“I’m sorry, we’re not renewing your contract, your last day here is…”

From the outside looking in, I’ve always admired the good work and the collaborative spirit that my dream company always seemed to have from what I saw online. When I had the opportunity to join the company at the end of 2024, I was truly excited and felt like it was the right time to transition after being a designer in healthcare for more than 7 years. As prestigious as it sounds to work in the company, my high expectations of the culture and people quickly shattered at all fronts after I joined.  

Battling Self-doubt

Coming from being the sole designer of a team to being placed in a team with a sea of designers, I couldn’t help but start comparing myself. What made it difficult was the culture, workload and interactions with specific managers and colleagues that started to make me feel out of place. One constant thought that kept replaying was: “Am I not a good designer, why am I given this work while other designers can each own a project?”

The little things matter

“Do not despise the day of small beginnings…” Don’t get me wrong, even though I was tasked to do little explorations from one project to another and helping other designers in their projects, I did not want to despise these tasks because I truly believe that the small things matter. I felt like the situation I was in was an opportunity for me to have the right attitude, even though the task might seem very insignificant in the bigger scheme of things or was part of any product roadmap. 

Does visibility truly matter?

One thing I struggled with being a designer in the company was ‘visibility’. It seemed like I needed to be articulate, to ‘advocate for myself’, to make my work known and work on high visibility projects to be considered worthy to be part of the company. The constant statement from my managers and colleagues were: “You need to ask for more work, if not we can’t justify to keep you here…”

Even though I understood where they were coming from, this statement kept me in fear that I would lose my job anytime if I don’t do “enough” work. Deep down, I felt that if I were to go down this route, of becoming a designer just to perform, to get that good appraisal grade, to get promoted for all the wrong reasons… I will eventually lose my soul.

I truly believe that it is more important to be known as a person with character, integrity and values rather than being known as “that good designer” who can deliver high impact work.   

A closed door is redirection

In the first week of 2026, I received an email from my higher manager that she wanted to see me, and it was there and then that they broke the news to me that they will not be continuing the contract with me. (I still had 3 months with the company before my contract ended) 

It was the most uneasy and painful season of my time there as it meant I will be jobless in 3 months yet still had to find courage to show up to work and contribute to existing projects as though nothing has ever happened. 

In hindsight, no matter how difficult it was, I’m glad to have lived out my values till the end and left on a good note without burning bridges.

Your identity is not in what you do

To be honest, this has been one of the hardest things to learn to do as a designer. When your job is taken away from you or when you have seemingly lesser work to do, does your worth fluctuate because of these external circumstances? 

“Is my worth as a designer tied to my workload? The greater the workload the better designer I am?” 

“Is my worth as a designer tied to being in this or that prestigious company?”

Never to put any company on a pedestal

I guess I have learnt this the hard way. I just wanted to highlight that what I have experienced is solely based on the team I was in, and it does not reflect other teams in the company. I think more often than not, such company decisions, who they choose to hire, the amount of opportunity given to an employee, to whom they decide to let go, reflects so much more on the higher management rather than the employee and I recognise not to take it personally.   

The light in all of this

Besides the culture misalignment, one of the highlights of being in this company is that it has grown me so much more as a designer than where I was before. The design team was quite established and the benefits of being able to work and help out in various projects allowed me to be exposed to different parts of the design process, that perhaps going deep into a project might not allow me to learn so much more. 

P/S: I struggle so much to share this part of being a designer in the corporate world but I really wanted to pen down this part of my journey as a means for me to grieve, heal and forgive.