The Career Mistake That Blew Up My Christmas (And How To Avoid It)
Dec 19, 2025
In 2014, I made one of the biggest career mistakes of my life.
I was working at Nike as a Brand Director when a recruiter slid into my LinkedIn inbox. She told me she had a hot London startup that wanted someone exactly like me. She also told me the salary… which was almost twice what I was earning at Nike.
And honestly, I got swept up in it. I wasn’t job hunting. I wasn’t even thinking about leaving. But I felt flattered. Excited. Chosen.
Instead of asking myself the most important question — is this right for me? — I jumped straight into the fantasy of a shiny new role with a shiny new paycheck.
I didn’t do the work on myself. I didn’t ask what I needed next in my career. I just said yes.
I started in August 2013 feeling like I’d won the lottery.
Two weeks in, I knew I’d made a massive mistake.
The company wasn’t right for me. The work wasn’t what I’d been sold. I didn’t click with the team. I didn’t click with the founder (who was also my boss). And the truth hit hard: I had left Nike — a company I loved — for something that was completely wrong for me.
In December, the week before Christmas, the founder called me into a meeting. I thought we were planning the year ahead. Instead, he told me it wasn’t working and he was letting me go.
It was Friday the 13th.
I walked out unemployed for the first time in eight years, one week before Christmas, completely devastated.
The mistake I made
I skipped the most important step of a career move: getting clear on who I was and what I needed next.
I had jumped straight into execution because a recruiter reached out. I hadn’t done the foundational work. And if I had done it, I would have known that company wasn’t right for me.
Why I’m telling you this now
Because this is the exact work I now do with everyone who joins Creative Career Level Up — and it’s the first step for a reason. When you know who you are, what motivates you, what environments you thrive in, and what you actually want next, you stop making reactive career decisions. You start making aligned ones.
Your Christmas Gift: Total Clarity (Free)
My mini-course Total Clarity walks you through the exact process I used in 2014 to rebuild my career from scratch — the same process that helped me go from unemployed and wanting to quit marketing altogether to landing my job at Apple and tripling my salary.
It’s normally $99. But this week, for you — it’s free.
How to access it
Click the link below to the mini-course, enter the code XMAS2025 at checkout, and the course will be completely free.
Or, if you prefer, you can go straight to the link at the bottom of this email — it will take you directly to the course page where you can redeem it with the code applied already.
Thank you for being here, for reading every week, and for supporting my work.
Please enjoy my Christmas gift — and here’s to your next perfect role in 2026.
I help people in the Marketing and Creative and Tech Industries to find their next perfect role.
If you are looking to level-up your career, use the link below to schedule some time to chat about whether the programme might be right for you.
