Career Archives — Page 3 of 4 — Agape Heart & Soul

A spontaneous trip to Geneva: Nostalgia & new beginnings

by Dina | Oct 3, 2026 | Career, Transitions

I decided to spend two spontaneous days in Geneva–my very first home in Switzerland, where I spent the first ten of my 34 years here.

The last time I visited was in 2021, and I hadn’t realised how much I had missed the city and my Geneva friends.

☀️ My husband and I went on a little trip down memory lane.

We visited my old apartment building on Rue Gutenberg.

Dina at her old apartment building in Geneva.

Passed by the City Hall where I became a proud Swiss citizen and Genevan 25 years ago, and a few more spots where friends and I used to hang out during my high-school and university years.

Dina at the Geneva City Hall.

Of course, we also went to the lake and saw the Jet d’Eau.

Dina in Geneva at the Jet d'eau

And I was thrilled to immortalise our mouette trip across the lake with a Japanese tourist dressed as an elephant 🐘😂.

Dina on the Geneva mouette boat, with a Japanese tourist dressed up as an elephant.

Despite the last-minute notice, I also managed to meet two long-time, very dear friends whom I’ve known for nearly 30 years. They were my very first university friends in this amazing city.

☘️ And then there were the new encounters.

Like Michel, a 70-something Genevan who had visited Egypt in 1978 and still remembered it with great fondness. We got to speak about the beauty of my home country and hometown, as well as his wife’s beautiful handmade earrings, which she was selling at the one-and-only Plainpalais flea market.

My dad and I used to visit that market every single Saturday, so it was lovely to be back.

And of course, I had to buy a pair of earrings from Michel—’cause I clearly don’t have enough. 🙈

I also had the best mocha maison ☕️ at Corde Coffee in Coutance, thanks to two very entertaining and wonderfully friendly baristas. Not to mention one of the most divine octopus dishes at Medusa, a Greek restaurant near the Nations.

Picture of an octopus dish at the Medusa restaurant in Geneva.

🇨🇭I love Geneva’s versatility.

Its amazingly international crowd, with people from every corner of the world; the ethnic foods; the chaos; and the unmistakable Romandie vibe.

I didn’t expect to feel so nostalgic being back—but I did.

🪴 It made me think of how we can feel when we leave a job, a team or a professional chapter that has been part of us for a long time.

Even when we are ready for what comes next, we may still miss the people, the routines, the version of ourselves and sense of belonging we are leaving behind.

In fact, I had a session on that exact topic with a client the day before I left for Geneva. Funny, isn’t it? The reason I left Geneva back then was to begin a new professional chapter in Basel.

Missing something doesn’t have to mean we made the wrong choice. It can simply mean that it mattered…

For me, it was all the memories I attach to this city: my younger years as a student, and the many firsts I experienced here—including my very first job and apartment.

🌻 If you’ve never been to Geneva, do visit. It’s a great city.

And if you do, make sure you stop by Corde and Medusa. You won’t regret it.

As I write this, my heart is full as I look forward to my next visit.

With love,
Dina 🫶🏽

Resources:

Medusa restaurant in Geneva.
Corde coffee shop in Geneva.
We also enjoyed a lovely lunch at Indian Bites—equally highly recommended.

How to explore a new career without quitting your job

by Dina | Oct 3, 2026 | Career, Transitions

You cannot think your way into a new career or into complete career certainty.

You have to try possible directions on.

Pros-and-cons lists have their place, as does reflection. But they are not enough.

They can help you identify what matters: your values, strengths, needs, non-negotiables.

But they cannot tell you what it would actually be like to do the work.

☘️ For that, you need small, safe-to-try experiments:
❧ a conversation with someone in the filed;
❧ a day of shadowing;
❧ a short project;
❧ a brief course;
❧ a volunteer or freelance assignment.

Often, clients come to me thinking that to change careers they have to hand in their notice and take some dramatic leap into the unknown.

You don’t.

But you do need to gather evidence beyond your thoughts.

You cannot fully know whether a new direction fits from inside your head. You have to try it on. And a small experiment can show you what energises you, what drains you, what surprises you—and whether the reality of a direction matches the idea of it.

The question is not: What is the perfect next move?

It’s:

📌 What is one small experiment that could teach me something useful?

With love,
Dina 🫶🏽

Dina Sabry Fivaz with author and illustrator Dan Santat at the SCBWI 2015 children’s book conference while exploring picture-book writing.

Image: Me with picture-book author and illustrator, Dan Santat at the SCBWI Children’s Books Conference in Los Angeles in 2015. I was trying on the world of picture-book writing—a small experiment that eventually led to the publication of my own picture book, “God’s Love Letter: Creation”, in 2022.

Resources:

Book recommendation: Working Identity, Updated Edition, With a New Preface: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career, by Heminia Ibarra. This is one of my favourite career tranistion books and a must for anyone considering a career change.

Working Identity: Unconventional strategies for reinventing your career. Book by Herminia Ibarra

When a good job is no longer the right job

by Dina | Oct 3, 2026 | Career, Transitions

A job can look rightfrom the outsideand still be wrong for you

A job can look right from the outside and still be wrong for you.

When I first moved into HR, I happened to land in Global Mobility. Later, I moved into Compensation & Benefits.

I was good at it, and kept progressing from intern to analyst to C&B manager for a Pharma affiliate.

Then my boss called me from Boston to make official the role I had already been covering for some time: Head of Compensation & Benefits for Eurasia.

☘️ I resigned.

Not because I had a bad manager, or because the company treated me poorly, or because I was burnt out. I was one of the youngest C&B managers, well paid. I had a great team, wonderful colleagues, and an excellent direct manager.

But I knew something important: I didn’t want Compensation & Benefits to become the stamp on my forehead for the rest of my career.

I no longer wanted my days to revolve around salary rounds, job architectures, and executive packages; I wanted to move laterally into Learning & Development.

☘️ Before resigning, I explored the possibility of an internal move and I was told I would need to remain in my current role for another two years first. But staying another two years would have meant becoming more deeply established in a field I already knew I wanted to leave.

So I left.

What happened next is probably for another post. But my point for now is this:

☘️ You don’t need to be in crisis for a career problem to matter.

A role can be secure, well paid, respected, and full of good people. And it can still no longer fit your aspirations, values or the direction you want your life to take.

In my case, I was clear about what I wanted. And when I realised it was not likely to happen within a reasonable period, I decided to pursue something new.

Work that fits is not only about what you’re good at. It’s also about what you want to keep becoming.

☘️ To be clear, I am NOT suggesting that you resign a “good” job from one day to the next—certainly not in the current job market.

What I am suggesting is that, if you can see the road you’re on is taking you somewhere you don’t want to go, it may be time to start exploring alternatives.

📌 What would you change if your situation were “good”, but no longer “right”?

With love,
Dina 🫶🏽

CV tip: How to tailor your CV for a target role

by Dina | Oct 3, 2026 | Career, CV writing, Transitions

Is this you?

If you’re a mid-career professional in Pharma, have broad cross-functional experience, and your CV has already been rewritten three times without generating interviews, your next step is not necessarily a fourth rewrite. A polished document cannot compensate for an unclear direction.

☘️ I sometimes hear versions of the same concern: ‘I have a versatile background; I could do a variety of roles; I’ve applied across a wide range of jobs, and… nothing.’

And therein lies the problem.

To take a concrete example

You may have relevant experience for both Patient Advocacy and Chief of Staff roles. But the same CV should not try to make the full case for both at once.

A lack of focus dilutes your value and expertise—especially when competing in a sea of specialists whose experience looks more directly aligned to the advertised role.

☘️ The issue is not the breadth of your competencies; it’s trying to make one CV carry every possible version of your career. Because, what you’re ultimately doing, is asking a recruiter or hiring manager to work out why you’re a credible fit—work they most likely won’t have time for.

So, what do I suggest?

Instead of applying to different job families with one generic profile, use your CV to clearly demonstrate your capabilities and achievements for a defined target role.

📌 So, before rewriting it, I recommend you answer the following questions first:
* What specific role is this CV intended to support?
* Why does that role make sense as your next step?
* What makes you credible for it?
* Which experiences best show the value you would bring?

Get clear about your direction and the story you want your experience to tell first. Then, and only then, should you start your fourth rewrite.

☘️ And once you’ve rewritten it, do one final check:

“Could someone reading your CV explain, in a few sentences, what you’re aiming for, why you’re credible, and what you bring?”

And yes, this means that if you decide to target different types of roles, you’ll need a different CV for each one.

📌 Does your CV describe what you have done—or make a clear case for your next target role?

With love,
Dina 🫶🏽

P.S. Next week, I’ll be sharing more practical thoughts for those with a specialist CV.

Your weekly poem: Harlem

by Dina | Aug 8, 2026 | Career, Inspirational, Poem, Transitions

🌿 A poem a day keeps the blues away…

“Harlem”—or What happens to a dream deferred? 🌿

🌻 What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat
Or crust and sugar over—
Like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
Like a heavy load.

Or does it explode? 🌻

— Langston Hughes (1901-1967)

🪴 Langston Hughes was one of the most powerful voices of the Harlem Renaissance—a poet, a civil rights writer, and a master of saying everything that needs to be said in as few words as possible. This poem is a masterclass in that.

📌 As we explore it together, I invite you to hold Hughes’ question on a personal level:

What happens to YOUR dream deferred?

🪴Hughes opens with a simple question: what happens to a dream that is postponed?

He then offers a series of images, each one a possible fate for the delayed pursuit of one’s hopes and dreams.

🌱 Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?—something once full of juice and life, shrivelled by neglect and heat.

And yet, even a raisin, if not discarded or considered “dead”, can still be consumed. And when we do, its sweetness is ten times stronger than a grape’s… the sweetness of a promise finally fulfilled—even if at an advanced age.

🌱 Or fester like a sore—and then run?—in this scenario, the dream becomes infected, festering until it finally breaks open.

I wonder if this is what happens when we start resenting ourselves—and maybe even our loved ones—for never having tried.

And yet, even here, there is a sense of relief in that image. The intense pain relief when the sore finally runs, because that’s when healing can finally begin. It might leave a scar, sure, but also the promise of a new beginning.

🌱 Does it stink like rotten meat?—decay. Something that was once nourishing, now putrid.

I initially imagined the sad sight of what once was a juicy steak—which once was a living cow—butchered to fill a man’s hunger only to be left out for so long—untouched, unconsumed, sacrificed for nothing.

And then I wondered: what if a stinking dream is like a crying baby—trying to get our attention in the only way it can: by stinking up the place? Demanding attention.

🌱 Or crust and sugar over—like a syrupy sweet?— a dream that hardens and crusts over, and while it may still look sweet on the outside, it’s probably now too hard to consume or enjoy.

Maybe it gets relegated to a shelf instead—like an artefact in a museum, too precious to throw away, yet too old for consumption. Neither dead nor alive. Waiting…

🌱 Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.—the accumulated weight of carrying something unrealised, day after day.

Given my gender and age, the first image that came to mind was that of an old woman’s saggy breasts—once perky and firm, now thin and shriveled, pulling further and further down towards gravity, day after day.

The memory of what once was, and could have still been, but no longer is.

🌱 Or does it explode?—what a genius way to end this poem. After all the domestic images of drying and sagging and festering, we are reminded that a deferred dream can also be a ticking Bomb.

Its unrealized energy and potential become, at some point, too much to contain and the only way left is an outward forceful expression.

Sometimes you can only defer a dream for so long before something gives.

A seed of hope

🪴 Given its title “Harlem”, it’s safe to assume Hughes was referring to the African American dreams of equality, dignity, and freedom that had been systematically deferred by racism, segregation, and broken promises.

And yet, as with any great poem, it works equally well on a personal level.

Any one of us who has ever postponed something important—a career change, a creative ambition, a relationship—will smell the stink and feel the heavy load.

But the poem also holds seeds of hope.
For a dream deferred is neither dead nor forgotten.

In every one of Hughes’ images, the dream is simply changing form, trying to grab our attention, hoping to be noticed—so that we can finally pick it up and decide: do we toss it away for good, or do we breathe life into it?

📌 What will you be choosing today?

🦋 Happy weekend everyone! 🦋

With love,
Dina 🫶🏽

PS: All em dashes are my own 😉.

PPS: Hi, I’m Dina—an executive and transition coach. And if you’re wondering whether how you are living your life today is how you want to spend the next ten to fifteen years of your career, let’s chat. No need to defer your dreams any further. I’m only one DM away. 🤗

Resources:

This week’s song is I DREAM A WORLD. It’s a famous choral song based on Hughes’ powerful 1941 poem of the same name. Lyrics:

I dream a world where man
No other man will scorn,
Where love will bless the earth
And peace its paths adorn
I dream a world where all
Will know sweet freedom’s way,
Where greed no longer saps the soul
Nor avarice blights our day.
A world I dream where black or white,
Whatever race you be,
Will share the bounties of the earth
And every man is free,
Where wretchedness will hang its head
And joy, like a pearl,
Attends the needs of all mankind-
Of such I dream, my world!

Your weekly poem: SEA JOY

by Dina | Aug 1, 2026 | Career, Coaching, Inspirational, Poem, Transitions

🌿 A poem a day keeps the blues away…

—or holding on to your wishes while job searching 🌿

🌻 When I go down by the sandy shore
I can think of nothing I want more
Than to live by the booming blue sea
As the seagulls flutter round about me

I can run about – when the tide is out
With the wind and the sand and the sea all about
And the seagulls are swirling and diving for fish
Oh – to live by the sea is my only wish. 🌻

— Jacqueline Bouvier (Kennedy), 1939

🪴 This poem was written by former American First Lady, Jackie Kennedy, at the age of ten. And, like every poem, it can be read in many different ways.

A possible interpretation for job seekers

Three close members of my family have been looking for a job for over a year now, and it’s been a psychological and financial struggle. So, if you’re in a similar situation, I’d like to offer you one possible interpretation of that poem—not from a place of “easy advice” but from a place of solidarity. And I’d like to focus on two specific lines in the poem:

“I can think of nothing I want more”
“Oh – to live by the sea is my only wish.”

I love these two lines because they invite us to dream a little and get in touch with what lies within the depth of our soul… So,

📌 as you go about your job search, here are two questions worth considering:

⭐️ What is it that you want nothing more of—your “only wish”, if you could choose?

⭐️ And what could be ways to pursue it—even now, in the midst of the grind?

🪴 Now, depending on how long you’ve been looking for a job, and how pressing your financial situation is, the spontaneous answer to the first question might be: ANY job that helps pay the bills. And I get it! But even then, you still need to have a target in mind. And that target will depend on your experience, your strengths, and the story you can tell through your CV, motivation letter, and network for “why you” in “this role”. And the more over- (or under-) qualified you are, the more important that story…

The parallel track

🪴 In parallel, I urge you to keep your ultimate wish in sight and pursue it.

“Oh – to live by the sea is my only wish.”

Career transitions are hard. They can be chaotic and are riddled with uncertainty and rejections. AND

They also hold the seed of change: a new direction, a new opportunity, new connections, new learnings. In short, they hold potential!

So, while you try to keep the ship afloat, you also want to keep your personal “sea joy” as your North Star.

📌 Which is why, I encourage you to keep coming back to those two questions:

⭐️ What is your ultimate “sea joy”? Be it a role, an industry, a change of scenery, an independent project…

⭐️ And how can you pursue that “sea joy” hope, even as you navigate the day-to-day grind of the job application mill?

🪴 Good luck with your job search or career transition! If you are a job seeker in Switzerland and need support, feel free to reach out. I’m only a message away—and I share what I know openly and for free in every first meeting.

🦋 Happy Weekend everyone! 🦋

With love,
Dina 🫶🏽

Poem

Image of the original manuscript and illustration by Jackie, source: jfklibrary.org

Resources:

This week’s song is LIFE by Des’ree: