Build the On-Ramp Before You Need the Off-Ramp

The email hit inboxes in the early afternoon, and the newsroom immediately started buzzing.

The company was offering voluntary buyouts. You could feel the energy in the room shift.

I even remember hearing someone yell, "This won't help morale!"

Yikes.

Journalism had been changing for years by that point. Budgets tightening, expectations rising, fewer seats filled. But moments like that bring something out into the open. They make it harder to pretend things are stable when they aren't.

And I think a lot of professionals — not just journalists — eventually find themselves in a moment like that.

Many professionals stay emotionally committed to versions of industries that no longer exist. That realization feels unsettling, especially if the work you do isn't just a paycheck, but part of your identity.

Running the Quiet Experiment

A couple of weeks after that buyout email, I went to an open house for prospective coaches after work one evening.

I remember feeling both excited and nervous walking in. Personal development had interested me for years. I'd worked with a coach before, helping me think differently about nutrition. I could start to see how helping people navigate change and transformation might fit me naturally.

But I also remember hoping I wouldn't run into coworkers there.

That's the part people don't always talk about with career pivots and reinventions. Before anything changes publicly, there's usually a quieter phase first, where you're privately trying on a different version of yourself, while still working to make sense of it.

Eventually I found a program that let me earn a coaching certification online while still working full-time. So I started taking classes after work. Working with practice clients. Reading more. Exploring.

And the whole time, this question kept nagging at me:

Who am I if I'm no longer only this?

The Question Underneath Every Career Transition

That's what happens when you spend decades in a profession, especially a mission-driven one. Journalism was more than a job to me. It was community, identity, craft, and purpose. I'd wanted to be a journalist since I was a kid, when journalism was the first merit badge I earned in the Boy Scouts.

So when I started exploring coaching, part of me felt like I was betraying the craft. Not the industry, but the craft. The version of myself who said that this was the work.

There's a particular fear rumbling underneath all of this that we don't often name: the fear of becoming unrecognizable to yourself.

If you've been a teacher for twenty years, or a nurse, or an attorney, or a pastor, your work isn't a role you play. It's a self you've built. And starting to imagine something else can feel like a kind of infidelity to that self.

Here's what eventually helped me:

I wasn't abandoning journalism. I was expanding my life beyond a single professional identity.

That distinction matters. You're not erasing who you've been; you're making room for who you're still becoming.

Seeing the Contraction Before the Crisis

I could already see where the industry was headed. And I knew I didn’t want to spend the rest of my working life bouncing from newsroom to newsroom, working more and more, and making less and less.

What looked like bitterness from the outside was just internal recognition. Sometimes we know things before we fully admit them to ourselves.

This is where bravery comes in. Not the dramatic, movie-scene kind. Just the quieter version — the kind that lets you acknowledge reality before your circumstances force you to.

I saw a crisis coming, and rather than get run over by it, I started building something. Quietly. Imperfectly. Slowly.

And I'm glad I did. Because if I had waited until the actual crisis arrived, my options would have started feeling smaller, and fear would have been making decisions for me.

Panic vs. Preparation

Panic and preparation are not the same thing.

Panic reacts after impact. Preparation creates a runway before it.

Panic narrows your choices. Preparation widens them.

As the kids say, if you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready.

Build the On-Ramp Before You Need the Off-Ramp

Most people think career change happens all at once. A resignation letter, a layoff, or a dramatic leap.

But more often, the real transition starts much earlier, and much quieter. It can be a class after work. A conversation with a close friend. A new skill. Or, a growing realization that you may need a life that’s wider than the one you currently have.

That's your on-ramp.

The off-ramp is what you're quietly moving away from, even if you haven't named it yet. For me, it was the slow contraction — working more for less, watching the ground get shakier under a craft I loved. For someone else it might be burnout, or the quiet dread of a Sunday night. You just have to be honest that something is no longer working.

The on-ramp is what you're building in the background. It’s not a finished new identity. Just the small, unglamorous moves: a skill you don't yet need, a relationship outside your résumé, a little financial breathing room, permission to imagine.

A real on-ramp runs parallel to the road you're already on. You don't have to take the exit yet. But you're just no longer stuck going in one direction.

So here's a question worth thinking about: What does your quiet on-ramp look like right now? And if the honest answer is I don't have one, what's the smallest first piece you could start building this month?

"The Bullet Has Already Been Fired"

Years before any of this, I had lunch with a mentor and friend who worked in HR. He understood corporate systems inside and out. And he said something I've never forgotten:

"The bullet has already been fired from the gun."

Not subtle imagery. But to this day, it sticks like glue.

What he meant was simple: many career decisions are already in motion before employees emotionally accept reality. Layoffs, restructuring, budget cuts. By the time most people fully process what's happening, the machinery has already been moving for a while.

That's not a reason to be paranoid or cynical. It's a reason to stay awake enough to play an active, robust role in your own future.

Stay Connected to Yourself While the Weather Changes

You’re not going to be able to predict every storm, but the challenge is to stay connected with yourself as the weather inevitably changes.

Preparation doesn't mean you've failed. Or quit. Or betrayed the work you once loved. Sometimes it simply means you're paying attention to what’s happening.

What this whole thing is really about, underneath everything: reclaiming authorship of your career before your circumstances force a long, difficult rewrite.

I wasn't fearless during that period of my life. Not even close. I was scared, conflicted, uncertain…and started building anyway.

What does your on-ramp look like right now? Hit reply and let me know — I'd love to hear what you're quietly building.

I’m Richard Taliaferro. I’m a certified career coach specializing in helping mid-stage professionals gain clarity on their career journey. I’ve written a guide on how to escape the work hamster wheel. Click here to download yours.