Dana Perino says George W. Bush helped her make sense of one of the most uncertain moments in her career, after she left his administration, took a public relations job and knew within two hours that it was not for her.
Perino, who served as White House press secretary, said she felt terrified about stepping outside government after leaving the Bush White House. She took the PR job next, but told Fortune, “It was pretty clear after two hours that I didn’t like it,” a blunt admission that marked the start of a change she did not expect.
After that, Perino turned to Bush for advice about what came next. He told her not to overplan her career path and to treat change as part of professional growth, a lesson she later carried into a move from the White House to. She went on to become a host and author, and said her government experience, communication skills and insider perspective proved useful in television.
That experience now sits at the center of the career lessons Perino shares through her books and her new novel, Purple State. Her story is a reminder that a bad fit can arrive fast, and that the next move does not have to be mapped out before the first one ends.
The point of Bush’s advice was not that every turn would be easy. It was that leaving government was not a failure to be managed, but a transition to be used.
