Who says losing your job has to be a bad experience? I don’t mean to be glib about it because I know personally that getting laid off or let go can be a very unpleasant surprise. However, I also know many people who have turned job losses into positive career changes and/or  profitable new business ventures.

I recently shared my views on this subject with a CNN.com reporter for the article Make Getting Fired Work for You. My bit is near the end (under the subhead ‘It’s OK to be happy about it").

The article also provide some other interesting insights. One tip is to thoroughly analyze why the job loss happened. While I agree that it’s generally useful to reflect on what you can learn from an experience,  I also think it’s important to make a distinction between getting fired and getting laid off. If you’ve been let go for performance issues, then it certainly makes sense to think about how you can avoid making the same mistakes in the future. However, when it comes to trying to understand the reasons for getting downsized, you can drive yourself crazy trying to figure out what you did to "deserve" it. In most cases, it absolutely was not you, it was them. You’d be better off using your analytical skills and your valuable time to figure out your next career move.