Gen X Executives Seek Career Pivots Amid Layoff Waves

After two years of massive layoffs and the promise of more consolidation to come in media and entertainment in 2025, the mood is bleak among executives of a certain age.

The pink-slip bloodbath has hit hard on Gen X veterans in the middle-management ranks of networks, studios, talent agencies and PR firms. And it’s come at a time when the entire industry
is wrestling with the impact of systemic change — goodbye, cable; hello, streaming — and the most disruptive technology since the advent of talking pictures: generative AI.

Amid all the tumult, however, there is enormous opportunity for professional growth for those with experience, connections and savvy in how to apply those skills in new arenas.

“People are very unnerved about whether there can be another chapter. People get very emotionally locked up when they feel vulnerable. And yet if you don’t feel vulnerable when you’re growing up in the business, you wouldn’t be able to achieve what you’ve achieved,” says Rich Ross, a former top executive at Disney, Discovery and Nickelodeon.

Moreover, those who have highly specialized skills — research, analytics, marketing, finance — can find themselves in demand as consultants and contract workers from the same companies that have gutted their teams through layoffs.

“There’s so much need because there’s been so much disruption,” says Liz Huszarik, a 30-year
veteran of Warner Bros. who recently launched the research shingle Maverix Insights & Strategies with two fellow WB alums. “They’ve all cut their teams, but they still have the same workload. They can bring in our company at a fraction of the cost.”

For many who reached the highest rungs of Hollywood’s biggest companies, the most humbling thing to accept is the loss of the perks that come with working for a network or studio.

Ross was pushed out of his role as Discovery’s top programming executive in 2018, in a restructuring that…