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losing your job

Facing Job Loss Or Redundancy: Nine Survival Tips

July 24, 2020 by Jenni Proctor 1 Comment

Are You Worried You Might Be Facing Job Loss Or Redundancy?

[Updated July 2020]

The fear of losing your job, facing redundancy or being unemployed is almost as insidious as concern about Covid-19 itself at the moment.

You may have heard the rumours that the business you work for may not survive the economic repercussions of the pandemic, or they are about to reduce staff. You feel concerned, knowing that no-one is safe in their employment at the moment. How could they just suddenly announce that your job no longer exists? After all, you know how hard you’ve worked, and you believe your work is valuable and valued.

But an unsettling feeling has crept in. Media and government reports are negative and worrying. What if you are about to lose your job!  What will you do?  How will you react?  You imagine the worst; losing your job; facing redundancy; being unemployed. In your mind, especially at 3 am, it is not a pretty sight!

Facing-Redundancy-losing-your-job

Prepare Yourself For Possible Redundancy

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Filed Under: Your Employment Tagged With: losing your job, made redundant, redundancy

How to Cope With Job Loss

December 15, 2015 by BoomersNextStep Guest Author Leave a Comment

How to Cope With Job Loss

How do you cope with job loss?

Losing a job can lead to negative feelings – inadequacy, embarrassment, insecurity and devastation. Recovery can take time, making it easy to become depressed or anxious. Learning how to cope with job loss is crucial for avoiding this. It can lead to an even better future, like undiscovered opportunities or a new career path that you may not have thought about otherwise!

7 Supportive Steps on How to Cope with Job Loss

Try not to panic or get overwhelmed. Realize this is an opportunity and move on. Allow yourself to experience natural feelings of denial, anger and grief. Accept what happened. It was just a job; now look to the future. Embrace your forced vacation. Relax, do projects around the house you have been neglecting, visit family or volunteer. Stop all unnecessary purchases. New clothes, eating out, movies and other little luxuries add up quickly! Start thinking about your next career. Update your resume, network and take classes that refresh your skills or prepare you for a new career path. Start your job search. Contact employment agencies, find recruiters, search the Internet, check the classifieds and let people know you are ready for work.

Stress Relievers

Channeling any negative energy into something positive really helps fight off stress. Here are some stress relievers to try. Do what you enjoy and what works for you.

Exercise, walk, do yoga or Pilates Help others or volunteer. Get a massage Go back to church, practice your faith Talk with others. Write in a journal (like in your Career Journal! See our Self-Marketing handout.) Meditate and breathe deep – try saying “woosah” with your eyes closed Play games and laugh Listen to your favorite music or relaxing music Plant a garden Eat a balanced, healthy diet Reduce caffeine and alcohol intake Do not procrastinate

Calming Down

During a panic or anxiety attack one of the most effective methods is deep breathing. The following exercise physically and mentally calms you. Putting your focus on the breathing and taking it off the anxiety makes the anxiety go away.

Breathe through your nose for a slow 1-2-3 count. Hold your breath for a slow 1-2-3 count. Exhale for a slow 1-2-3 count. Do this as long as you want; it really helps. Stop the anxious thought and replace it with a more calming thought (weekend plans, a family trip, etc.).

Or focus on something else: count backwards from 100 by 3’s, say the alphabet backwards, focus on an object around you, etc. If possible have someone you know/trust talk to you and comfort you. Tense the various muscles in your body for a few seconds and then release, allowing yourself to relax. If you are able to stand, get up and walk around slowly, while “slowly” deep breathing (change of focus). Do not lock your jaws together; this worsens any nausea in your panic attack. Relaxing your face helps.

Negative Emotions

For most of us, job loss has a devastating emotional impact. You may experience some of the following emotions. Rejection, failure, or a sense that you did a poor job Embarrassment or weakened identity from no longer earning an income Anger towards yourself, your former employer, the situation, the economy, etc. Fear or anxiety about the future, your career, your ability to pay immediate financial needs and provide for your family Depression, which can result in even more challenges for finding a new job (changes in eating/sleeping habits, low energy, avoiding people, neglecting hygiene and appearance) Stress over any or all of the above emotions

Dealing with Negative Emotions

Any of these feelings are a normal response to job loss, but you must decide how to handle them. If you recently lost your job, you will come across people who recently lost theirs too, which can cause more stress. Job loss is always occurring, you just did not notice because it did not affect you personally. Ignore the fact that everyone around you is unemployed. Focus on yourself. Everyone has lost a job at some point, so do not take it personally. You are not the only one, although it may feel like it now.

Make a Choice: Dwell on it or move on.

Choose to move on! Feel the pain and then do something about it. Get yourself recharged and head out in full gear for the next lucky employer to see your value. You may realize one day, that this job loss is a blessing in disguise. Many times they are! Everything happens for a reason. So if you lose your job, pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and get back out there!

Coping Strategies

If your job loss was because of performance, learn from it for your future employment. If it was a layoff, it was out of your control. Company reorganization can result in eliminated positions. Acknowledge your emotions, do not hide them. Take a few days to relax, recover and regroup. Get support from friends, family and professional colleagues. Maintain the human contact and interaction like you had at work. Do not isolate yourself. Maintain a healthy diet and avoid alcohol and drugs. Maintain a positive attitude and receive positive outcomes. It drives you to do better and go farther.

Finding a job is your full-time job now.

When do you get a job, keep looking once in awhile. Always keep your options open. If you feel depressed, (increased anger, changes in sleeping/eating, hopelessness or sadness) for longer than a week, seek professional help. Networking is emotionally satisfying and the most effective job search technique. Instead of dwelling on your job loss, you are actively eliminating the cause of your stress. Networking gives you face-to-face human interaction, new friends, new conversation, information and insight! During your job hunt, keep a calendar with you daily schedule. This really helps you organize, focus and execute your job search. Anything on paper (or Yahoo calendar) is easier to follow than a schedule in your head. You will be prepared and looking forward to upcoming events and tasks.

Play to Your Strengths

Even during a recession, people still have needs to be met. Ask yourself, “What are my career strengths and how can they be helpful to others?” This may mean branching into a related field that requires the same skill-set, or perhaps learning a new set of skills for a related job. You may even start your own business.

Career-reno-masterplan-3

Filed Under: Job Search For Older Workers Tagged With: job losses, losing your job

Losing Your Job Can Be Emotional

September 1, 2014 by Jenni Proctor Leave a Comment

Redundancy isn’t the sort of news you expect to get by text message.

The major construction company Thiess has sent out text messages to staff working on a specific project to tell them that their services are no longer required.  The message was factual, offering information updates, a contact email and phone number, and finish dates.

What were they thinking? Losing your job is a very emotional experience that demands far more sensitivity than a text message allows.

Man wearing construction helmet

Redundancy with it so many levels of emotions, unique for each person.  There is the obvious sense of “I’ve worked hard for them and they don’t want me any more”…and that hurts.  That emotion occurs for most people, irrespective of whether they love or hate their job.

For most there is the worry about what will happen next.  Will I find another suitable job?  Will I have to move to get work, and what will that mean for my family? What if I never get another job that is paying the same money or using my skills?

It’s not always bad. For a few people, redundancy is welcomed as they were already thinking about moving on or retiring and the redundancy becomes a clean fast-tracking of the process, with an unexpected windfall.  For others it becomes the catalyst to leave their comfort zone and try something new, even something exciting that they may not have tried if they had stayed in their job.

Each person who receives news that their position has been made redundant is an individual who deserves to be treated with respect, to be (even if it seems insincere at the time) reassured that their work has been valued and valuable to the company, and to be given the opportunity to talk through their future plans with a qualified and experienced career professional.

If you know that the company you work for is about to restructure, and talk of redundancies is swirling around your workplace, there are actions you can take to prepare yourself for the inevitable.  By being properly prepared you give yourself the best possible chance of embracing this change and making it be a turning point that you look back on with pleasure not pain.

Hopefully other companies will learn from this major Theiss PR mistake and handle their redundancies with more empathy and tact than has been evident in this situation.

Filed Under: Your Employment Tagged With: losing your job, redundancy

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