Laura Brown and Kristina O'Neill, ALL THE COOL GIRLS GET FIRED: How to Let Go of Being Let Go and Come Back on Top

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Totally Booked with Zibby" — Laura Brown & Kristina O'Neill, All the Cool Girls Get Fired

Date: January 16, 2026
Guests: Laura Brown & Kristina O’Neill
Host: Zibby Owens (with event introduction/moderation)
Location: Recorded live at Bloomingdale's, co-hosted by Child Mind Institute, Bloomingdale’s, and Zibby Media

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on the realities of getting fired—destigmatizing professional setbacks and reframing them as opportunities for growth and transformation. Zibby Owens welcomes Laura Brown and Kristina O’Neill, accomplished editors-turned-authors of All the Cool Girls Get Fired: How to Let Go of Being Let Go and Come Back on Top. Recorded live at Bloomingdale’s, the conversation is candid, inspiring, and infused with humor, exploring both the technical and emotional aspects of job loss, with a particular focus on women’s experiences in high-profile, high-pressure industries.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Personal Journeys: Getting Fired and the Fashion Magazine World

• How They Met
  • Laura shares her move from Australia to New York just before 9/11 and meeting Kristina at a Marc Jacobs fashion show.
  • Their careers intertwined as they both ascended in the magazine world (06:03).
• Getting Fired: Their Stories
  • Laura’s Layoff: Let go alongside her full team at InStyle during a corporate handover, via Zoom, with 20 minutes’ notice (06:58).
    • Quote: “I got 20 minutes’ notice. And then we were all posting the Zoom and...the printer was closing...” — Laura Brown (07:31)
  • Kristina’s Experience: Fired solo after a leadership change at WSJ Magazine; texted Laura “I’m getting the boot,” and felt overwhelmed by the logistics and emotions of sudden job loss (09:00).
    • Quote: “I was handed this very thick packet...decisions had to be made very quickly...I just couldn’t believe there wasn’t a resource that had all the information I really needed...” — Kristina O’Neill (10:27)
• Industry Context
  • Both recall the skepticism about the internet’s impact, joking about the early dismissals of digital media’s relevance (11:39).

2. Destigmatizing Getting Fired: Creating a New Narrative

• Changing the Conversation
  • Magazine culture fostered secrecy and shame around being let go; people often “created alternative narratives” instead of honesty (13:14).
  • Kristina recounts resisting pressure to present a “spun” story. Quote: “I could not imagine lying...It made them uncomfortable that I wanted to go out there and just sort of say, no, it’s on you too.” — Kristina O’Neill (14:24)
• Ego and Self-Worth
  • Laura stresses recognizing that being fired can coexist with being great at your job; external factors (layoffs, buyouts, changing industry) drive most terminations, not incompetence (14:59).
  • The book’s title itself is an act of rebellion and reframing: “All the Cool Girls Get Fired.”
• Owning Your Story
  • When you name it, you break the shame: “If you carry that around, it’s much harder to have people help you with what comes next.” — Christina O’Neill (16:41)

3. Normalization: “Everyone Gets Fired”

• The hosts had a lighthearted audience poll: nearly everyone in the room had been fired.
  • Quote: “We’re all losers, which is great... No, I’m kidding. So we’re all full. That’s wonderful. Living room. Living lives.” — Christina O’Neill (17:57)

4. The Changing Nature of Work

• Zibby and the authors discuss how the expectation of lifelong employment is outdated; gig work, entrepreneurship, and career pivots are now the norm.
  • Quote: “There are far broader ways to work than that...You can bake cookies on TikTok...The judgment of ‘do you know when’ is changing.” — Laura Brown (18:26)
• On CV gaps and short-term jobs:
  • “Now someone’s got six things going on...certainly more empathy.” — Laura Brown (19:27)

5. Reflecting on Responsibility

• Self-assessment is key after being fired: “Was I the right fit here? Did I do well? Was I unproductive or unhelpful? Did I behave badly?” — Laura Brown (24:03)
• Sometimes it’s about recalibrating values or behavior, but sometimes it’s simply circumstance.

6. How to Fire, with Humanity

• Discussion on the art of letting people go:
  • Poor practices: sudden IT lockouts, abruptness post-COVID (24:54).
  • Best practice: “As much humanity and grace and dignity and as much information as you can legally reveal.” — Christina O’Neill (25:12)
  • Laura recounts advice from a former HR leader: “Shit happens, you can call me.” Empathy is vital, especially when layoffs are systemic (25:48).

7. The Book as a Practical and Emotional Guide

• Combines actionable advice (negotiating severance, healthcare, finding legal help) with real-world stories from high-profile women (27:45).
  • “It was important to have voices whose firings looked very different than ours...investors pushing out founders, client-based firings, etc.” — Christina O’Neill (28:12)
• Notable essay: Oprah’s story appears at the book’s end, showing that early failure can precede astronomical success (27:45).

8. Stories from Other Women

• Katie Couric, Oprah, Lisa Kudrow: Each faced early or unexpected firings, later leading to iconic successes.
  • Example: Lisa Kudrow was fired from Frasier but soon after cast as Phoebe in Friends, a career-defining role (31:06).
  • “You cannot count yourself out. In the moment, it felt 1000% personal, but it didn’t mean she wasn’t good. She just wasn’t right for that one.” — Kristina O’Neill (31:55)

9. Resilience & Long-term Reframing

• Hard to hear when fresh, but often true: “It’s the best thing that could have happened to you.” — Laura Brown (33:01)
• After the shock and logistics, the reckoning can lead to more fulfilling, aligned pursuits.

10. Hope and Community

• Zibby wraps with a metaphor: this is about “being in someone else’s shoes for a minute.”
• Quote: “Sometimes we don’t pause when things are changing so rapidly...But you know what? We’re all in it together and we’re going to ride this out. And that is the message your book really gives — hope and community.” — Zibby Owens (34:23)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Being Let Go Publicly
  • “I could not imagine lying... It made them uncomfortable that I wanted to go out there and just sort of say, no, it’s on you too.” — Kristina O’Neill (14:24)
• On Value and Self-worth
  • “Your value is yours. Your experience is yours.” — Laura Brown (08:25)
• On Women Owning Their Narratives
  • “We can be honest about that. These two things can happen together... The business situation was what it was.” — Laura Brown (15:21)
• On Reframing Firing as Inevitable
  • “Work itself has changed...There are far broader ways to work than that. The judgment is changing.” — Laura Brown (18:26)
• On the Book’s Message
  • “It meant a lot to us...to have different people at different career levels...who reacted very differently. The breadth of experience is really important.” — Christina O’Neill (29:36)
• Resonant Metaphor from Zibby
  • “You’re letting us all be in someone else’s shoes for a minute. Sometimes we don’t pause, but...we’re all in it together.” — Zibby Owens (34:23)
• Summing Up the Message
  • “There is a high five and a half.” — Laura Brown (34:49)

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Important Segment Timestamps

| Segment | Timestamp | |------------------------------------------|-------------| | Laura & Kristina’s first meeting | 06:03 | | Laura’s firing & aftermath | 06:58–09:00 | | Kristina’s firing—HR, legal, logistics | 09:00–10:27 | | Industry changes, internet skepticism | 11:39–12:13 | | On destigmatizing being fired | 13:14–18:03 | | Audience poll: “Who’s been fired?” | 17:39–17:57 | | Changing world of work | 18:03–20:22 | | Self-reflection after being fired | 23:45–24:31 | | On firing with humanity | 24:54–25:48 | | Essay selection in the book—Oprah, etc. | 27:45–29:37 | | Lisa Kudrow story | 31:06–31:55 | | Emotional journey, hope, and community | 33:01–34:55 |

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Tone

Warm, candid, supportive, and practical—peppered with the wit and dry humor characteristic of seasoned editors and book people. The discussion is honest about pain and anxiety, but ultimately hopeful, pragmatic, and inclusive.

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Summary Takeaway

"All the Cool Girls Get Fired" is more than a how-to manual; it’s a movement to reframe getting fired as not an ending, but a sometimes-liberating, always-transformative rite of passage. Laura Brown and Kristina O’Neill, with Zibby Owens guiding the conversation, share wisdom that is empowering, actionable, and full of grace—helping listeners realize: you’re not alone, and the end of a job can be the start of something fresher, braver, and more authentic.

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For more book discussions and author interviews, listen to Totally Booked with Zibby and follow @totallybookedwithzibby.

Transcript

[Zibby Owens]

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[Laura Brown]

Did I talk too much? Can I just let it go?

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[Christina O'Neill]

You're not alone.

[Zibby Owens]

Let's talk about what's going on.

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[Zibby Owens]

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[Christina O'Neill]

Lunch was great, but this traffic is awful.

[Person with Stomach Issues]

Um, can we stop at a bathroom?

[Laura Brown]

Are you alright?

[Person with Stomach Issues]

I keep having stomach issues after eating, like diarrhea, gas and bloating, abdominal pain and sometimes oily stools.

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Creon may increase your chance of fibrosing colonopathy, a rare bowel disorder. Tell your doctor if you have a history of intestinal blockage or scarring or thickening of your bowel wall, if you are allergic to port, or if you have gout, kidney problems or worsening of painful swollen joints. Call your doctor if you have any unusual or severe gastrointestinal symptoms or allergic reactions. Take Creon as directed by your doctor and always with food. Do not chew capsule. Cysts may cause mouth irritation. Other side effects may include blood sugar changes, gas, dizziness, sore throat and cough. These are not all the side effects of Creon. Call 800-63391 or visit creoninfo.com to learn more. That's C R E O N info. Com.

[Person with Stomach Issues]

I'm asking my doctor about EPI and if Creon could help.

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Hey guys, I'm Jenna Bush Hager from the Today show and I'm thrilled to bring you my podcast, Open Book with Jenna. Every week I sit down with fascinating people, authors, celebrities and friends to talk about life and the books that shaped them. If you love great conversations and discovering your next favorite reading, join me on Open Book with Jenna. Listen now wherever you get your podcast.

[Zibby Owens]

Hi, this is Zibby Owens and you're listening to Totally Booked with Zibby. Formerly Moms don't have Time to Read Books in my daily show, I interview today's latest best selling, buzziest or underrated authors and story creators whose work I think is worth your time. As a bookstore owner, publisher, author and obviously podcaster, I get a comprehensive look at everything that's coming out and spend my time curating the best books so you don't have to stay in the know, get insider insights and connect with guests like I do every single day. For more information, go to zibbymedia.com and follow me on Instagram Ibbeowens Laura Brown and Christina O' Neill are co authors of all the Cool Girls get how to Let Go of Being Let Go and Come Back on Top. This was recorded live at Bloomingdale's along with Dr. Harold Koplowitz, who is the head of the Child Mind Institute and founder who introduced the event. Child Mind, Bloomingdale's and Zippy Media partnered on this fantastic event pre holidays, which I hope you can hear. We had some background noise. I hope it doesn't bother you too much, but the conversation was really great. Laura Brown is the Founder of LB Media and the Chair of Red's Creative Council. She sits on the board of Red, the Fashion Trust Us and MeToo movement and foot Soldiers Park Selma. Previously she was Editor in chief of InStyle, executive editor of Harper's Bazaar, and senior editor at Devlut. She earned her BA in Arts and Communication from Charles Stewart University in New South Wales, Australia. She lives in Manhattan with her husband. Christina o' Neill is Head of Sotheby's Media and Editor in Chief of Sotheby's Magazine. Previously she served as Editor in Chief of WSJ, Wall Street Journal Magazine, Executive Editor at Harper's Bazaar, and worked at New York Magazine and Timeout New York. Christina also serves on the board of Swedish fashion brand Totem and is a city Meals ambassador. A graduate of NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study, she serves on the Gallatin Alumni Council. Christina lives in Brooklyn with her family.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Welcome. Thank you so much. This will be an episode of Totally Booked with Zippy, which is a daily author interview podcast. If you haven't listened, please tune in. And there are conversations just like this about 30 minutes or less and we'll chit chat and then you all can ask a few questions and get your book signed and all the good things. And I'm just so excited you're all here. Thank you. And thank you so much to Bloomingdale's for hosting us. Thank you. Okay. All the cool girls get fired.

[Christina O'Neill]

You are obviously cool.

[Laura Brown]

Thank you for this. Validated.

[Christina O'Neill]

You're fired.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

I figured, I mean if you have to put that you're cool on the book cover, like no really, I am so cool. Tell everybody about how you got fired. Let's just like bring you down right away and also maybe explain which one you are and a little more about.

[Laura Brown]

I'm Laura Brown. This is going to be fun for the podcast.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Yeah.

[Laura Brown]

Just checking the roll alert. We actually a bit of backstory on us. We I I moved to New York from Sydney, Australia on September 4, 2001 and was dazzled as one was and ended up at New York Fashion Week on the evening of September 10, 2001. Obviously the night before everything changed for but at that night, on that night I Met 1 Christina O' Neill at the Marc Jacobs fashion show. And so we came up together. She was already working and I was kind of just new here and so we both kind of paralleled each other's experience. We all both had dreamt about working magazines and after this our whole life and we ended up overlapping for seven years, eight years at Hartford Star before Christina went on to become editor in chief WSJ magazine. And four years after that InStyle and then in Dr. Bragg I was fired first.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Thank you.

[Laura Brown]

By myself and my whole team or lay off on us. In one day in February 2022 we had had installed had sort of one of the magazines in that group that had three different go over since 2016. The first one was timing which kind of flamed out pretty fast after we started then it was a company called Merit which is a Des Moines early dude company and then we're bought by Dot dash and got that shared which was the company and lead our scope in February. So yes, it was on zoom.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

And then it was.

[Laura Brown]

I got 20 minutes notice. And then we were all posting the zoom and you know, the printer was closing and so it was. And I remember I back up bit of a backstory more on me at the end of COVID I'd sort of known a little bit that maybe I would want to do magazines forever. And if I was an exorcist, I worked for my inning and. And the economy of magazines was wearing you've got to make Miami. So I registered my own business. And so when we. And I thought, oh, maybe I'll take my leave at the end of 2022. Did not then we're going to get absolutely like as candid in February. And. And I remember after we also hung up the zoom and then we. Even though I'd be not totally focused on like, I remember my managing editor was like, we don't have a budget yet.

[Christina O'Neill]

And I was like, oh, you know.

[Laura Brown]

Didn'T have one to build and get fired anyway. But after we all were kind of laid off, I. I got everybody back on the zoom. I said, just hit that link. There's no HR running anymore. And I remember saying to them some things that have since become spine of the very book you're holding here, which is, was your value is yours, your experience is yours. And with the way that. And being quite stubborn about that. And then I kind of went off and commenced doing my own thing. But then cut to. If you want me to cut to 14 months later, sure.

[Christina O'Neill]

I got fired.

[Laura Brown]

And that was about.

[Christina O'Neill]

I did not have the pleasure of having my entire team wiped out at the same time. I just wanted one. I was singled out. I was called to hr. We had a new sort of context. The Journal had a regime change at the top. We had a new editor in chief of the newspaper, and she started in early February.

[Laura Brown]

And February went by and we didn't have a meeting.

[Christina O'Neill]

March went by. We didn't have a meeting.

[Laura Brown]

And I thought maybe it's just because.

[Christina O'Neill]

We'Re down here being so successful, you know, doing our thing. But lo and behold, when I finally had time with her in late April, the meeting was from her office in seven minutes before it got switched to hr. So I knew my date was sealed. But from that moment under the table in hr, when I was being sort of pushed by packet of paper, I texted Laura and said, you know, I'm getting the boot. She was traveling. So I said, you know, you can. And I think what I realized in the moment was just how much I didn't know about what was about to come, what was happening in real time, you know, whether or not I needed the lawyer. And all the things that were in the packet were just sort of foreign to me. Navigating the American healthcare system is not fun. There are a lot of things that simply overwhelmed me when you're already feeling.

[Laura Brown]

Very kind of vulnerable.

[Christina O'Neill]

Vulnerable and totally out of sorts and all the good things. And then suddenly you're handed this very thick packet of paper with decisions that have to be sort of made, and in many ways they want them made very quickly. So that was sort of where this idea for the book came from. Because, you know, here I am Googling a lot of things, and I just couldn't believe there wasn't a resource that had all the information I really needed in the moment captured in one place.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

And actually, I should say. I should say also, I grew up obsessed with magazines. Did anybody here love magazines? Like, love? I poured over instyles pages like it was crazy. And I worked at Vanity Fair for one summer during college, and we went department to department, and one day we had a whole panel on what's going to happen with this new thing called the Internet. And everyone's like, it's fine. It's not going to bother us. And I was like, okay. And we went right back to work. And I thought right then, like, there's no path from being the intern to being editor in chief or a contributor. And it turns out you all figured it out.

[Laura Brown]

That's funny. You mentioned that. We had. When we were at Harvest Bazaar, we were told we were going to get the Internet, you know, have a website.

[Christina O'Neill]

Yeah. And.

[Laura Brown]

But Harvest Bazaar was going to split. One staff member. Or it's going to have half. Or that. Which half. At that time, I was like, okay, it'll be half. I just throw in Cosmo or whatever it was. That's how it's so crazy. Now we're looking at AI coming down and it's like the Internet was like half.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Well, it was. It was great in the book hearing. Even though you got fired from these jobs, how you came up in these jobs as well, which was very interesting.

[Laura Brown]

When you're hopefully like, especially with a career that you're more of a world fascinates you when you're younger. We're all like, similar ages. And if you can see what our peers here, you know, they were the shiniest things, weren't they? You know, everybody was glamorously. And I think we're grateful that we had that. I think you as in any job you really work with and you do stuff beyond that or understand what it's measured, which she certainly do. I work that. We had that at the time session. We were kind of not.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

I feel like this is the era of destigmatization. Like, we are destigmatizing one thing after another, menopause. Like, we're just, like, clearing the ranks so that people can talk about everything. And this is the official destigmatization of being fired. Like, that is what this book is. It is a manual. It is a rallying cry. It is, like, the definitive throwdown. Talk a little bit about this and how it is not just a book, but this is really a movement.

[Christina O'Neill]

Yeah. I mean, when we got fired working in fashion, it's obviously tip of the spear, shiny. Like, it is a very superficial industry, and you are judged on literally where you sit at a fashion show. So we grew up in an industry when people would read their role, they lied about it. Like, there was, you know, they would obfuscate. They would create sort of alternative narratives around why they were hurting. No one ever walked out the door and said, I just got fired. So when it happened to us, I mean, you know, obviously now it's been three years. But at the time, I couldn't imagine. And my boss did say to me in the meeting, she sighed, we'll follow your narrative. And I knew that was the opening where I could have gone home and come back the next day and said, okay, I got it. I'm gonna launch KO Media, and we're gonna pretend like I've been thinking about this for months and whatever. I could not imagine lying.

[Laura Brown]

Like, I just.

[Christina O'Neill]

I'm not a liar. Like, you know, I would be walking around with a heat bash from carrying.

[Laura Brown]

This sort of boat burst forward.

[Christina O'Neill]

So in that moment, I knew for me personally, I had to own it. But I could tell it made them uncomfortable that I wanted to go out there and just sort of say, no, it's on you too. Like, you guys are gonna have to own that you're making this decision. And I think that just gave us the courage to tell our. If we can't lie to ourselves and our friends and our family, there's no version. Like, what do I gain by lying to a bunch of, like, blank people out in our industry? So that was really important to. To me personally, that I didn't have to carry a lie forward.

[Laura Brown]

I think also ego. Like, in a way that we knew our world, we right at our jobs, we got fired. These two things can coexist. And so it wasn't like, oh, it's terrible. We weren't embezzling. See, she always says that. So I feel like she was the.

[Christina O'Neill]

If you work with the terminal, you're pretty sweet. Yeah, exactly.

[Laura Brown]

But no, we, you know, these two things can happen together and we can be honest about that. And then it's actually no reflection on our abilities that the business situation was what it was when we look where we are, 20, 25, with all the, you know, the Trump administration, whole government department, you know, AI, all the stuff that what it could just cause in this absolute blade in layoffs. Why are you going to sit there and go, it's my fault? You know what I mean? Because 95 of the time this is happening, people are probably good for shops too. And so it was even just sort of taking that quite stubborn stance, you know, and taking a funny term. Like we took this trope, tired old trope, which is a magazine trope, which.

[Christina O'Neill]

Is all the cool growers, you know.

[Laura Brown]

Ray Beef King, all the cool girls, though, the chest drop, whole girls, you know, at this, the invite, whatever it is. I said, all the cool girls get fired. And just immediately we're like, let's upturn this. And then you see people just. Even the title kind of fly up. And when we meet women out who come up to us very well, we see the glass of our hospital right now. The myriad women of Compass that I've been. I get them like a high five, which is so cool. And your entire disposition and it's just like it is. So much of it is like the shade and that you carry within yourself at Melanie.

[Christina O'Neill]

And if you carry that around, it's much harder to have people help you.

[Laura Brown]

With what comes next.

[Christina O'Neill]

If you are sort of, you know, pretending like it didn't happen the way it actually did, you know, creating these sort of false. You know, I think it is much harder to know that someone's going to cruise something. They're not talking about it. Right? I mean, but I think we found it by owning it. You immediately unlock it. You have the conversation. It's out in the open, there's no pretense. And you're able to say, like, okay, let's talk. We don't need to talk Crafts. What do you want to do now? What do you want to do now? How can I help you? And people are doing it every other crap. Both hands might help them along. So, you know, we're positive or not, you know, we don't love the idea of people Sort of following the shame of it.

[Laura Brown]

I think it's really hard enough to.

[Christina O'Neill]

Put it out there up and the sooner you sort of are able to get on with it, like a lot.

[Laura Brown]

Of good come from that.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

How many people here have been fired from one job? Or okay, Has anyone here not been fired?

[Laura Brown]

One person.

[Christina O'Neill]

You're hired.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. So we're all losers, which is great.

[Christina O'Neill]

We're all full. No, I'm kidding. So we're all full. That's wonderful. Living room. Living lives.

[Laura Brown]

Just have the stage, right?

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Well, being fired, I mean the notion that people have the same jobs forever is just gone. Like everything has changed every day that companies change, priorities change. How can this not happen? This is like a necessary byproduct. So instead of, I feel like part of the issue is the positioning of a job to begin with. Like you might not be here forever.

[Laura Brown]

Yeah, the job itself will change. And you know, it's, it's funny because we sort of joke, we sort of say, oh we're lean out over here. Shel Sandro, represent. And at that time it was very much how do you succeed within a corporate structure and how women support each other to do that and how can you basically. But since that time years ago, work itself has changed. You know the corner office, which is corporate, you know, workplace is actually a male structure. Know corporate titles are, are military titles. They'll chief this, chief that, chief this. So you know, we had to longer to get to that, to that place. Which is why sometimes when you fall from that round, it's harder. But what we have at our fingertips now is far broader ways to work than that. Oh, I'm not successful in myself yet. That tiger does. You can exist, you can, you can work part time, you can do gig based stuff, you can bake cookies on TikTok. They do all of these different ways to exist and make money than sort of judgment of like do you know when real probably coming up there was like oh, if on a resume, if someone had like a job before two years it was like and now someone's got six things going on. I don't want to change judgment too and certainly more empathy. So if you allow yourself do see that. And most of us have financial imperators and we've got to take a job as soon as possible or whatever. But there's a kernel in your brain always that can maybe just take a tiniest point to go, okay, what is out there for me that I what was there something about the ritual of.

[Christina O'Neill]

His life for this job that I.

[Laura Brown]

Didn'T, I didn't like and I I would like to leave behind. And there's something else I might want to explore. And again, it may not be where you can earn a price every day might not be that bite is not a T, even though we'd love it if it was. But there is all these avenues open to you that at that day, like the corporate corner office stuff sounds like Mad Men.

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[Podcast Host/Moderator]

But how do you know when there's actually stuff you need to work on?

[Christina O'Neill]

Oh well, I mean it's one thing.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

To say like we're all cool for being fired, right? But maybe some people are being fired because there's something they're doing that it's like not the best.

[BetterHelp Ad Voice]

I don't know.

[Christina O'Neill]

Yeah, no, it's the courts.

[Laura Brown]

You need to sit with yourself and understand why. But it is in a way a lot of those questions. Was I the right fit here? Did I do well here? Was that resentful here? Wasn't there worse stuff? Was I unproductive and unhelpful because did I behave badly? All those things are still kind of a behavioral recalibration, I guess, or a value for calibration. And. And sometimes you're shocked into having to think about it. You ain't no bad things a lot.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Has anyone in here ever had to fire someone else? Yeah. So that's another layer to this. Is there a good way to fire someone? Like what can all the people. Because this is a two way street. How can managers do a better job letting people go and not leaving people in the dust feeling shame? Because I feel part of it is on them.

[Christina O'Neill]

Yeah. I mean one thing that I think we've seen a lot of in the sort of post Covid era Is the email being turned off in the middle of firing so people come out in the meeting and then suddenly they're locked out of their computers and they're being drop by side A little drain I think.

[Laura Brown]

A if they're being fired for.

[Christina O'Neill]

Us it's obviously very different. And hey probably there is a research loss I think you know if you can do it with as much humanity and grace and dignity and give as much information as you can that you're legally able to reveal. You know I think in my case I got the old we're going in a different direction you know but fair enough like they're never going to tell you maybe the entire laundry list of reasons that they're going in that direction but it. It's enough to just make you sort of feel like okay like this is not. I'm not the fit for what her vision is going forward and I'm gonna have to do okay with that.

[Laura Brown]

I would disagree but we have had some tapes RCMP or let's imagine that a chap called Bahihidi moved me forever and she's found carnia she was the one that actually said moving for more shame but it's taken the semiclomer and we've learned a lot from her. She's very straightforward very athletic kind of a bit shit happens and you can call me and I think just and especially if it's something that is bigger than you to remind people if that you know so them not seeing and then taking on that burden on themselves and especially when we are in Taylor's with layoffs era but you know what I mean there is no that's going on and sometimes it is a decision that is you know is this guy or is a lion I said try to not even They've got to keep a this isn't the front I I empathize with HRS too because they've got to keep to the script it's so you've got to be so caretaker so to relay that within that script is a real I wonder how people would.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Feel if you laid them off but gave them a copy of your book.

[Christina O'Neill]

No to HRS across America we are happy for both sides.

[Laura Brown]

No one wants to admit that that would be useful but actually if you do give someone a handbook or some set of tools. Yeah in that moment when they are be alive. Yeah. You know we actually had speaking of like child mind everything we had a when he runs an organization who college students to work and she came to one of our assignees Nellie and she said, oh, my God, I could give this to 700,000 college students on our roster to make them understand it's going to happen at some point and it's not visual and you can check yourself. And so that sort of thinking as well, getting younger folks early and just making them understand it's part of the rhythm of work and change to work then and not to take it on as many of us maybe have more generation of that.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

So the book is the nuts and bolts that you need and the manual and the guidebook. But also there are stories from so many amazing women scattered throughout, which I feel like if I had an essay from Oprah, I would probably put it on the COVID of my book. Like, I didn't even know she was like, the last essay, I'm like, I'm glad I read to the ems, because this is like the best essay in the whole book.

[Laura Brown]

We were building up. But we'll sign up Everest.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Yeah, exactly.

[Christina O'Neill]

Yeah. So we interviewed 15 women who are, you know, high profile now, but weren't at the time of their firing. Not necessarily. Katie Kirk was high profile, but Oprah was very early in her career. She was around 23 years old when she was fired from the network. And it was really important to us because a. We wanted a sort of, you know, an assortment of voices whose firings look very different than ours. And to have those examples, to not like, I got corporately fired, I got past the paperwork, HR executives were sitting in the room, et cetera. But a lot of people get fired in very different ways now. Some of them take on investors who then push them out. Some of them are fired by clients, and maybe not the people who pay their overhead, but they're fired because the client relationship has run its course. So it was really important us have representation of different types of stories and to understand, you know, our stories are one version of this. But it. It meant a lot to us, I think, to have different people at different career levels in their career, different financial and economic situations, and, you know, who reacted very differently. You know, some people could not get a box for many days. And then other people just sort of thought this, like, I've been waiting for this. I can't wait to get on to what's next. So, you know, I think that breadth of experience is really important because you recognize ours is one side of it.

[Laura Brown]

And obviously, if you have more doors, you have time and all of those things, but the feeling of getting fired is the same. And the feeling is like, shit. Yeah. You know, and it Is that. Is that it? Is that, is that feeling of being on the couch and why all these women who now are now extremely successful choose them deliberately as well, because, number one, they will evoke you. They weren't his fancy pants, you know, when they, when they would fire them. Two, when you were there crying on the couch, you can maybe like, fire up dreams a bit. This lady Oprah joking as though she's walking around Maui with a veggie basket. You know what I mean? Like, she was embarrassed and she was from. She didn't want to be my tell her dad and all that kind of stuff. So, no, it's a real. There's a real grip that experience there and divided up very clearly into what happened, what next. You know, it is very clean.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

I do feel there's a very clear through line to most the women who shared their stories, including both of you, which is it felt like the worst thing that could ever possibly happen. And yet it led to something usually better. Or it led. It might not be obvious, but had they had Oprah not been fired from that terrible job where her bosses were so, so horrific to her and asked her to get, like, plastic surgery, I mean, it's really bad. I mean, if you read one thing. No, no. But then she might not have been. Oh, she might not have become Oprah.

[Christina O'Neill]

Same with Lisa Kudrow. I mean, when we see some of the actresses in the book, you know, we had the benefit of, you know, Laura and 20 other people got fired when Lisa Kudrowed. They seem like an actress getting fired is an actress getting fired. That is the person who's doing the job being let go. And her story, I think such a great example because she was fired by Jimmy Burrows on Frasier. She was cast. They had done the first table read. She thought her life was set. And they did the reading and they were like, you're not Ross. But out she is kicked to the curb. And she literally thought her career was over. I task my big moments, my breakthrough. And lo and behold, you know, she heard about friends being kind of shopped around. She got an audition, walks into the room, guess who's doing the casting? Jimmy Burrows.

[Laura Brown]

And he hired her for Friends.

[Christina O'Neill]

So, you know, I think you have to play the long game. You can't count yourself out. You have to understand that in that moment, of course, it felt 1000% personal for her, but it didn't mean she wasn't good at her job. It just meant she wasn't right for that one.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

And you say in the book by the way, that I did not know. Maybe you all didn't know this, that the character of Phoebe Buffet was actually the twin sister of.

[Christina O'Neill]

Of another girl.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

You all knew this except me. Yeah, I was not mad about you.

[Person with Stomach Issues]

Okay.

[Laura Brown]

All right, all right.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Well, if there's one other person in the world like me now, you know.

[Laura Brown]

It can serve as a useful reminder. I think I buried it somewhere. Oh, that's fine. Yeah. You know, sometimes it can't be that simple.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Well, I do think that as I'm getting older, the universe works in all these weird ways. And sometimes you can want something so badly and you want it to happen at a certain time, or you want a job to continue, or you want to get this job, or you want this, or a kid at this age or whatever it is, and, like, it just doesn't happen. And maybe there's a reason, maybe it's just terrible.

[Laura Brown]

But if we all.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

If there's a reason and something good comes later, maybe then we can reframe the terribleness of it all.

[Laura Brown]

We always laugh, like when. When you've just gotten fired and someone says to you the best thing, don't.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Say it at the beginning, right in the face.

[Laura Brown]

You know, but more often than not, they are. They are right. You know, it just takes. You know, honestly, you have to, like.

[Christina O'Neill]

Grieve it and process it and go through the stuff. I mean, the book, obviously, the first, you know, six chapters are the, like, crummy stuff, right? Like, do you need a lawyer? Navigating healthcare, you know, figuring out all the sort of, like, immediate, urgent things.

[Laura Brown]

But then the second half of the.

[Christina O'Neill]

Book is like, how do you get back in the workforce? Like, how do you position yourself? How do you write a LinkedIn bio that now includes a gap? You know, And I think there are things and a lot of lessons that come from that time. And not everyone is given, like Laura said, more resources, more time. But if you are given a chance to sort of, you know, sit and reflect and really kind of like, plug into what you did like and didn't like about that job, it will set you on a path that in 95% of the cases, more positive.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

We're going to go to questions in a minute, but I have to say, I think it is so fitting we are in this beautiful new shoe department at Bloomingdale to have this conversation, because what you're doing is letting us all be in someone else's shoes for a minute. We are both.

[Christina O'Neill]

Oh, my God, no, I know.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Going for the greatest. No, no, but seriously, Because I think sometimes we don't pause when things are changing so rapidly in society like they are now. Just to say, like, you know what? This is not so easy that we don't know what our company is going to do and there is this instability and lack of control. But you know what? We're all in it together and we're going to ride this out. And that is the message I think your book really gives is one of hope.

[Christina O'Neill]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

And community. So thank you for that.

[Laura Brown]

Thank you. There is a high five and a half.

[Christina O'Neill]

Awesome.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Now you can get lots of shoes. Okay, that's the end of the podcast portion of the event. So thank you so much for coming on the podcast.

[Zibby Owens]

Thank you for listening to Totally Booked with Zibby, formerly Moms don't have Time to Read Books. If you loved the show, tell a friend, leave a review, follow me on Instagram ibbyowens and Spread the Word. Thanks so much. Oh, and buy the books.

[Podcast Host/Moderator]

Lunch was great, but this traffic is awful.

[Person with Stomach Issues]

Um, can we stop at a bathroom?

[BetterHelp Ad Voice]

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[Person with Stomach Issues]

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[Person with Stomach Issues]

About EPI and if Creon could help.

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