Under the right circumstances, a career change can serve as a breath of fresh air. Under the wrong circumstances it can breed suffocating fear.

Many area employees found themselves on the wrong end of a career change in recent years, forced to find new jobs as a result of the economic downturn. From major industries to small businesses, many employers had to cut workers. But despite a fickle job market and high unemployment, some local workers were able to turn their misfortune into opportunity.

Johnny Robinson, 48, of Columbus, had worked for Sara Lee in West Point for 14 years when the plant closed its doors in March 2007. He had taken the job working maintenance at Sara Lee after spending 13 years working for Sanderson Plumbing in Columbus. With just a GED to fall back on, Robinson was needed to find another job to support his family.

“I’ve got a wife and family, and bills still go on,” said Robinson. “I had to get back out. Man, you don’t know what it’s like getting out there, looking for a job and you haven’t looked for a job before.

Hank Vaiden, 43, of Hamilton, faced the same apprehension when he was laid off, in May, from the Holcim cement plant in Artesia when the plant idled more than 100 workers.

Though Holcim announced plans to shut the Artesia plant down completely, it still is operating with a skeleton crew of 11 people, waiting for the company to pull the plug.

Still, Vaiden was optimistic because “The Lord closes one door and opens another.”

Joan Boothe’s faith likewise helped her overcome job loss. Due to sagging attendance and offerings, Boothe, of Carrollton, Ala., lost her 12-year job as a pastoral assistant at Carrollton Methodist Church. But she remained optimistic: “I don’t want things that come before me on a daily basis to act as an interruption but as an opportunity.”

Uncertainty

For Robinson, the loss of his longtime job didn’t spell opportunity, it spelled insecurity.

Work once was easy to come by for Robinson, and he liked his job and its benefits.

“I was very satisfied with Sara Lee — the pay and everything. It was a big disappointment because I thought Sara Lee would be there forever,” he said.

With only maintenance experience — and more than 1,000 other former Sara Lee employees suddenly flooding the job market — Robinson was worried. He secured a few job interviews, but nothing panned out.

“I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t know which way I was going to go,” he said.

Vaiden — who has cooked competitively for the past 12 years —considered making a drastic career change but “was scared to death.”

“Anytime you do anything to change, it’s scary,” he said.

An easy transition

Boothe, whose income wasn’t crucial for her and her husband, Bobby, had an easier decision. She decided to realize her dream of being a mobile missionary.

She delivers meals to the homebound elderly, sings at nursing homes, volunteers with the mentally disabled, works with addicts and performs a jail ministry.

Boothe also works with Heart and Home, a nonprofit agency, which performs small construction tasks, such as building wheelchair ramps, and remains active in her church.

She hopes she can one day earn some money in the course of her missionary work, but says the work is more important.

“I have more time to spend on what God’s placing before me,” said Boothe.

Workforce training

Unlike Boothe, Robinson’s income was essential; he relied on unemployment benefits to support his family until another option became available. EMCC had received a National Emergency Grant authored by the Three Rivers Planning and Development District in Pontotoc to provide free workforce training to former Sara Lee employees. The grant eventually funneled nearly $3 million to EMCC.

“I had been going to EMCC off and on anyway, so I knew the teachers down there. They recommended I take the basic manufacturing skills class because that’s what most of the jobs around here were going to,” said Robinson.

Originally, Robinson hoped to use the manufacturing skills class to land a job at American Eurocopter, but that didn’t work out. So he took another class. And another. And another.

“I know I spent every bit of a year going to classes,” he said. “I didn’t have to pay for those classes. It was a big relief knowing I could get the training.”

Entrepreneurship

Vaiden decided to make his own opportunities; he started his own business.

He opened Hank’s No. 1 Championship BBQ on Highway 45 North in Columbus. He’s one of the rare few to relish losing his old job.

“If it wasn’t for the fact that Holcim shut down, I probably wouldn’t be doing this. I would have stayed out there,” said Vaiden. “The Lord closes one door and opens another, and this is the door He opened. ... I don’t think if I ever got another job and it was secure with insurance, I wouldn’t take the chance. But at that point, I didn’t have anything to lose.”

Despite having no experience in running a business, he says the day-to-day operations of Hank’s BBQ haven’t been much hassle, though the experience has been stressful.

Vaiden’s cooking team, the Cotton Patch Cooking Crew, won State Champ honors in Louisiana in 2007 and will represent Mississippi at the Memphis Barbecue Network after taking third place at the 2009 Roast-N-Boast competition in Columbus — accolades that have fueled his business.

And based on word of mouth from pilots at Columbus Air Force Base, Hank’s has been visited by a barbecue judge from Missouri.

Struggling to find work

Robinson’s happy ending has taken longer to write. After a year without steady work, Robinson landed a job working maintenance at Mississippi State University. A year later, that job downsized, too, and Robinson was back where he started.

He found another opening at Sodexho, Mississippi University for Women’s maintenance contractor, in air conditioning and refrigeration service. Yet, once again, he lacked the training.

“They told me before they could even hire me I must have a Type 2 certification in air conditioning repair, so I had to go back to school go get that,” said Robinson.

After completing his certification, Robinson got the position; he had finally landed another steady job.

“It was great. Now I don’t have to drive all the way to West Point or Starkville. (The job) is just a few minutes from my house in a field that I really wanted to learn, so it was a win-win situation,” he said.

Robinson, who completed his associate’s degree in electrical maintenance, says he’ll continue taking classes at EMCC to ensure he’ll never again feel the fear of being without a job or a plan.

Reflecting on job loss

“Looking for a job ain’t nothing you want to get out there and do. You never really think about it as long as you’ve got a job, and I really had never been without a job,” Robinson said. “You don’t know what to expect. You’ve got to try to sell yourself that ‘I am the person for this job.’ It’s a lot of stress.”

While opening a restaurant wasn’t in Vaiden’s plans, it seemed to pose less of a risk when he didn’t have many other options.

“The whole idea about running a business, I was scared to death,” he said. “But at the same time, with the economy like it was, it was kind of hard to find a job, so it’s tit for tat,” he said.

While Vaiden’s career move is paying off monetarily, Boothe’s decision is paying off spiritually. She’ll round out her many years of working — for The Commercial Dispatch from 1974-1977 then as editor of The Pickens County Herald for 16 years — as a full-time missionary.