5. Career Truths From High-Profile Women Who Have Been Fired

In Part 4.1 of Inside the Cool Girls Club, we sat with the first four truths from the women in All the Cool Girls Get Fired:

• It is not all about you, but you still need to look in the mirror.

• Loss begets growth, if you give yourself time to grieve.

• This is your moment to be a lifelong learner, not a panic applicant.

• “What went wrong?” is a better question than “What did I do wrong?”

That was about understanding what really happened.

In this part, we move to a different question:

If this door has closed, what does that free you up to do next?

Here are three more truths that surface again and again in these stories:

• Sometimes you stayed too long, and life ended it for you.

• Their “loss” can become your liberation.

• The sooner you own your firing story, the sooner it stops owning you.

Let’s go back inside the Cool Girls Club and see what these women have to say about what comes after the firing.

Truth 5: Did You Stay Too Long?

The Missoni sisters add an uncomfortable — but honest — layer to this conversation.

They talk about how sometimes we do not have the courage, or the financial room, to leave something that no longer fits. So life steps in and does it for us. A role we would never have walked away from on our own is suddenly gone.

Margherita Missoni also reflects on what her firing meant for her children. They watched her fall, and then they watched her get back up. The lesson was not “my mother never failed.” It was “you can come out of it.”

Swan Chapter take

This is another chance to walk the talk with your kids — or with anyone younger who is paying attention.

Most of us have told the next generation some version of:

• “Follow your own path.”

• “Do not stay where you are not valued.”

• “You are more than your job.”

  
  

This is where they see what that looks like in real life. Not the polished version, but the honest one:

• You were let go.

• You grieved.

• You reflected.

• You made different choices.

The Missoni sisters — and Oprah as well — return to a similar image: life closes one door so another can exist at all. Oprah talks about the “bounce back” being just as dramatic as the firing, only in a better way. The setback becomes the setup. It arrived to point you toward something more aligned.

It feels like rejection because it is rejection. But it is also information.

The question is not, “How do I get that exact door back?”

It is:

What new door is this making space for — and am I willing to walk through it?

Truth 6: Their Loss Can Be Your Liberation

One of the most powerful arcs in the book is the story of Jennifer O’Connell and Rebecca Quinn.

Both were laid off from HBO around the same time. Both were nearing 50. Instead of treating that moment as an ending, they treated it as permission. Together, they started Velvet Hammer Media.

The energy is not “please take me back.” It is:

“What a loss for you. We are building something else.”

There is a line they use that stays with me: “Welcome to the club. The water is warm here.”

This is not forced optimism. It is a reframe. Leaving — or being pushed out of — a powerful brand is not only a fall from grace. It can be a return to agency.

Swan Chapter take

Not everyone is meant to start a company after a firing. That is not the only valid outcome.

But the core truth still holds:

• Being let go does not mean you now have to aim smaller.

• It may mean you finally give yourself permission to aim truer.

• “Control of your own destiny” is not just about entrepreneurship — it is about how you choose your next commitments, your boundaries, and your pace.

If this were your “my turn” moment, what would that look like now — in this season of your life, with everything you know?

Truth 7: Own Your Firing So It Does Not Own You

Sallie Krawcheck, fired twice from highly visible leadership roles, is blunt about this:

Own your firing.

Do not:

• Invent a softer story you do not believe.

• Hide behind vague language forever.

• Treat it like a stain you need to scrub away.

She also offers a strangely freeing reminder: most people care far less than you think.

Yes, people notice when it happens. Yes, there may be a moment of curiosity. And then they return to their own lives, their own stress, their own work.

You are the one left replaying the story.

Swan Chapter take

Owning your firing does not mean oversharing. It means:

• You are honest with yourself about what happened.

• You develop one clear, grounded way to explain it when necessary.

• You stop organizing your identity around other people’s brief reactions.

Most people are not tracking your career as closely as you imagine. They are focused on surviving their own.

So let it go.

Not the lessons. Not the clarity. But the belief that this moment defines you.

Bringing It Back to You

You do not need to remember who said what.

What matters is the pattern:

• The world is changing, and while it is not all about you, your growth still matters.

• Loss can become growth if you give yourself time to mourn and reflect.

• This can be a moment to invest in yourself, not just scramble for the next role.

• Asking “what went wrong?” opens more truth than endlessly asking “what did I do wrong?”

• If you stayed too long, this may be the only way that door was ever going to close.

• Being let go can lead to something that fits you better — not just something smaller.

• The sooner you own your firing story, the sooner it releases its grip on you.

You are not reading these stories as inspiration porn. You are reading them as evidence.

If they could survive it, learn from it, and build again at 50 — from public roles, at the very top — then so can you.

Swan Chapter note

Being fired is brutal. Feel it. Do not dramatize it, and do not minimize it. Own your story, own your part, and then get to work. Reflect. Learn. Invest in yourself.

This is not about rushing into any job that will have you. It is about using the shock as a clean break from what was no longer working — and a starting line for the chapter you actually want.

You are not done. You are between chapters.