MEDIA & PRESS KIT
Media Kit
Bios, book details, and interview angles for producers, podcast hosts, and journalists. For interview or feature requests, fill out the form below and Jamie’s team will follow up shortly. You can also read the full press release here.
ABOUT JAMIE
Author bio — three lengths
Jamie L. Johnston is a former trust company VP, serial business buyer, and reluctant retiree. After being fired for earning too much, he built and sold multiple businesses. Own Your Next Job is his blueprint for executives who refuse to settle for less than they’re worth.
Jamie L. Johnston spent decades climbing the corporate ladder — only to discover the ladder was leaning against someone else’s wall.
As a VP at a major trust company pulling $300,000 a year, Jamie was fired not for poor performance but for outperforming. Instead of chasing another job, he bought a business. Then another. Along the way, he made expensive mistakes, learned hard lessons, and quietly accumulated the kind of wealth that a salary never could have provided.
A graduate with three degrees earned in six years, a former university football player, and a 50+ year husband, Jamie writes with the candor of someone who has nothing left to prove — and everything to share.
Own Your Next Job is his life’s instruction manual for every professional who’s been pushed out, passed over, or just plain done with working for someone else.
Jamie L. Johnston didn’t plan to write a book. He planned to retire quietly, enjoy his grandchildren, and let the lessons stay personal. Then he looked around and realized how many people — smart, capable, experienced people — were silently suffering through the same trap he had escaped.
The trap has a name. It’s called being over-qualified, over-expensive, or simply over fifty in a workforce that rewards youth over wisdom.
Jamie was one of them. In the 1980s, he was a vice president at a major Canadian trust company, earning $300,000 a year, with a private office, a secretary, and kids in private school. Life looked good — until his boss called him in and said: “We’ve got a problem. You’re making more money than any other VP in the company.”
Jamie replied: “Isn’t that because I’m performing better?”
It didn’t matter. The system wasn’t designed for outliers. He refused to take a pay cut and was fired on the spot.
What followed wasn’t a job search — it was a transformation. Jamie discovered that his greatest asset wasn’t his resume. It was his ability to see opportunity where others saw risk, to buy businesses with existing customers and cash flow, and to build something no employer could ever take away.
Three degrees (a bachelor’s, a master’s in economics, and a master’s in business). Five years of competitive university football. Fifty years of marriage. Three children and seven grandchildren. A string of businesses bought, built, fixed, and sold.
Jamie writes not as a motivational speaker — he’s happily retired and not interested in the spotlight — but as a man who learned through real wins and very real losses what it actually takes to own your future.
Own Your Next Job is the book he wishes someone had handed him the day he was fired.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Own Your Next Job
You built a career. You earned your stripes. And then, one day, the system decided you cost too much.
Own Your Next Job is the straight-talking, no-theory guide for executives, managers, and experienced professionals who’ve been fired, downsized, or sidelined — and refuse to start over at zero.
Author Jamie L. Johnston was fired for outperforming his peers. Instead of hunting for another boss, he bought a business. Then built a retirement worth having.
Inside: how to find, evaluate, negotiate, buy, run, and eventually sell a business — with hard-won lessons from someone who lived every page.
This isn’t a pep talk. It’s a playbook.
