Looking for a job when you have to
A recent article at CIO.com (with apologies to the folks at Network World) – http://www.cio.com/article/587725/IT_Careers_Can_You_Survive_Unemployment – got me thinking. It’s hard these days to find someone that doesn’t know of someone who’s lost a job – if not in the recent recession, during offshoring or the tech stocks bubble-burst … or …
Personally, I can think of four family members that have had to do an unplanned job search at some point during their careers – some more than once. And that number includes me.
For an IT Pro, a job is a big part of your self-identity and ego. After all, we probably spend about 60 hours a week working. Many of us are on call even when we’re not working. You get strokes at work – you feel like you’re doing something that’s meaningful for your organization. Much of your social activity is work-related. The cards you hand out when you’re introducing yourself are business cards. They identify you as an employee of your organization. When you register for a conference – including MMS! – a required piece of data is your company name.
What happens if all of that is yanked from under you? Here are some possibilities. Shock. Denial. Personal Insecurity. Loss of Self-Esteem. Emotional Trauma. Powerlessness. Financial Insecurity. Anger. Loneliness. Loss of Structure in Life. Worthlessness. Depression. Resentment. And this is just the short list.
One thing that happens, once you are lucky enough to snag another job, is you want to do everything you can to be sure that never happens again. Since this is really beyond your control, the next best thing is to be better prepared in case it does happen. How can you do that?
Networking, of course (including always having a current resume because you never know when you’ll need it). Having a good relationship with your boss and staying on the right side of office politics. Reading the tea leaves regularly. Having a good reputation – where your name is known in the industry, not just within your own company. Getting jobs that make you employable – meaning ones with job skills that someone else will want, and always trying to keep a step ahead when it comes to job skills and on the job training. Think of all the Cobol programmers that had great jobs in 1999 dealing with Y2K issues (remember that?). It was great at the moment, but what happened to them afterwards? Be sure your skill sets are hitched to rising stars.
If you have a secure job at the moment, do what you can to insulate yourself personally and professionally should that situation change. And if you’ve been unemployed, you probably already know to always be prepared … just in case. Finding a job is a full time job – and it’s even harder when you have to go retrain to get employable job skills, along with dealing with the emotional and personal fallout.
