Career Building vs. Ladder Climbing: Marie Libre on Building a Career That’s Yours
One of the most steadying workshops from the 2026 AdaMarie Career Navigation Summit is now available inside the AdaMarie Professional Network. Here’s what you’ll take away from it and how to watch the full session.
Marie Libres did everything the way you’re supposed to. Good grades, college, the job after college, the steady climb up the ladder. On paper, she was doing it right. So why, after being laid off three separate times, did she keep asking herself the same question: why wasn’t what I could do ever enough, no matter how hard I worked?
That question is the beating heart of her workshop, and if you’ve ever asked a version of it yourself, this session was built for you. Marie’s answer, which arrived only after she stepped back from tech entirely to let her nervous system settle, is a reframe: she hadn’t been failing at her career. She’d been climbing a ladder that kept breaking on her. What she needed wasn’t to move up. It was to move forward.
What makes this more than a feel-good story is the framework Marie builds out of it. She draws a sharp, useful distinction between the career ladder and what she calls a career compass. A ladder only points up; a compass points toward what’s yours.
Watch and you’ll come away with a clear way to find your own “north,” plus the three ingredients she says every built career needs: self-awareness about what actually matters to you, mentors who act as the wind in your sails rather than just a step-by-step map, and the practice of creating something of your own, however small.
The workshop also includes a hands-on worksheet exercise that’s worth doing with pen in hand: mapping your values, your strengths, and the mentors already around you into something that’s entirely yours, and, crucially, something that exists independent of any single employer. So the next time a reorg hits or a role stops fitting, you’re not starting from zero. You’re starting from what you’ve built.
If you’re feeling bruised by a job market that keeps shifting under your feet, this is a conversation that meets you there and hands you a better compass.
Watch the full workshop inside the APN
Marie’s complete session, including the full career-mapping exercise and her three ingredients of a built career, is available now in the AdaMarie Professional Network, alongside every other session from this year’s summit.
Inside, you’ll find:
The full summit replay library, including the sessions you couldn’t catch live
Live workshops and expert conversations year-round
Our spring Career Accelerator
A growing library of career resources
A Slack community full of people navigating their next steps right alongside you
