From VP to Unemployed. When the Title Disappears, Who Are You?

Work Is Not Your Identity: A Wake-Up Call During the AI Boom

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In 2016, Olivia was promoted to Vice President at a Fortune 500 company in Chicago. She was ecstatic. The title alone gave her a sense of identity, belonging, and social validation. Every family gathering, every conference, every LinkedIn post was now laced with that two-letter prefix: VP. She didn’t particularly enjoy her job, but the status made it all feel worth it.

Fast forward to 2024. Olivia is 42, recently laid off in a restructuring exercise where AI tools replaced entire middle-management layers. Her severance was generous. Her sense of self, however, was in shambles.

“I don’t know who I am without my job,” she confessed in a podcast interview.

And she’s not alone.

For decades, job titles became substitutes for identity.

"Hi, I'm Jack. I'm a Product Manager at a tech startup."

"Hey, I’m Monica. I lead marketing at a D2C company."

Not
"I’m someone who loves solving problems"
or
"I’m passionate about helping others grow."

We became our business cards.

But here's the truth no one likes to talk about. We outsourced our sense of self to fragile corporate scaffolding. And now that AI is shaking that scaffolding down to its roots, we’re left exposed.

AI won’t kill all jobs. It will just kill the illusion.

The illusion that prestige equals performance.
The illusion that sitting in eight meetings a day means you’re doing something important.
The illusion that being a VP or a Head of X makes you indispensable.

In reality, many roles only existed because companies were bloated enough to tolerate mediocrity. And sycophancy.

Remember Alan, the guy who always nodded in meetings, said “great idea” to every VP, and never actually executed much? He climbed the ladder because no one noticed. Or cared.

But AI does.

Tools like ChatGPT, GitHub Copilot, and Midjourney are not replacing talent. They are just removing the hiding places. They are compressing the distance between idea and execution. And they are making it painfully obvious who actually adds value.

The new economy will not reward prestige. It will reward passion.

Grace, a copywriter from Denver, lost her agency job last year. She could have panicked. Instead, she leaned into her craft. She started a daily writing habit, rebuilt her portfolio, and began helping small businesses rewrite their messaging for AI-readability.

She now makes more than she did at her job, works fewer hours, and most importantly, she feels more herself than ever before.

She stopped working for a company.
And started working on her craft.

The winners of the next decade will be the weirdly obsessed.

They are not working for money alone. They are tinkering, building, testing, and shipping.
They stay up at night not because of deadlines, but because they are excited to explore a new tool or idea.
They post their work online not for applause, but because creation is how they breathe.

AI will amplify these people.
For the rest, it will simply expose them.

So what can you do?

Let go of your old identity.
The corner office. The job title. The bio that said ex-Google.

And start asking:
What would I still do, even if no one was watching?

It might be photography.
It might be designing better workflows.
It might be writing thoughtful analysis.
It might be building tiny SaaS tools or coaching others.

That is your craft. That is your moat. That is your freedom.

Yes, the job market is uncertain.
Yes, layoffs are brutal.
Yes, AI is moving fast.

But this is not the end.

This is the unmasking.

And for those who are ready to show up with honesty, skill, and craft, it is finally your time.

In a world that is losing its appetite for corporate masks, the best thing you can be is real.

Work is not your identity. Contribution is.

And contribution does not need a title.
It needs Effort. Obsession. Truth.

And when you bring that?

Money, meaning, and mastery will follow.

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This post is part of the Remote Jobs and You newsletter on Substack. Each edition brings you the latest remote job opportunities and an insightful read tailored for modern professionals.