to communicate with employees what's really going on in the company and in the world around us. And from there, I continued having that dialogue with employees. Eventually it ended up being every other week. And I did this for five years. And so when I left Intel, one of the most common requests that I received from people is, hey, we're really gonna miss the Rittner Reflections. Is there any way you could continue doing this? And I thought, I guess I could. I've been doing this for five years. So I started in the first week of January and I think I published my first one. And in that first one, I described the journey at Intel and how this came about. I also talked a lot about the world that we were facing. And I recall the first episode really talked about the five things that we could be certain of in this year up 2025. I highly encourage you to go back and listen to episode one and you'll get a good sense of what those five things that you could be certain of are. And I've tried over the course of the podcast here, I've tried to kind of focus on some of those through the discussions that I've had with individuals and so on. Anyway, so I went back over and I found one that I think is really, I'd like to kind of just read to give you a sense of, you know, the sort of communications that went on back at Intel. And this was down back in March of 2024. And it happened to be the four year anniversary of when I first started publishing these. And so I'm just going to read this and give you a sense of what it was. So the group that I worked, that I ran was called International Trade Group. So it starts out, Dear ITG. On this day, four years ago, I emailed my first written reflections to address the reality of an unprecedented global pandemic. None of us at that time fully realized the long journey ahead as we began working from our homes. My intent in sharing my reflections was to establish ongoing communication with employees and to provide timely, relevant and personal information that would help them navigate the uncharted and turbulent times ahead. Over the next four years, through over 200 pages of journal entries, I chronicled an interesting and unique journey, sharing insights and charting ITG's course for the future. These reflections were drawn from global geopolitical ships, Intel's transformational strategies, the necessity of digital connectivity, and the impact of AI. I've pointed to Intel's spirit of innovation and competition while drawing parallels to the essence of the Super Bowl, underscoring our drive to excel. I've encouraged you to embrace agility and to adopt a foundry mindset. I've stressed the importance of attracting the right talent, as well as leveraging both customer trust and exceptional service to guide our actions. I've challenged you to confront obstacles head on, to do more with less while never forgetting to enjoy time off with your family and loved ones. I've also used these reflections to open the window a little into my personal life, sharing the challenges of working from home and going back to the office, the joys of running races, the interesting places I traveled to, and the challenges of home ownership and fallen trees. As I contemplate the amazing journey of these past four years, I am grateful for the opportunity to lead this talented organization. Your engagement has been invaluable in shaping my approach to leadership and communication, not just the 104 of you, but to many employees around the world. For this, I want to say thank you. Going forward, I remain committed to the original goal of keeping you informed, entertained, and encouraged. I ask that you join me in looking to the future, armed with the wisdom of our past. Today, this celebration couldn't be more perfectly timed with Intel's landmark 8.5 billion award for the CHIPS Act, which is a clear indication of Intel's strategic progress and our collective dedication. Here's to the amazing journey that continues. I hope you enjoyed that episode of my written reflections that I shared with my international trade group back in March of 2024. You can see that the intent was to provide update on where we are and to provide encouragement. So it's been now six months since I left Intel. And I get this question a lot from people. So what have you been doing? And I look back and I think, what have I done in six months? And I've got to categorize it into seven areas that I've spent my time on. And the first area, I would say, is unwinding from Intel. I mean, I spent 34 years working at Intel every single day, just running a million miles an hour. And all of a sudden, it stops. And so the first thing I spent a lot of time early on is just kind of unwinding from Intel emotionally, mentally, physically, but also just all of the steps that it takes to separate yourself from a company, especially when you're also at a level of retirement. So there were a lot of things to do. You wouldn't believe from health care to pensions to et cetera, et cetera. So a lot of work just to get myself separated. The other big challenge getting separated from Intel was setting up my home office without Intel IT. And so I have been fortunate enough to have my son-in-law, Keith, who's the producer of this podcast, helped me in many ways try to figure out how to get my speakers working, how to get the software loaded, how to arrange my calendar so I could actually see things. So that all took quite a bit of time. And I'm happy to say that things seem to be working fairly well now. Second section, I would say, is this podcast. I already explained to you why I'm doing this podcast. This has been just a lot of fun. I had an opportunity to meet with a number of people, spend some time, for example, with folks like Alex Capri last episode. And I've got some more lined up where we'll have some great conversations with folks talking about some of the big issues of the day. And obviously, trade is one of those. So this podcast has been a lot of fun. The third area is I early on decided that there may be opportunities for me to leverage my 34 years of experience in trade to provide that experience and that expertise to others. So thanks again to my son-in-law, Keith. He helped me figure out how to set up a company. So back in January, February, I set up my own company called Ritner Trade Services. And it is an LLC. And it allows me to offer my consulting services or my advisory services. I haven't really got started on this, because I've been so busy with so many other things, as you'll hear in a minute. But I'm hoping soon to be providing consultation and advice to others out there in the world of trade. Third area, this was a surprise. This is not something that I thought I would ever be doing. But I actually now am a host of my own Airbnb. And yes, I actually purchased a property, a condo, in back in North Carolina where my daughter lives. And the condo-- it's a two-bedroom condo in a small town just south of Raleigh, a growing community. It's one of the fastest growing areas outside of Raleigh. And it was an Airbnb for the last three years. And the owner decided to sell it. So I purchased it as is. And I'm really excited to say that within four days of purchase, we had our first guest. And so we had to scramble around quite a bit to get that place up and running and ready. And so we've actually-- we are actually booked now a solid till July 4, which has been really exciting. And it's come with a lot of learnings. I mean, this is a whole different industry. This is the hospitality industry, not the semiconductor industry. And so I had to learn a lot of things around-- I guess it's similar in some ways in semiconductors. As I said in my written reflections, what's really important is the customer. And so I guess in the hospitality industry, the most important person is the guest. And so making sure that guest has everything they need, making sure they have a comfortable and clean and just a wonderful experience. It's all about making sure the guest has a wonderful experience. And so our first guest was very, very patient with us because we were still kind of in transition. And so he provided us with a lot of good feedback, which we are adjusting to and looking to improve. So I'm very excited about this. My daughter lives 10 minutes away. And so she's my co-host. And it's been kind of fun to do this together with her. Number five, speaking. I've been doing a lot of speaking. I've been invited to participate on a number of panels. I've been able to moderate a panel just last week back in DC with a company called Siari. Had a great panel discussion on some of the challenges in the world today and export compliance. I've been very fortunate I've been invited to Stanford a couple of times to sit on a panel talking about US and Taiwan relationship when it comes to cross-border trade and also AI. I have been able to participate in a number of events with the Asia Society, which is a wonderful organization. We have a chapter here in Northern California. I sit on their advisory committee and I'm meeting just a lot of very talented individuals who have broad, deep experience in the world of trade and also in the world of geopolitics. And so it's been a great, great experience doing that. Number six, I've also been running. You all know that I'm a runner. I've talked about this in my podcast. And so I'm continuing to run. Just recently, I found a new running group that meets weekly at the track. And so I now get to run with a bunch of 20, 30-year-olds. And so I am learning how to run a bit faster, which is good for me, especially as I'm on the edge of starting to train for my next full marathon, which will be held in December in Valencia, Spain. And so come August, I will be in full training mode to get ready for that marathon. And then finally, just I would say the final of the seventh section here that I can describe what I've been doing. It's just a lot of time with social time, with family and with friends. I look at my calendar, and it's full of meetings. Spent a lot of time at coffee shops and having lunches. And it's just been great to spend time with people, to have that freedom, to be able to pick up the phone and say, hey, what are you doing tomorrow? Let's go have a coffee or a lunch. And of course, a lot of time with my family can't just emphasize enough how wonderful it is to have grandchildren and to be able to spend time with them. And so that's been fun. So you can see I've been very, very busy during these last six months. When I left until my biggest fear I was going to be bored, I wasn't sure how I was going to spend my time. And I can say after six months that I have been probably almost as busy as I was there working at Intel. With that, I'd like to shift my focus a little bit, because one of the things that I've noticed over the course of these last six months is I'm not alone. There are a lot of people out there who have been involuntarily terminated. Many of those, obviously, I know from Intel, but they also come from other companies, from the government. And there's a lot of people that have gone through this experience. I'm calling it involuntarily separated. This is kind of the polite term. The way that it's normally been said is you've been laid off. Some people even say fired. I don't know if it's that much. But I think in this day we're living in right now, there are many, many people in this country that have been laid off or involuntarily terminated. And what's really, I think, difficult about this is the word involuntary. I know at Intel we were going through reductions, and there were a number of opportunities that employees had to voluntarily separate. And so they made that decision and said, yeah, I think it's time for me to move on. And they took a package and they left. But there were a number of us, including myself, that were involuntarily separated. In other words, it wasn't our choice. If, given the choice, we would have happily continued working and contributing in the roles that we were in. And there are a lot of people that find themselves in that situation. And so I just thought it might be good just to talk a little bit about that from my own experience, how it felt, and what did I do, and how have I managed it. And so I will finish this episode and provide you with some of my insights and some of my recommendations or tips for how to manage through this. But let me just first describe a little bit about how I felt. Maybe some of you might relate with this. But when I was notified that my job had been eliminated, it was completely unexpected. And that first feeling of disbelief that is really happening to me, I experienced. And over time, you began to go through a series of emotions, trying to understand what just happened. And from the disbelief to the discrediting it, how could this be, why, the questions, the feeling of uncertainty that you're facing, the questions around, what am I going to do? All those things go through one's mind. And I think that it's a very difficult situation in my entire working career. And I've worked probably when I worked in college and so on. But if I add all that up, I've worked for probably more than 40 years of my life. And I've never been laid off or involuntarily separated. And so it was a new experience for me. I mean, for some people, I know growing up, my father was involuntarily separated. I can think of at least three times. And the reason why I remember those is because they were a big deal. I mean, and my father was working in the Silicon Valley in the late '60s and the '70s, early '80s. And this was a time here in the Silicon Valley where it was fast and furious. I mean, there was a shift from sort of a defense industry, because we had the universities here. We had the air base, I feel it, moving more towards the tech. And it went to the birth of Silicon Valley. And you saw the birth of companies like Intel, like Apple, like others. And you really began to see-- there was a lot of companies that sprung up. They grew fast, and they also fell fast. And so there were a lot of layoffs. And my dad, working in that industry, went through that. And I'd always remember as a child, when that happened to my dad, it was traumatic. It was difficult. Now going through this myself, I can look back and think about my father and think about what it must have been like for him to be laid off and then have to go through that effort. And it depends also when this happens in your life. I mean, if this happens when you're early in your career and you're still raising a family and you've got all that burden of how are you going to make sure you've got to work and you've got a job and you can provide. If it happens later on in your career like myself, I mean, it's not as-- I don't have that pressure on me, although it is not easy. But I don't have that pressure. So I know there are many of you out there that are in that situation where maybe you are early in your career, you do have family and people to support. And it is hard. It's very difficult. And I can now have a much better appreciation of my dad in that sense. So for all of you out there listening or who know someone that's been involuntarily separated, I'm going to offer just some tips, some things that are reflective of my experience over the last six months. And obviously, my experiences are different than maybe yours. But hopefully, these things will resonate and maybe be helpful for you. So I've kind of categorized them in five buckets. And they all, as I typically like to do, they all start with the same letter. And this time, I chose the letter P. So all these start with P. So I'll just start off with the first one. And the first one I want to share with you is I think the very first thing that you should consider when you've been involuntarily separated is to think about your perspective. The perspective that you pursue will mean a lot to how you manage this. And what I mean by that is let me just walk through some things that I think have helped me with my perspective. Number one is realize that this involuntary separation is not about you. It was about your company. It was about the company having to make hard choices. Very rarely does a company want to reduce its workforce. Very rarely does a company want to eliminate jobs. But sometimes through the economy, sometimes through the state of the company and its performance, through a multitude of reasons, a company has to reduce. And there's no easy way to do it. Having been in a position where I had multiple times in my career had to involuntarily separate someone, it is no easy thing to do. And when you make that decision, there are lots of reasons for it. And oftentimes, it's financial or it may be organizational. But it's very rarely about the person. Now, if someone obviously is a very poor performer and they've been-- they're being terminated for their performance, that's a whole different story. But I'm talking about just this need of a company to reduce its numbers as it goes through a process of trying to figure out how to do that. And so very rarely is it about the person. So that's the first thing from a perspective to think about it, what you're going through. It's not about you. Two, you are not alone. There are a lot of people, like I said earlier, that are going through this. And you're not the only one out there that's experiencing this. And so being able to recognize that, there are others. And finding ways, and I'll talk about this in a little bit, finding ways to gather with others who are going through this similar situation can be very helpful. Number three, it's not a waste. You have not wasted any time. I don't know how long you've been in the company a year or 30 years. During the time that you worked for the company, you gained incredible experience. I'm sure learned many things. And all of those experiences and all of those learnings go with you. You're taken with you. And they become the fuel that helps you navigate and figure out what you'll do next. And number four, it's not the end of the journey. It's really just the beginning. Because when you are involuntary separated, it opens the door for you to pursue a different opportunity. And I can say from my experience over the last six months, as I've shared with you just a bit ago, the things that I'm doing right now, many of those things I would not be doing if I was still working in the same job. And so this has opened up new avenues of exploration and of learning and of enjoyment and of using my time in different ways. And so I want you to understand that it's not the end of your journey. It's really the beginning. And it's really what comes next for you. That's number one, perspective. Have the right perspective. Number two, I call it passion. Other people call it purpose. But I think it's really important when you are involuntary separated to step back and think about, what am I passionate about? Or what is really my purpose? Because that becomes, I think, the question that will help you navigate your next steps. And so I ask you, what is it for you? What is your passion? What is the purpose of why you're here? One way I like to kind of think about this, and maybe this will be helpful for you, is to ask yourself, if I could do this-- and I'll put this on quotes, whatever that this is for you. You put those words in there. If I could do this, I would jump out of bed in the morning to start it. Or I would stay up all night to finish it. If you can figure out what that is, or this is, by answering that question, you will begin to discover what is your passion and what is your purpose. And that's really important to know that, because that way it will help you avoid dead ends and going down a path that maybe you look back and say, oh, what did I do this? So you have an opportunity now, having been involuntarily separated, to figure out, maybe more clearly than ever, what is that passion and what is my purpose? So do you know what that is for you? Take some time and figure that out. So that's number two, number three, plan. This is a great opportunity to plan. When you work for a company, I always like to describe it as like being on a carousel. Carousel keeps turning. You can stand on it. You can walk on it. You can sit on it. But it keeps turning. And working for a company, oftentimes, your plans are kind of dictated by the company. I mean, you can have your own personal plans, but in many ways, your day is shaped by what's going on at the company. How you spend your time, what you do in the future, where you go, all of those things oftentimes are dictated by the company. But now that you've been involuntarily separated, you have the opportunity on your own for yourself to develop a plan, a plan of how you're going to go forward. One of the things I've found helpful for me is every single day I have a to-do list. I kind of had one at work when I worked, but I also have one now. And I have a list of things. So every single day I'm thinking about, what do I want to get accomplished today? And those things hopefully lead to bigger things. Sometimes, there are smaller steps to get me to something further. And so I would highly encourage you to think through how you could use a to-do list. And then finally, the third thing I'll say here is to measure progress every day. I think one of the struggles of being involuntarily separated is that sometimes it's hard to feel that you're making any progress. You've applied for five jobs this week, or you haven't applied for any jobs this week, or you just spent your day surfing the web, or scrolling through X or whatever it might be. But I think it's important to kind of identify where you've made progress and measure those. So that will give you a sense that you're moving forward. You're not just stuck. OK, number four, I will say. Number four, P is people. And I think one of the tendencies when you are involuntarily separated is to isolate yourself. You're used to going every single day, whether you went to work or whether you hooked up on the video and you met with people. But most likely in your job, most people you've met, you meet people all the time. You're having conversations. But when you're all of a sudden at home and you're not working, there's a tendency to isolate oneself. So don't do that. It's really important that you use this time that you have to connect, to reconnect, if there are those you haven't seen a lot, or to network with people that you've known. So I can't emphasize more how important it is to keep all that going. Because I can tell you from my experience over the last six months, the more people I've met, the more things I have discovered. And I have discovered maybe where someone else could use some help or whether someone could help me with something, whether it was a networking opportunity where I saw a job that I thought would be helpful for somebody or somebody else did the same for me. So I think it's important to maintain that network. And you have to work at it. Because the longer that you're separated from work, the more easy it is to lose touch. And so it's really important that you're diligent about doing that. One of the things that I use is a calendar. I have an Outlook calendar or a Gmail calendar. And I use this at work. I was one of these people that used to take my meetings and color code them. So at work, I used to color code. Anytime I met with someone one-on-one, I color coded that green. And so I used to like to go back week by week, and I'd look at my calendar and see how much green did I have. And a lot of green meant I meet with people, which was really, really important in my job. I think now as I'm not working full-time, I think it's still important for my calendar to be filled with green. And so I do that now. I color coded my calendar. And every time I meet with somebody, I put green. And so it helps me go back and realize, yeah, I'm staying connected. I'm with people. And I'm spending that time. So please keep your network alive. Don't isolate yourself. And then finally, the last one I'll say is patience. P for patience. And that is this time of your life where you've been involuntary separated. To get to that next step, it's going to take some patience. I've heard of people that were able to land a job really quickly. And that's really fantastic for them. I've heard and seen people that it's taking a very long time. In fact, it may be not even getting close. And so there's a tendency to lose patience and to get discouraged. But be patient. These things take time. And to find the opportunity that aligns with your passion and your purpose, to really find that, sometimes may take some time and you just have to be patient. So be patient. Take your time. Don't give up. Sometimes people will get discouraged and give up. Don't do that. Keep looking. Also, it's important to kind of recalibrate. I think I've seen that over the last six months that I thought I might be going in one direction and I realized maybe I need to recalibrate. I'll give you an example. The level that I had it until when I left, that role that I had, the Chief Trade Officer, there's very few of those in companies around the world. And so that means there's much fewer opportunities for me. And I realized that it's probably going to be very difficult to find the same thing I had. And so I have to recalibrate. And that's why I've created my company because maybe I should spend my time doing consulting versus trying to find the job I had much before. So recalibration is really important. And then lastly, I'll leave with you the last thing. And this is probably the most important thing I'll say. Keep learning. Don't stop learning. Just whatever the situation is, whether you're meeting with someone, whether you're working on a project, whether you're putting a plan together, just keep learning. Because the more you learn, the more successful you'll ultimately be in whatever opportunity you end up pursuing. So those are my five P's for you just to kind of encourage you in this journey of being involuntarily separated. One, have the right perspective. Two, figure out your passion or your purpose. Three, make sure you keep planning. Four, don't stop meeting with people. And five, be patient. It'll all work out. And you will find the right opportunity very soon. With that, I am going to finish my podcast today. And I'm going to just say thank you for joining and listening. I hope this has been helpful. And we will be back in two weeks. And I'm very excited to have another guest who is an author and a former CEO. So please stay tuned for the next episode. Thank you and have a great day. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] (upbeat music)