The System Was Built to Break Us
Throughout her two decades in the workforce and as a coach for women navigating midlife transitions, Jess has seen firsthand how workplaces in late stage capitalism are designed to extract everything from employees while offering little in return. The system is designed to take advantage of our core human need to feel worthy and we are conditioned to hustle, grind, and find our enoughness through achievement. “Feeling worthy is a core human need,” she said. “But when our worth is tied to praise, money, and status, we end up sacrificing ourselves just to feel like we have value.” As Brené Brown says, women are especially taught to seek worthiness by pleasing, perfecting, and proving. And this is the precise recipe for burnout.
Jess learned this lesson the hard way. Twice.
The Nonprofit That Broke Her Spirit
Jess had always wanted to lead a team. When she landed a role at a nonprofit, she was excited to step into her first real leadership position. She had no idea what she was walking into.
“The Executive Director quit within a couple of months,” Jess said. “Then my boss left, too. No one trained me. No one trained the people before me. It was chaos.”
The HR team, stationed at the headquarters in a different state, fed Jess all the wrong advice. “They wanted me to build files against my team, not build trust with them. They told me to document everything. Have a conversation, then send an email summarizing it.”
Jess’s team, meanwhile, wanted clarity on what they were supposed to be doing. “I couldn’t give them answers,” Jess admitted. “Because no one had given me answers.” Frustrated, her team vented to others in the office. Soon, rumors spread. “They thought I was too corporate, too rigid with my emails,” Jess said. “Meanwhile, I was a new manager, uncertain about how to step into that responsibility, so I followed HR’s instructions even when a part of me knew it felt wrong.”
The tension reached a breaking point. One day, her boss initiated a conversation with Jess and her peers–other managers in the organization–to clear the air.
“Do you trust and respect Jess?” her boss asked.
“No.”
“They just dumped everything on me,” Jess said. “You’re a terrible leader. You think you’re better than us. We don’t like you, and we don’t respect you.”
Her boss didn’t intervene. Didn’t push back. Just sat there, letting Jess get ripped apart.
Jess acknowledged and addressed their specific complaints, letting them in on HR issues with her team that they hadn’t previously been privy to in hopes that it would clear up some misunderstandings.
Then she took a breath. “Do any of you want to try to repair this?” she asked.
“No.”
Then came the breaking point.
The mother of Jess’s direct report–who had just resigned–called her. “I’m watching you,” she said in a menacing voice to Jess. “I know what you’ve done.”
“I filed a police report and told my boss, I’m working from home.”
Less than a year into the job, she quit. “It was the first time I felt like I had actually failed,” Jess said. “I wasn’t trained. I wasn’t respected. I couldn’t build relationships. And it broke me. I started wondering—am I actually competent? Am I likable? Am I a bad person?”
Burned out and disillusioned, she packed up her life, sold her car, and drove her belongings back to Connecticut. Then she boarded a plane to France, determined to figure out who she really was.
She worked on organic farms, including one at a Buddhist retreat center. And she let the weight of that year fall off her shoulders, one breath at a time.
Corporate Lies and Gaslighting: The CEO Who Wanted “More Juice Out of the Squeeze”
After rebuilding her life, Jess landed a promising role in a fully remote company.
She did well. Built supportive relationships with her team. Learned a lot. “For a while, it was great,” Jess said.
Then the lies started.
“The CEO gave me a new title and increased job responsibilities, but told me I had to test out the role for a few months before he’d consider increasing my pay.”
Jess did the work. She collected performance data, analyzed salary trends, and wrote a formal proposal for a salary increase. She sent everything over to HR for consideration.
No response.
A month passed. “Can someone confirm they even got this?” she asked. Silence.
Then the CEO called. “Jess, we’re making some changes in a few months. You’ll like them. You’ll manage a team member, we’ll move you to leadership, and we’ll adjust your salary. Just be patient a little longer.”
“No,” Jess said. “I’ve already been doing this work for five months. I deserve the raise now.”
After some back and forth, reluctantly, the CEO agreed.
Within a few weeks of that conversation, the first round of layoffs happened, cutting her team in half.
“Suddenly, it was just me and my boss.”
Jess wasn’t moved to leadership. The promises never materialized.
Then came the retaliation.
After Jess filled out a quarterly review, providing constructive feedback about the organization and its leadership, the CEO called Jess personally.“I need to give you some feedback,” he said. “I heard from multiple people that you weren’t being a team player.”
Jess froze. “Can you tell me more about where this is coming from and what I did that made my colleagues say that?”
The CEO refused to answer. “I’m not going to name names. Just know that’s what people are saying,” he said.
Jess thought she had done exactly what she had been assigned to do even when it came at a personal cost. And now, she was being accused of something vague, with no accountability.
“It felt like my past trauma of colleagues not respecting me was happening all over again,” Jess said.
As Jess pushed for more clarity and shared that she was struggling with the feedback, the CEO walked it back. “Well, people have their own opinions,” he said. “I’m just passing along feedback.”
When Jess approached her boss asking if she knew anything about this feedback from the CEO, her boss privately told her, “I have no idea where this is coming from. You did exactly what I wanted you to be doing. I’ve heard nothing bad about you.”
But it was too late. The damage was done.
The Breaking Point
Her boss quit. Several partners quit. Others followed.
Over a period of 6 months, Jess repeatedly told her new boss she needed more support, only for it to be ignored. Finally, she was told she could hire a resource from another country who had no training in her field, but it was too little too late.
Jess was burned out. Doing the job of three people. Barely holding on.
Now she says that she could have seen it coming. She thought back to the job description which described the ideal candidate as being “a workhorse”. She remembers that during an all staff meeting, the CEO said he was looking for “ways to get more juice out of the squeeze” with the oranges in this scenario being the staff.
As Jess’s health took hit after hit, and she just kept pushing through, her body finally said “no more”. She went on short-term disability. Got diagnosed with a chronic health condition. Went into a deep depression.
Then she quit. When she expressed to her boss that she thought it would be appropriate to get severance to compensate for the impact of being pushed to the breaking point, he recited the corporate policy “We don’t offer severance to people who leave voluntarily.”
Reclaiming Power: “I Fucking Matter.”
Jess leaped into the unknown. Again.
“I will always have my own back,” she said. “I’ve quit jobs twice now without a parachute because the pain of staying was worse than the fear of what might happen next.”
She had to get humble. Had to ask for help. Had to give herself permission to rest.
To anyone feeling trapped in a soul-sucking situation, Jess offers this:
“You matter. You deserve better. And it is possible to find better. Maybe you’ll have to create it for yourself. But trust yourself. Take the leap before your body forces you to. Your health is worth more than a paycheck.”
Jess Is a Powerful Person, Advocate, and Leader
Jess now dedicates her work to helping others escape toxic systems, build new ones, and live in alignment with their values. She believes the world needs more people living freely—because when we’re exhausted, exploited, and afraid, we can’t build anything better.
Her mission?
To help as many people as possible break free.
Jess Paré is a coach for mid-career women in transition, a leadership development facilitator for teams, and a product development strategist for coaches & consultants, in addition to being a bestselling author and speaker.
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