You are looking for a new job. You're qualified. You're experienced. You're doing everything right — and nothing is moving. Instead, you are spinning in applications, silence, and rejection. In this fifth episode of the What Now series, I walk you through what isn’t working and what you need to do instead of move past Ghost Jobs and into a new career phase.

If you've been applying to hundreds of roles and not landing that job, you're not failing. You're navigating a system full of ghost jobs — postings that exist for data mining, salary research, compliance requirements, or optics, not actual hiring.

Right now the traditional online application process is statistically the lowest-probability path to getting hired, and it's quietly eroding your confidence, your identity, and your energy. Listen to this episode to fix it.

The Solution: The Build Your Brave Framework

1. Clarity: Stop applying harder and start getting clearer. Define what you're no longer available for, what energizes you, and what life you're building. Clarity moves you out of the spiral and into strategic momentum.
2. Momentum: Shift from mass applying to real conversations. Reconnect with former colleagues, attend events that genuinely interest you, and identify companies you're authentically curious about. Build relationships from a place of who you are — not desperation.
3. Accountability: You don't have to do this alone. Having a partner who provides insight, coaching, and governance changes everything. Anna applied to 180 jobs over four months with minimal results. Within four months of working through this framework, she landed a leadership role — better pay, healthier culture — that was never publicly posted.

Your next career phase is possible. Real opportunities exist. You just need a smarter, braver strategy to find them.

If you are ready to change your career growth strategy from what doesn’t work anymore into what does work, specifically for you, click here to start working together through 1:1 career coaching with me.

Connect with Me:

You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:
Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Are you experienced, doing your job well & delivering results, and still waiting for the lay-off to smack down? You're not overreacting. You're paying attention. In this fourth episode of the What Now series, I walk you through how to stop the default response to overwork and how to reduce the fear and step back into control.

I share how one client went from overworking, stressed to the max, and poorly leading her team due to lay-off fear to becoming a trusted leader, with personal and financial calm, who navigated the dreaded lay-off with inner power.

Specific I show you how to use the Build Your Brave Career Framework:

1. Clarity — includes three clear questions, including the scenario you're afraid of:What do I actually want in the next 12 months? What would I do in the first 30/60/90 days if laid off? What am I tolerating because I'm afraid?

2. Momentum — stop panic productivity and shift into real aligned momentum of both feelings and actions.

3. Accountability — decide who you're becoming specifically in terms of lay-off anxiety.

You are anxious about lay-off because you are paying attention. Lay-off or not, you can be in charge. Click here to start working together to take control of the lay-off fears through 1:1 career coaching with me.

Connect with Me:
You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:
Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Did you get passed over in your career and you're ready to fix it so your work get the title and salary it deserves? In this third episode of the What Now series, I walk you through how to fix getting passed over and turn into into career leap.

I share how one client went from a decade of being passed over to a role two levels up in less than four months at the same company, rooted in the Build Your Brave Career Framework.

Specifically, I show you:

1. Clarity — Have the uncomfortable conversation with your manager. Ask what led to the decision, then listen. If you hear "maybe in six months," "keep going, we believe in you," or a "well, actually" reframe — that's your clarity. Growth isn't coming here.
2. Momentum — Process the disappointment and grief, but don't stop there. Take intentional action: shift your narrative, close a gap you actually want to close, or start exploring what's next.
3. Accountability — Ask: Who have I been, and who do I want to become? Design clean, simple statements and become them in your daily choices.

Getting passed over happens. Staying passed over is a choice. This episode is your sign to make a very different choice. Click here to start working together to solve your career confusion through 1:1 career coaching with me.

Connect with Me:
You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:

Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Are you exhausted — not just tired, not in need of a nap, just exhausted? In this second episode of the What Now series, I walk you through why career exhaustion happens and how to use the Build Your Brave Career Framework to move forward.

I share client examples and concrete suggestions.

Specifically, I show you:

1. Clarity — Start with honesty. What's exhausting me? Who's stealing my energy? What am I no longer willing to tolerate?
2. Momentum — Feel your way forward, not just execute. Establish clear boundaries as you feel your feelings, one brave shift at a time.
3. Accountability — Choose who you want to become and stop waiting for anyone else to become her.

Career exhaustion is not permanent. It's a sign that you are ready to grow.

If you've been silently asking "what now?" this episode is your sign to take the next brave step. Click here to start working together to solve your career confusion through 1:1 career coaching with me.

Connect with Me:
You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:

Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Are you feeling confused about your career, but you are not quite in crisis? You're not alone and you're not stuck. In this first episode of the What Now series, I reframe career confusion and give you a simple way to solve your career confusion.

I share a client's process of moving from confused and stuck to energized and thriving, rooted in the Build Your Brave Career Framework.

Specifically, I show you:

1. Clarity — Stop asking the same big, vague questions so that you start telling yourself the truth about what you actually want.
2. Momentum — Commit to small, intentional actions that build the confidence and the direction you need to ensure your confusion.
3. Accountability — Decide who you're becoming and grow into your future you through self-concept and mindset design.

If you've been silently asking "what now?" this episode is your sign to take the next brave step. Click here to start working together to solve your career confusion through 1:1 career coaching with me.

Connect with Me:
You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:

Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Listen, this episode might sting a little—and that's exactly the point. If you're a woman in tech who treats feedback like a personal attack instead of career fuel, I'm talking directly to you.

I've watched with horror as more women have become timid about giving feedback and defensive about receiving it. This pattern is quietly cutting your career growth at the knees while multiplying your stress.

Here's what I know: You wouldn't coddle your code, your product, or your project when it needs iteration. So why are you being so precious about feedback on your own performance?

In this episode, I'm drawing a hard line between toxic workplace BS (which is NOT what we're discussing) and the constructive, developmental, growth-oriented feedback that is actual career generosity. The kind you need to actively seek out, receive with curiosity, and use strategically.

Here's what I cover:

• Why feedback is the accelerated growth engine in tech—and why your career needs the same iterative approach as your code
• The brutal truth about how women are held to higher performance standards (backed by research since the 1970s)
• Why your defensiveness is far more damaging than the original feedback ever was
• How leaders are watching for your response to feedback—not your perfection
• Why you must stop optimizing for likability and start optimizing for clarity and effectiveness
• The mindset shift that changes everything: feedback is data, not identity
• Concrete examples of professional feedback versus unhelpful criticism
• Why avoiding giving feedback makes you unclear and untrustworthy (not nice)

I also share real feedback my clients recently received and how they made it mean something totally different than what was actually said.

The women who enjoy their careers and reach their goals aren't the ones who never get criticism. They're the ones who are seen improving over time—in line with their values, purpose, and boundaries.

Bravery isn't just about bold moves. It's about sitting still in a moment of critique and choosing your growth instead of your ego.

Your Next Steps:

1. Separate the feedback from what your brain tells you.
2. Make feedback a monthly habit.
3. Seek feedback from your critics.
4. Give yourself 24 hours.
5. Stop optimizing for likability.

Related Episodes

• Importance of Specific Feedback in Career Growth
• Aggressive or Just Direct? Navigating Feedback as a Woman in Tech
• E85: How to Deal with Unspecific Career Feedback to Build Your Skills, Relationships, Career, and Salary

Connect with Me:
You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:

Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Listen in as I respond to the generous and conflicting feedback that you sent about my last episode, "Bravery in the Meantime." Your feedback was the full range responses—positive, relieved, dismissive, and angry. I share your feedback and also offer my own thoughts on what comes next for us all.

What You'll Hear:

• Four buckets of listener feedback, from validating to challenging
• My vulnerable response to criticism about privilege, systemic change, and individual coping
• An invitation: What can Nicole create to support you in building your brave career?

Key Takeaway:
What you want to reject because it threatens you might be exactly what you need to work on right now.

Mentioned in This Episode:

• Previous episode: "Bravery in the Meantime: How to Use a Tough Career Phase for Long-Term Success"
• Past episodes: "The Glass Floor" and "Recognizing Toxic Career Surroundings"

Connect with Nicole:
You can be a woman in tech and enjoy your career. When you build the skill of bravery, you will stress less, work less, and then earn more. Check out the following resources designed to help you thrive in your career:

Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn

Building your brave career isn't always about leaping, insisting, disrupting. Sometimes it means staying with intention using. This moment to calm your nervous system, build your skills and inner strength, enhance your financial safety and deepen your real life, your hobbies and your interests, and the most important relationships.

Building your brave career is sometimes about bravery in the meantime.

Listen to this episode for concrete examples of how to use a difficult career phase to build your long-term career without stressing out, burning out, or limiting your goals.

More Links:
Check out my website

Join my mailing list for more insights, opportunities, and inspiration

Connection with me on LinkedIn