I tried to go back to my previous job and it turns out bad everytime

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Hi, how are you? :wink:

how´s the Summer going so far?

Just thinking about what to do in life, if you have any ideas or opinions are very welcome!!

This is the thing: I was working abroad in a job that I really, really loved, where I could do super exciting interesing work (very challenging also). But I took a very bad decision for personal reasons and left it for another job, closer to my family, I left that country and relocated back to my home town.

Well, I hated the change so initially I thought about working 1 year at the new job at least and then applied for this previous job, as we ended up in very good terms.
But then it became unbearable so I decided to apply for my previous job after a few months. Well, the same day I was applying for the job, the company internationally froze all new recruitments until the beginning of this year.

So I waited until they started hiring again, and then waited after I had worked 1 year at this new position I dont like, and then go on and make a move finally and then the same day I was going to apply again, the covid crisis started, borders closed in that country and I asked and of course hirings were frozen yet again.

Now that they are hiring again, they are not hiring for my position.

Well, to make everything even better, due to the covid crisis I was laid off (along with my colleagues) and now I´m unemployed.

And now that I´m unemployed I´m not sure what to do… knowing that what I want to do is go back to my previous job or if not, going back to that country, would it be better to wait and apply only for jobs there or my previous job? Or would it be wiser just applying for jobs here and there and actually everywhere?

I´m so stupid for taking the decision of leaving that job. And my manager and my friends told me not to and, man, I just did it. :frowning:

What would you do?

thanks! Hope you enjoy your day!

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Well, for one thing I suggest you should stop beating yourself up over your decisions. We all do stuff because it seems like a good idea at the time. We can’t change the things we’ve done in the past, much as we’d like to (I’ve made some really bad decisions in my time; sometimes it’s about doing the right thing at the wrong time, sometimes it’s about not doing the right thing at the right time).

Having gotten that out of the way, I’d take the opportunity to sit back and do some thinking. What was it about the first job that made it so great? Was it the nature of the work, the organisation, the people or the projects? Try to reduce these things to a few pointers, and then look out for roles with similar attributes. If you see a possible opening, do some research. Look online for people’s accounts of what it’s like to work for that company. Find out as much about potential employers and workplaces as you can.

My father had a clear rule about life: “you can never go back”. I once stepped back into a previous role for a short-term contract some eight months after I’d previously worked for that company. I’d enjoyed that work, my colleagues and the project, and if I’d been offered the chance to stay with the company full-time the first time, I would have taken it. But going back, even after only eight months, showed me that in that short time, things had changed and I could feel the effects of the discontinuity.

(On the other hand, in my current role I have a few colleagues who have left, only to come back six months or a year or so later, been welcomed back, and slotted straight in as though they’d never been away. I suspect that’s down to the company culture, which is rather different to any other I’ve seen in the past. So it may well be a matter of trying it and seeing, if you get the opportunity.)

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I was about to echo what Robert said, we may have had the same father.

Instead a story about chances, and perhaps cheese: My career started out with not finding a job, working from my Dad for 2 years, then landing the dream job and staying for 14 years. Half way through the 14 years I nearly left, because I was getting bored. One job interview I went to was so boring, I pretty much walked out of the building. I had not realized that I had the best job for me at the time, I just needed to challenge myself more. And once I did that I was happiest man in the world…but then I decided to move to the other side of the world. For the sake of my kids, so I sold the house, at a time the markets were plummeting. I made a loss. But I realized that it’s not about the money, if safety and happiness is what you need and seek, then it takes big steps, like immigrating. The first rule my Granddad this time gave, was, to make a decision, to cross a river, you have to throw your hat over first. Ironically I was crossing that same river 50 years later, but hey ho.

On arrival, I had no job waiting, we prayed, I found work, and then a year in, 2008 crashed into us, another bad timing. I could have cursed my timing, but instead I decided that I have to make like a rubber duck, and bob up to the surface and swim. My life is full of poor choices, but the other Rule my dad game me is never to burn a bridge behind you. Even if you think they stink, make your previous employer think that you love them. 5 jobs in 15 years, most of them I might be able to go back to.

Redundancy hit me twice, yes it will cause everyone depression whether they know it or not. but it’s nothing personal, it’s about luck, and about investment. And sometimes, even the most invested people still loose their jobs, so you want to build your network as widely and fast as possible on day one of every new job.

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Hello general,
I suggest applying everywhere. We all want to be in control our lives, but that’s not really possible, especially now. You cannot know where an acceptable job will appear. A broader search can lead to opportunities and choices sooner.

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Apply for anything that’s out there, even if you find that you don’t like the job you’ve gone into, you will learn something while you’re there. OK, it may be how not to do something but you can maybe apply that knowledge in a later job to do that something in a better way. Besides that, being in a job will make it easier to get a job you do want further down the line.

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I once changed jobs though I still liked the old one. The new one seemed better but there were a lot of questions about it, I changed anyway. The new job turned out not to be that good, worse than I had thought. I still don’t regret the change - if I hadn’t done it, I would always have wondered if that new job would have been good. This way I know, sadly it wasn’t. But unless you do it, you never know. What I’m trying to say is, don’t beat yourself up about changing jobs, even if the new one didn’t turn out so well and ended because of the pandemic. You couldn’t have known that at the time of the change and at that moment it felt like the right thing to do. We can not see the future and maybe that’s a good thing. As soon as the Corona panic will ebb, there will be jobs again.

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