Day Club Initiations – Chinkara Singh – Three Easy Lessons

I had 2 sessions that morning - a record session and an edit session - just another day where I felt I had to clone myself to get all my work done. It was the norm. The only way to catch up was to work 14 hour days consistently. You could feel the belt tightening around our company, but with all the work I completed at record speed, I was irreplaceable, right? In fact, a friend had heard a rumor that I was going to get a promotion.

And, It's always the two people in the office. That's the rule -- there has to be more than one person for legal reasons. And they called me in from my 2 -session-morning to do it, but i thought i was getting a promotion.

And though it didn't seem like it at the time, I was.

That morning, I was laid off from my employer of 5+ years with no warning and locked out of my computer immediately. Didn't get to say good bye to friends or even get all of my personal information off the computer (lesson 1). Even though I felt my loyalty to them had been betrayed, I immediately felt relieved. The market was still good, and I was leaving for LA the next day.

I moved to LA later that year. And would never have done so if the layoff hadn't happened. I learned how to sell my skills as a freelancer and give what they call the 15 second pitch (lesson 2). I had time to take short workshops to refine my skills as a producer in the industry - SAG talent workshops / Apple apps workshops / NAB conference / etc. I was never more connected to the production that I love.

From the layoff, I learned to market myself. I was never good at that - I found it to be cheesy, like a name dropper - but it forced me to find a flow, how to show people what I'm good at, and tell them effectively so they remember me (lesson 3).

A couple of years into it, I had my own logo designed that was echoed in my business card, website, portfolio, letterhead, invoices, stickers, and thank you postcards. And finally, people started remembering me by my logo.

It was the insight into my industry that I needed to be successful - marketing myself, advertising myself. Six years of being a freelancer, I immersed myself in more layoffs and rehires to conquer my fear of it. In turn, my measurement of success was how I turned a layoff into a promotion.