When federal research cuts rocked RTP, one woman built a bridge for jobseekers

As federal funding cuts reshaped North Carolina’s research economy, one woman turned her own layoff into a way forward for others.

Tamara Terry had been watching it happen for months.

Government cuts had slowed projects and closed over a hundred contracts across the Research Triangle Institute, an independent scientific research organization in Research Triangle Park. So when she learned in April that she was being terminated at RTI International after 25 years, the moment landed differently than she expected.

“It wasn’t a shocker,” she said. “There was a lot happening in our country as a whole.”

Terry, a research scientist and recent director of academic research engagement who had spent her life managing large-scale federal research projects, said she did not feel grief or panic. Instead, she felt clarity.

“I didn’t feel like I was losing something or mourning a loss, but I knew that this was a moment for me to walk into the next part of my destiny,” Terry said. “And really pivot into my next career, which is what I did.”

A career built on federal research gave way to something more personal

Research Triangle Park is one of the largest research hubs in the country, with tens of thousands of jobs tied directly or indirectly to federal contracts. When funding slows, the effects ripple quickly through institutions like RTI, and into the lives of workers who depend on that stability.

Within weeks of her layoff, Terry began doing what she had always done informally: connecting people, offering guidance, and helping others navigate professional transitions. By June, she officially launched FDW Strategic Solutions, a consulting firm based on faith, desire and will—a legacy borrowed from her parents’ businesses in eastern North Carolina.

“My parents launched and created FDW Family Health Care Center, which is a clinic for people who need health care services,” she said. “It was important for me to keep the legacy of that name moving forward in my life. They gave us all the tools to be able to give back to our world and be a blessing…It’s a way for me to give back to them.”

Terry’s work spans marketing management, workforce development, career coaching, and what she calls being “a connective tissue for North Carolina,” linking people, entrepreneurs, and small businesses in the Research Triangle Park to opportunities, networks, and new ways of thinking about their skills.

“I’ve always been someone that my network as a whole can really depend on for strategic guidance, depend on for connections, depend on for just overall support,” she said.

Since April, Terry estimates she has helped about 50 people, many of them laid off or struggling to shift jobs in a rocky job market.

“There are hundreds and thousands of people that are currently unemployed right now,” she said. “And in my situation, I was able to quickly pivot and quickly evolve. That’s not everybody’s story.”

A second layoff, and a job market that felt unrecognizable

One of the people Terry helped was Dionne McLean, a Raleigh-based senior manager of strategic partnerships who had also worked at RTI for more than a decade.

“We were both impacted by the federal government contract closures and divisions being shut down,” McLean said.

The layoffs came during what McLean described as an out of the ordinary moment for workers in federally adjacent fields.

“This was just an unprecedented situation,” she said. “There was a bit of angst and anxiety, and that was coming from just the unknown.”

McLean said she entered a job market that felt overwhelming.

“This is truly an employer’s market,” she said. “The pool has gone from hundreds of people to now hundreds of thousands of people that are looking for jobs.”

According to a recent CNN analysis, economists say the US labor market has entered a “low-hire, low-fire” phase, with job growth running at one of its weakest paces in the past two decades—leaving job seekers facing longer, more competitive searches.

Turning networking into a safety net

McLean reached out to Terry for support in June, shortly after Terry launched her business. What Terry offered was not just resume advice, McLean said, but a shift in perspective. 

When looking for work, Terry encourages people like McLean to focus less on job titles and more on transferable skills that are marketable: communication, problem-solving, networking.

“Tamara has a vast network of where she’s been, public, private, small, large entities, and so she kind of knows everybody everywhere,” McLean said. “She’s opening up those opportunities of how to walk into a room and what to say when you go into those doors.” 

McLean said the support helped her regain confidence during a long and often discouraging job search, and even encouraged her to think about starting her own consulting company like Terry’s.

“I haven’t landed a role as of yet, but…I’ve had more success in landing interviews and having conversations, so my networking has grown exponentially,” she said with a laugh. “So if networking was the job, I’m great.”

What feels personal is increasingly widespread

Neither Terry nor McLean described themselves as federal employees. Both worked as contractors through RTI, serving government clients. Still they said the ripple effects of federal funding cuts have been deeply personal.

McLean said she doesn’t know if people realized the impact the federal government had on North Carolina until cuts were made in 2025.

“When we look at the news and we hear, ‘hey, there’s more job cuts, and we’re cutting these federal categories,’ if you’ve never worked in the federal space, you wouldn’t understand what that means.”

According to Terry, she’s seen firsthand people leave research and government-adjacent work to find other opportunities entirely because of instability.

“The stability that used to be the federal government is no more,” Terry said. “It’s tough for people, and when there is instability, I think people would rather back up and retreat versus jump in the fire, because if you jump in, you may be disappointed.”

Finding purpose

For Terry, the layoff did not derail her sense of purpose. It clarified it.

“I don’t believe we were put on this earth for ourselves,” she said. “But rather our ability to really help other people.”

Her faith, she said, carried her through the uncertainty.

“I didn’t have the A, B, C, D, E, F, G, plan,” Terry said. “But one thing I knew for certain was that I served a good God and that He worked everything out for me.”

And she is clear about why she keeps going.

“I’m looking for opportunities to be a blessing to someone,” she said. “That’s how I live my life.”