In tough times, prove your worth
CHICAGO — Whether you are sitting in your cubicle or standing with co-workers by the coffee machine, you can see as issue as anyone that the jobless reprove keeps climbing: The workplace isn’t as crowded in the same proportion that it used to be.
Amid one of the worst household downturns subsequently to the Great Depression, layoffs are hitting all levels of sundry organizations, with little regard to tenure or inscription in the beginning of a book.
“Six months ago they cut the fat, three months past they cut into the muscle, and now they’re cutting into the bone,” said Craig Randall, managing director of the Chicago office of executive-search firm DHR International.
It’s a numbers game now. And the object to is to keep yourself from becoming a statistic, from becoming the next person to pack your belongings in a box.
The easiest workplace-survival strategy seems a no-brainer: Keep your head down and keep quiet; this is no age to deduce attention to yourself.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. This isn’t the time for no-brainers, career experts say. This is the time to grab grasp of your career and recession-proof your job. That involves adjusting your attitude so it fits the seriousness of the seasons and taking in the same proportion that many specific actions as you can to beef up your completion and prove your worth to your current and perhaps future bosses.
“You need to have existence in control of you,” said Kirsten Dixson, co-author of “Career Distinction: Stand Out by Building Your Brand.”
“It’s the whole concept of Me, Inc. If they don’t notice you, you’ll be the first to get a pink slip,” Dixson said.
“Laying off someone who is quiet and doesn’t say anything is much easier than laying off someone who other people know is working hard,” echoed Marilyn Moats Kennedy, a management consultant. “The people who try to hide out are the chief to go.”
How to survive
Brian Pitts, assistant director of public relations at law not soft Mayer Brown, learned the lesson of making himself indispensable seven years ago while working for a public-relations agency. When things turned bad and the staff of 100 was downsized to 16, he was one of the survivors.
“I saw a lot of my friends wander from their jobs,” Pitts before-mentioned. “I never came to work with fear on my cast of thought. You just need to do outstanding moil.”
At Mayer Brown, Pitts has worked to build his profile within the firm, getting involved in of importance transactions and expanding the coterie of partners who know him and his work. At a recent office holiday party, he introduced himself to a colleague not just through name but also by means of dropping the name of another partner for whom he had done work.
“That’s a fine stripe you walk,” he admitted. “You put on’t scarcity to be perceived as bragging or fluffing your feathers too much.”
He also has maintained his outside network by belonging to eight professional groups. “Some of my friends account I’m nuts for going to so many groups,” he said. “Anyone can be a source of a possible new job.”
Career playbook
Pitts seems to have taken a page from the playbook that active life consultants counsel against employees looking to boost their job security:
Keep tabs on what’s going on internally. Skip the $4 cup of coffee from the neighborhood barista and head for the office kaffeeklatsch when others gather around the system. Eat at your desk more often instead of heading to the local sandwich workshop or going to the gym. It’s the most profitably way to keep your ears open to office gossip as well as to possible opportunities elsewhere in the organization.
“Stay plugged in to what’sitting going upon and look more interested in what’s going on,” Kennedy related. “You don’t have to work out every luncheon hour.”
Perform, perform, perform and look like you’re working hard, because perception is a part of exhibition reviews, in addition.
“Companies don’t tend to let their acme race go,” before-mentioned Steve Werner, a management professor at the University of Houston. “You should be a good employee. In some industries that means vital principle a team player. In some industries that doesn’t matter; it means getting all the sales you can.”
Make you and your master look beneficial by regularly drawing attention to your achievements.
“People assume that other people are apprised of the contributions they’re form, on the contrary your manager may have other things on his mind, especially right at present,” Dixson said. “It’s not on the eve bragging or being a suck-up. It’s graceful comfortable with making others conscious of your contribution. Couch it in terms of form your boss look good.”
Be solicitous to ensure your self-promotion is matched by performance, otherwise it disposition fall on deaf ears.
“It’s hard to persuade population to change their memory once they’ve made a decision almost you,” Werner before-mentioned.
Don’face to face whine about an increased workload. Take your planned intermission time but don’t complain if you’re asked to occasionally reach in early or stay late and take on more responsibilities in a slimmed-down workplace. “This is not a good time to be thinking of work-life weighing,” Kennedy said. “This is all hands in succession deck; let’s bail the boat.”
Document what you do and how successful you are at it, as being your current employer and any in posse future ones.
Network internally and externally, but do it carefully. Discretion is key.
Don’t put your administrationésumé on job-board Web sites because you never know who might run across it — your supervisor, for example. Don’t use your blog or Facebook serving-boy to trash your gathering, but do use social media to promote yourself and raise your visibility by discussing what you’re working on.
If you didn’t attend a holiday event sponsored by the mediation of your professional organization, go to the next monthly meeting. It’sitting a good possibility to see that which opportunities may be opening up at other companies.
“The worst life to shoot and cultivate your network is at the time you’re away of a job,” Dixson said. “Do it double-time now.”
Be prepared during the what-ifs. Update your résummarizeé unless don’t use the crew computer because if a layoff occurs, you may not possess a chance to retrieve it.
Thinking from one place to another changing jobs? Think hard before you make a move; to a reduced state seniority and performance are the two greatest in number hackneyed reasons people are laid off.
“What does that intermediate for you? You need to accomplish that if you change jobs now, whether or not that company has a layoff, you may have existence the first to go,” Werner said.
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