Mike Kostersitz spent 31 years building a career at Microsoft. Then, at age 60, he had to do something he hadn’t done in decades: Find a job.
In May, Kostersitz, a principal product manager lead working on Azure, said his team had a meeting with a senior leader that seemed to go well. But the following morning, he noticed a high-priority meeting had been added to his calendar — and it didn’t bring good news.
“Me and 120 other anonymous faces got told our jobs had been eliminated,” said Kostersitz, who lives in Washington state. His manager and two of his direct reports were also affected, along with about 6,000 others.
Kostersitz said the layoff came as a total surprise, so he took the rest of the week to process it before beginning his job search. Over the last five months, he’s landed interviews with a handful of companies, including Nvidia and Nike. He said there’s one opportunity he’s optimistic about, but that he still hasn’t secured a job.
Kostersitz is among thousands of Microsoft workers who’ve been laid off over the past year. A company spokesperson previously told Business Insider the company was focused on reducing management layers and streamlining processes.
Microsoft isn’t the only large tech company laying off workers. Amazon, Meta, and Google have also cut jobs. While overall layoffs remain low by historical standards, tech workers have been disproportionately affected, and a hiring slowdown across the industry has made it more challenging for many to secure new roles.
In a challenging environment, some workers are considering options outside Big Tech — whether taking a role at a smaller company, starting a business, or retiring early. Kostersitz shared how he approached his first job search in decades.
Processing the layoff
In the days after his layoff, Kostersitz said his initial instinct wasn’t to be angry with Microsoft. He’d spent more than half his life at the company and had built many connections there.
However, he wished the news had been delivered more personally.
“After 31 years, you would expect at least your manager or your VP or somebody to come to you and say, ‘Hey Mike, this is going to happen and here is why.'”
Still, Kostersitz said he was grateful for Microsoft’s “55 and 15” policy, which allows long-tenured employees who are at least 55 years old and have spent at least 15 consecutive years at the company to have their stock grants continue vesting even after their employment ends.
His Microsoft stock and savings gave him time to look for a new role, but he knew that cushion wouldn’t last forever. Kostersitz said he and his wife can get by financially for about two years without tapping into their retirement accounts — thanks to savings, severance pay, and Microsoft stock.
As he struggled to find work, Kostersitz said he began thinking about whether an early retirement could be an option. Now 60, he’d tentatively planned to retire around 67, though he was open to working longer. However, he concluded that retiring now would be financially challenging for him and his wife.
“Technically, we could retire,” he said. “Would it be a huge change of lifestyle? Absolutely.”
Looking for a job for the first time in decades
Given that he’d spent the prior three decades at Microsoft, Kostersitz initially felt like a fish out of water in the job market.
Over the past two decades, he’d built teams — reviewing résumés, interviewing candidates, and making hiring decisions. But being on the other side of the table was unfamiliar.
So his first step was to hire a career coach to help him build a résumé, update his LinkedIn, draft cover letters, and optimize his materials for applicant tracking systems.
In addition to hiring a private coach, Kostersitz said Microsoft provided a career advisor as part of its layoff package. Kostersitz said the advisor recommended he “de-age” his résumé by removing roles from the 1980s and ’90s. His LinkedIn profile now begins with work experience dating back to 2003.
Kostersitz began applying for jobs, targeting director-level roles in product or program management. He applied to tech companies like Google and Apple, as well as to tech roles at non-tech firms like Nordstrom.
He said he tried to secure referrals at some companies — and got one from a Nvidia employee that helped him land an interview — but said he struggled to get traction.
Kostersitz said one challenge during interviews is figuring out which parts of his career to highlight. He said he frequently gets “tell me about a time when” questions, and while he has decades of experience, it’s difficult to know which examples will resonate.
“It’s like, I have 30 years of stories for you. Which one do you want to hear?” he said.
Despite these obstacles, Kostersitz hasn’t given up. He said the Microsoft-provided advisor encouraged him to stick with his current strategy — and emphasized that job hunting in today’s market is, in some ways, a test of endurance.
“They said it’s a game of chicken right now. The person who has the longer breath and can stick it out longer will get the job.”
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