Episode 327 - I share six tools I use with experienced professionals who feel stuck in job search. You will leave with clearer direction, a simple decision filter, and practical ways to build momentum.

Renata Bernarde (00:00)
if you’re here in January, it usually means one of two things. You’re ready for a change or you’re exhausted from trying. Today’s episode is for both versions of you.

The point I want to make today is simple. Nothing changes unless you change the way you think. If you feel overwhelmed right now, you’re not broken. You’re overloaded. Your brain is overloaded. When you’ve got decades of experience, the stakes feel higher, the story feels heavier, and the options can feel narrower than they usually are.

So this episode is about widening your options by changing how you see yourself and how you run the process of job searching. So I’m going to adapt six mindset tools that inspire me to the reality of your experience as corporate professional. You want a job in 2026 and beyond, and I’ll give you six tools, no hype, just a reset. All right, let’s begin.

If we haven’t met yet, my name is Renata Bernarde. I’m a career coach and I work with experienced professionals in the corporate world, usually based in the US, Canada, UK, Australia, Europe, Asia, and usually navigating their job search or career change in their 40s, 50s and 60s. I love working with them.

Like you, my clients are navigating job search, career change, leadership transitions, and that tricky moment where your experience is strong, but your confidence has taken a hit. I also teach career planning and design at Monash University and I host this podcast, The Job Hunting Podcast, which I started many years ago and it now has 300 episodes ready for you to binge search for specific topics.

My job in your ears, through my newsletter and my coaching is to help you think clearly, communicate powerfully, and move through job search with more strategy and less stress. So go to my website, make sure you’re subscribed to my newsletter, and follow this podcast wherever you found it.

So over the holidays, it’s summer here in Australia where I am at the moment, I did what I always do when I’m trying to reset. I read a lot, I listened to lots of other podcasts, I watched and I took notes and I pulled together a handful of ideas that kept repeating themselves to me across different sources, different industries, different life stories. So today,

I’m going to distill those ideas into six mindset tools you can use if you are an experienced professional looking for work, rebuilding your confidence, redesigning what you want next in your career. And stay with me until the end because I’m also going to explain to you an important change I’m making to this podcast this year and how you can stay connected with me week by week.

Now keep a note open as you listen because I’m going to ask you a few questions. You don’t have to answer them perfectly. You just have to answer them honestly. And if you’re a newsletter subscriber, you don’t need to take notes. Your newsletter this week will come with all the questions for you and a playbook for you to work with. So that’s the benefit of being a newsletter subscriber. Now, while I’m doing that, I’m also going to be honest about something I think you will respect.

This podcast is here to help you. It’s also here to help you take action. I will walk you through this road to a new job and career, and I will also push you. And for some of you, the best action is working with me privately or choosing one of my courses. And I’ll give you real value today. And I’ll also make it clear where the line is between this will help and this will change everything, which is usually behind the client firewall.

All right, let’s get into it. So the first mindset tool is design the character. Here’s the thing, the most interesting people don’t fall into their lives. They design them. I heard this recently on a video. I will link that video below. It really inspired me to do this podcast. And it was everything that I do with the work with my clients. And I wanted to…

educate you on how we do it when I work with clients. And I wanted to bring that into your career. A lot of experienced professionals, they try to get back to who they were before their career disruption. They use job seeking to try to get back to what they had instead of move forward with their careers. So same industry, same title, same level, same identity. And then when that doesn’t work,

quickly they panic, the panic sets in and that’s pretty normal and pretty common. I’ve done that myself in my corporate career. But here’s a better starting point for you. If you were writing the lead character in a film, who is this person now? Not 10 years ago, not pre-layoff, not pre-burnout, now. What do they care about? What are they known for?

How do they make their decisions? What do they refuse to tolerate anymore? What kind of work are they proud of? And these prompts are so important for you to work through as you go through that job search, before you go through that job search, in fact. Answer them like you’re describing a character, not like you’re writing a LinkedIn bio. These questions, you know, are…

for you, you’re not necessarily going to share them yet with anybody. What problem do I solve better than anybody else? What types of environments brings out my best work? What do I want to be hired for this year specifically? What do I want to be protected from this year specifically? What would make my week feel like mine again?

Now, let me make this practical. When people hear design your life, they often jump to aesthetics, routines, habits, a new notebook, a new app. I’m not against any of that. That’s cool. I love it. But for you, the design is your career architecture, your positioning, your boundaries, your pitch, message, your operating system. You are the author here.

and I want you to feel that control. But being the author means you stop waiting for the market to tell you who you are, to tell you what jobs to apply for. This is exactly where coaching becomes so powerful, because it’s hard to write your own story when you’re still grieving the last chapter. So for now, your action step is simple. Write a character brief for your 2026 professional self.

One page, bullet points, no perfection. And if you want my structure for this, the one I use with my private clients that sits behind my paid work, that’s the difference between inspiration and implementation. Go to my website, reach out to me, let’s work together. Okay. The second tool that I want to share with you is to choose a word as a filter.

A lot of people have started doing this, my husband has done it for a few years now, and I think it works very well. You choose one word for the year and you use it as your filter to improve yourself for your personal development, for your professional career development. I love this for job search because job search creates decision fatigue. You have too many choices, too many options, opinions and tactics.

Which jobs to apply for, who to contact, what to say, how to present yourself, when to pivot, when to persist. There’s just too much. A single word then becomes your decision filter. Pick one word for you for 2026, then run your decisions through it. Does this outreach match my word? Does this role match my word? Does this story match my word?

This stops you from drifting. It gives you a spine, a foundation. Here are a few words that can work beautifully for senior professionals. First one, visible. I stop hiding behind competence and I start seeing. Another one, selective. I stop chasing and I start choosing. Brave. I do the uncomfortable thing early, not late.

Clear, I stop being impressive and I start being understood. Steady, I build momentum through consistency, not mood. Unmistakable, I stop blending in and I start standing for something. Now I want you to pick just one and I want you to use it in two places. On your desk, on your wall, where you will actually see it. It’s important for you to see that word. In your notes app.

as the first line in your job search plan, then every time you make a job search decision, ask, does this match my word? Here’s an example. If your word is selective, you don’t apply to roles that make you feel cheapened, even if you’re scared. If your word is visible, you stop spending energy tweaking your resume for the 10th time and you start reaching out to humans.

One word won’t fix everything but it will stop you from drifting.

Now, a third tool. I want you to try your best to outsmart the internal monster inside you. Let’s talk about that internal monster. I have one, everybody has one. High performance don’t usually struggle with a monster of laziness, by the way. They struggle with avoidance disguised as productivity. I see it all the time. It’s avoidance dressed

like this. I will just refine my LinkedIn profile one more time. Before I do that, I’ll just apply to 10 more rows before I start networking. I’ll wait until I feel more confident. I will wait after the holidays. I will do more research. The monster that you have inside, it loves comfort. In a job search, comfort usually looks like solitary work.

You can stay busy without being exposed. So networking, messaging, asking, following up, those are visible actions. They trigger vulnerability. And that’s why the monster fights them. You argue against all of them. You find reasons not to do those things yet. So the thing here is not to try to negotiate with this monster. You have to outsmart it.

The best way to do that is to remove all the variables and add accountability. That’s why coaching works. ⁓ But there are other things that you can do. And here are three examples that work for experienced professionals. You build a calendar and you enforce it. So you block, you know, two blocks per week, same time, same place. One block is for outreach. Go out network.

Message people one block is for interviews and storytelling practice. So if you’re not interviewing you’re practicing for it The other thing that you can do is pre written scripts I do a lot of that work with my clients if you’re listening and you’re a client, you know how you know how I work with pre written scripts It’s not for every situation but for the moments that you freeze the moments that you are with high high cortisone in your body

and your brain doesn’t work as much, those scripts can be very, very important. There is the reconnection message, the referral ask, the first questions in a job interview, the I’m exploring next steps message, the follow up after no response. Those scripts can be ready, can be written for you and with you, with the help of a coach, for example.

Then there is external accountability. Like I said, a coach, you can work with me one-on-one. You can join one of my small groups. You know, I have a group coaching program that I run once or twice a year. You can sign up for the waitlist. There’s my LinkedIn monthly membership. If what you’re struggling with is to show up on LinkedIn more visibly and with the executive presence that you want to portray. ⁓ A weekly check in with someone, someone.

someone who is an expert, someone who has more experience in this than you, who won’t let you disappear, won’t let you surrender to the monster. This is where I’m going to say something that might sting, but it’s true. If willpower worked, you wouldn’t be stuck. If willpower worked, everybody that made important decisions on New Year’s Eve will follow through them.

but your brain is protecting you from discomfort, not from failure. So the question becomes, what systems am I willing to put in place so I don’t have to rely on my mood? If you’re listening and thinking, I know what to do, I just can’t make myself do it. That’s exactly the kind of person that I want to help because the work isn’t more information, more…

things to read, podcasts, episodes even, the work is changing the behavior under pressure. So that’s something for you to think about.

All right, the fourth tool, the third person audit. That is such an important tool. It’s my favorite. It’s a clarity tool. It creates distance to create clarity for you. And here’s the exercise I’d like you to do. Imagine you are advising someone, someone you respect, someone with your exact resume, your exact strengths.

and your exact fears. If you were their career strategist, what would you tell them to do this week? Not this year, this week. Would you tell them to stop applying and start talking to people, tighten their target, take a temporary contract to get moving, rebuild their confidence through a smaller win, change their narrative because it’s underselling them, stop chasing roles that they don’t deserve,

that don’t deserve them? Now ask yourself, why am I not taking the advice I’d give to someone else? This is where senior professionals get trapped. You’re brilliant at solving problems for organizations. You’re less compassionate with yourself. So here’s a practical third-person audit template for you.

If I were coaching Renata’s listeners, I would tell them focus on these two role types, reach out to these 10 people, tell this story in interviews, stop doing this one thing immediately.

If you do nothing else after this episode, please just do this. Okay? Imagine that you are coaching someone that is exactly like you and go through these questions. You will find it so enlightening and you may see where the cracks are and I want you to notice the cracks.

Now, this is an important tool, one that I will be speaking a lot about this week because I’m speaking about ageism with a group of job seekers later this week. I have to prepare that webinar. I want you to stop ignoring your ceiling. This is what I want to discuss with you and with this group I’m talking to later this week. There is a lie that floats around corporate careers.

The lie is that the best years are behind you. That you’ve missed out your window. That age bias exists. I’ve talked about this many times, but here’s what I know from working with people in their 40s, their 50s and their 60s. The market doesn’t only reward youth. They reward relevance. And relevance is something that you can build over time. You can only build it.

over time. You do it by being current in your thinking, clear in your positioning, strong in your communication, and specific about your value. When someone hires a senior professional, they’re often hiring for judgment, stability, influence, and the ability to execute without drama. Those are advantages.

So when you catch yourself thinking maybe I’m too late, replace it with better questions like how do I become unmistakably irrelevant for the problem this organization is facing right now? That’s what makes you stand out, not your job title, not your years, your point of view. And that is something we can craft together.

I say together because sometimes that self-reflection takes time and takes the support of somebody else to help you identify it. If you’ve been working on your career day in day out in a rat race for too long, you may not see yourself the way that the market sees yourself. So getting that external validation and critique and support is really important for you. Find a way to do it, either through coaching or mentoring or

the support that you can find around you. And it has to be expert support.

The last tool that I want to share with you today is that ideas and planning can be disguised as procrastination. This is especially true for smart people. You can spend months preparing the perfect resume, the perfect profile and the perfect strategy for yourself. And meanwhile, nothing will change. Only actions change outcomes.

So what are you doing this week? Not working on, not thinking about, but actually doing. Here are some examples of what doing in job search can look like. Doing looks like you sending five reconnection messages. You publish one LinkedIn post that states what you do and what you’re targeting. You book one conversation with someone who’s being where you want to go.

You apply for two roles that actually match your target with a very tailored pitch. You practice your tell me about yourself story out loud three times. Progress loves exposure. So if you want momentum, you need that output. You need things that are not perfect yet so that you can continuously improve them, especially if they are not perfect yet.

That’s when you really need to go to market and do something about it. I want you to remember this. You don’t need more motivation. Here you are listening to this podcast. You are motivated enough. You need fewer decisions and more structure. That’s what these six tools are. Structure for the part of you that gets tired. Look.

Here’s the thing, the job market hasn’t been easy for a few years now. If 2025 knocked you around, you’re not alone. A lot of talented people ended last year feeling really disoriented,

not because they lack capability, but because the market has changed and the rules got fuzzier and more complicated. And that’s why I’m here in 2026 with a renewed commitment to making this show more personal, more honest and more useful for you. I want to tell you what’s changing and why. So from today, I’m releasing the podcast every two weeks.

This change is important to me and it’s not because I’m doing less, but because I’m doing it differently. I want this episodes to be more spacious, more thoughtful, more human. And I want you to feel like you’ve had a proper conversation with someone who gets it. Me, of course.

Because I know that what many of you are going through is that you’re not just job hunting as a hobby, you’re doing it while you’re managing mortgage stress, family responsibilities, health, identity, pride, and the weird emotional hangover that comes from being highly capable and feeling stuck. You still keep the podcast bi-weekly, you have also lots of episodes to binge for, you can go to the website so you can search.

specific topics, but the relationship with me will remain weekly, The podcast will be every two weeks and my newsletter will remain weekly with content that will be created specifically for subscribers. For example, the newsletter I want to include practical

prompts for you, like all these questions that I asked during this episode, more guidance you can apply that week that you get the newsletter. And from time to time also add maybe an audio or a special specific podcast just for subscribers that I won’t share anywhere else. So if the podcast is the deeper conversation, the newsletter is the weekly coaching style note that keeps you moving forward.

subscribe just go to my website, join the newsletter or you know go to the show notes and you will find a link to subscribe as well. And if you want to go further here are your next steps. If you want to work with me privately you go to my website and you book an introduction with me. I will tell you quickly if I think I’m the right coach for you and what I think will make the biggest difference in your job search.

If you prefer to work on your own, I have courses on my website that take you through the methods step by step without noise. And one more thing, if you’ve been listening for years and you still haven’t taken action, let this be the year you stop consuming and start building.

Do one small thing this week that pushes you forward and outside of your comfort zone.

Okay, so I will be back in your ears in two weeks and in your inbox weekly. If you are a newsletter subscriber, watch out for my newsletter coming to your inbox this week. It will include a companion to this episode, so you have all the questions I have asked in this episode and you can go through them at your own time. Until then, take care of yourself. Bye for now.