Job Insecurity - The Wine O’clock Wrap Up

Last week I ran the first of a series of free online events with wine. You could either buy some wine from Petersons (a small business in Singapore I have chosen to support) or BYO wine. 14 people joined and it was fantastic to see everyone’s faces on Zoom with their wine and beer glasses in hand.

The session covered how we can think about change and some things we could think about, if we are worried about losing our job, how to plan to lose your job (yes not a great thing to think about but better to be prepared) and what you can do if you lose your job. I’m going to use a personal story to illustrate how things can go well, or not so well as the case may be….

Back at the start of 2016 (which could have been a great year, just like 2020 could have been a great year) I was offered a promotion and moved to the UK to accept it. I packed up my very happy life in beautiful Singapore and put it into a 40ft container and sent it across the seas. My two boys aged 8 and 5 at the time and my husband hopped on a plane soon after. And my parents moved from Australia a month later to join us and help look after the kids so Arran and I could work. We found a beautiful house in Harrogate to live in and the most lovely school for Aiden and Charlie to go to (which reminded all of us of Hogwarts).

Two months into our new adventure and as we hung the last picture up in our beautiful house, I was told that my company no longer needed my job…..sigh.

Let’s talk about change and choice. Stephen Covey has a great model to think about change. He talks about the circle of concern and the circle of influence and that proactive people spend most of their time in the circle of influence. During “Wine O’clock” we talked about how easy it is to get caught up in the circle of concern (or maybe it should be called the circle of worry).

Lying awake at 3am worrying about CoVid-19 and whether you will continue to have an income helps no one. I know this because back in 2016 I lay awake a lot. I worried about what we were going to do next as a family. I worried about negotiating my severance package. I worried about whether we could stay in the UK….you get the picture. None of this stuff helped.

As soon as I moved into the “circle of influence” and “circle of control” things got better (well mostly). I did things like:

• engage an employment lawyer to represent me (who was actually hopeless at negotiating anything but that’s another story….)
• researched UK work permits (we were basically stuffed and couldn’t work in the UK at least for 2 years), and
• started applying for jobs and working out where we could to move to.

Preventing losing your job may or may not be possible but you can get ahead of things. Every time in my human resources career when I have been involved in making roles redundant it was very clear that things in the business and the economy were not going well. Don’t be in a bubble people! If there is a global financial crisis or a pandemic (as the case may be) it is going to affect most businesses. Yes there are some businesses who do better during these times, but it’s not hard to work out if it’s going to affect the business you own or work in. Generally you should try to keep tabs on how your business makes money and what makes them successful and how they are tracking. Listed companies need to post their results online and most good businesses will regularly give update to their employees on how they are going.

So, get busy thinking about how your business is doing whether your job at risk. Generally organisations have a duty to consult with employees if they are going to make job cuts. You can flip this by thinking about what you could do to either cost your employer less money for a period OR things you could do in your business to improve revenue and/or profits to help the business stay viable.

Some ways you could save your business money include (which squarely put you in the circle of influence):

• Taking reduced benefits or paying for part or all of benefits yourself. You could think about insurances or allowances you may be receiving
• Could you work less days? Could you work a 9 day fortnight or a 4 day week reducing your salary costs by approximately 10% or 20% respectively
• Could you take a pay cut for a period?
• Could you take some holiday/annual leave? This reduces the accrual organisations need to maintain on their balance sheet. Could you take some leave without pay?
• Could you work on a contract on a needs basis?

Work out some options that make sense for you and go have a conversation with your manager. What’s the worst that could happen?

On tough days at work I often fantasise about not working and lying by the pool with a cocktail. The reality of losing your job is very different. Yes this is kinda morbid exercise but is hugely helpful because:

• It’s best to have a plan in case the worst happens.
• It helps stop the 3am worrying about stuff you have no influence or control over, and
• It’s easier to work stuff while you have a job.

I did a bad job of this when I moved to the UK despite knowing the business was under stress and being involved in many cost cutting activities. Don’t be like me.

So how do you plan to lose your job?

Start with what your company owes you in terms of notice and severance. Notice is the period of time the company needs to give you until your job ends or is the equivalent amount of money for the same period. This should be in your employment contract.

Severance is money that the company may pay you as compensation for losing your job. Depending on where (Country or jurisdiction) and who you work for (small or large business), you may be paid something or nothing. Sometimes this information is in your employment contract but more often it’s found in government legislation or company policy. You may need to do some hunting to find this or ask some questions. It’s important to know your legal rights. When you know your notice and severance payment you can work out an immediate financial position.

Then, will your company offer any outplacement (support to help you find another job) or an employee assistance program (which can help with the psychological shock and sometimes financial planning services). Generally only larger organisations can afford to provide this assistance to employees losing their job.

Think about if you have the right to stay in your country, if you lose your job. So this applies to expats. If you are an Australian working in Australia, or an American working in America you are fine. If you are an expat working in a country where you require some sort of company sponsorship or work permit you need to consider what happens if you lose your job. Will you have to leave the country? And in what time period? Are there different ways you could stay in the country if you lost your job? For example in Singapore, if you are on an employment pass, you could consider applying for a personalised employment pass which gives you a longer period to be unemployed and stay.

You can also think about negotiating a period of gardening leave where you are technically still an employee, but you don’t work, so your work permit would not be cancelled for a period. This was something I was able to do in the UK so my family and I could stay and the kids could finish a term of school.

Then what?

Document all your outgoing costs. What could you do without? What could you cut? What could you delay paying? Then look at your savings or investments plus your notice and severance payments. What is your financial position? How long can your survive knowing all this? Then think, what changes do you need to make? Do you need to find somewhere cheaper to live? Do you need a flat mate? Do you need to sell anything (like a car)? All of these things are under your control to manage. What can you put in place now in readiness and what conversations do you need to have with others in your family?

Finally, start building your networks. I am often asked to meet people who are worried about losing their job, or have lost their job and have worked at their company for many years and have a limited network that could assist with securing a new role. It's best to be nurturing your networks before you need them. You might like this post on networking to get a job.

You could lie on the floor or lock yourself in the bathroom and cry for days (which is therapeutic and probably worthwhile for a short period) but at some point its best to get into the circle of influence and control.

So what can you do?

Start with your termination payment. Do you have any leverage to negotiate this? Could you ask to be paid over a number of months (at full or half pay) instead of a lump sum? This may help you manage your finances while unemployed. What is the tax payable? Is your termination payment liable for tax?

How will you invest in your future? At the moment there are many fee and reduced fee online courses. What of these could help future proof your career? What could you learn that would make you more employable?

Update your resume and LinkedIn profile and reach out to your network with your “story”.

Can you get your side hustle happening? When I was in the UK unemployed for 4 months I got my website I-develop-me up and running and wrote three chapters of a book!

Protect your mental health and do some fun things every day.

What else would you do?

Did you ever have a boss who changed your life?

Have you ever come across Gretchen Rubin? If not you can learn about her here and here. She is most famous for The Happiness Project and I wrote about it a bit here.

Any-hoo, I was on LinkedIn the other day, trying to find something interesting, which at times (in my opinion) can be difficult,  and came across a question posed by Gretchen. She asked "Did you ever have a boss who changed your life?"

Immediately I thought yes. Many have. Some good and some bad and most taught me something and as a result, changed my life and career in some way. Here are the three bosses that immediately came to mind.

1. The Store Manager
This boss was a Store Manager when I worked in retail. I was her Assistant Manager and despite her liking me, she didn't want to teach me anything and she was often rude to customers. She was insecure and nervous and I think quite a bit worried that if she taught anyone anything they might take over her job. I wrote about her here. She was very worried when she went on holidays back to the UK for a 6 week trip that we would all get along without her and she wouldn't be needed. Myself and the rest of the team really enjoyed that time she was away. We actually worked as a team and had happy customers.

How did she change my life? She taught me all the things not to do as a manager. She taught me to be generous and teach other people what I knew and to not be insecure about doing that. Managers and leaders who are generous with their time and knowledge will always be valued.

2. The Difficult Manager
I started work at this Australian listed company and from day one I knew it wasn't for me. I didn't fit the culture and my manager was a difficult person from start to finish. She was diagnosed with a debilitating illness when I worked there but I suspect I would have still struggled to work with her demands and style despite that. I tried lots of different things to work with this manager but in the end I just couldn't do it any more. I also wrote about her here

How did she change my life? She taught me that despite being able to work with pretty much anyone, if I don't fit the organisational culture I would fail from the start. I learnt that organisational fit is really important and that there are just some people that I won't be able to work with, and to keep trying is very unhealthy.

3. The Challenging Manager
There are challenging people who are bad for your career, and challenging people who are good for your career. This is a tale of someone good for my career. This manager was open to a debate, a verbal sparring and it was great. If I didn't believe in something I could speak up. He also made me realise the importance of the role of HR. I have worked in many organisations where it wasn't valued that much, but having someone point out that I helped manage the most expensive part of running a business was enlightening. This person was also the first to treat me as a true business partner and confidant, and I learnt so much about the business by just being there to listen.

How did he change my life? He gave me confidence to be me and to not be afraid of conflict, as conflict can help relationships in the workplace.  I also improved my spreadsheet skills immensely!

Did you ever had a boss that changed your life?

Lisa x

The Resume Series: Resume Basics - the 5 don'ts

So back over here I gave you some tips on what you should do if you are pulling together or updating your resume. Sometimes it's easier to say what not to do (and infinitely more fun!). Here we go!

1. Don't include referee contact information: If the company wants to do reference checks they will ask you. This will give you time to chose the best people to speak about you for that specific role, and give you time to contact them. This is also important if they are travelling or overseas where you may need to provide different contact details. You don't want your referees being contacted without your permission.
2. Don't include a photo. Seriously. Unless you are a model about to go to a casting, this will just give recruiters and HR people the chance to roll about the floor grabbing their stomachs in mirth make fun at your ill chosen photo. Stop it. Do have a photo on your Linkedin account. A professional one. Not one holding a cocktail. Not one where you eyes are red from a flash and not one with someone's arm around you, that you have cleverly cropped out. It's not clever.
3. Lose the fancy fonts (thanks Rob). I like me a fancy font. I do. Fancy fonts look great on Pinterest and craft blogs. But unless you are going for a creative type role leave them to the creative types. I recommend just using one font, two at a stretch if you are a little creative. That is it. Also use a fairly normal one. If your resume gets pulled through expensive recruitment software basic fonts and formatting will be your friend.
4. You don't need to detail your family situation or age. Most employers don't care if you are married, separated, divorced, with 2 kids, 3 dogs, a cat and 2 budgies or whether you are living with an alien. If they do care it's none of their bee's wax and in most developed countries it's illegal to ask. In places where it's not illegal they can ask you at interview where you can tell them in person to mind their bee's wax. It's not relevant to the job.
5. Don't send the same resume in for every job. Tailor it to each company and opportunity, AND
6. Yes I know I said 5 don'ts but a friend who works in recruitment (thanks Lynette) made a suggestion about another great don't. It's the section on your resume about your interests. I personally think you should leave this out altogether. If interviewers are interested in you personally, they will ask. If you have to include interests don't put things like "watching TV" or "sleeping" I mean really? One resume I read told me that the person liked to do massage, both kinds. What was I supposed to think about that? I don't remember interviewing that person.

So there you have it folks. Got any other don'ts?

Lisa x

The Resume Series: Resume Basics - the top 10 do's

In times of change and organisational restructuring a good resume is the ticket to your next role. Over this week and the next I'll be covering the basics of resumes. Here is my first post on the topic - the top 10 do's!

Lets face it. Resumes are hard. They are hard because we don't do one very often. They are hard because they get out of date quickly and they are hard because mostly we don't know what a prospective employee is looking for. The job ad may detail a number of things and you may have addressed them in your cover letter and/or resume and you still don't get an interview. Ugh!

I would like to say the process of choosing candidates for interviews is scientific but often it's not. I mean, there is a correlation between choosing resumes that match the selection criteria but it's sometimes a little random. Humans are not particularly rational (despite what some humans tell you) so no matter how closely your resume meets the specification you may or may not get chosen. That's life and unless you have been discriminated against you should just move on. Big companies now use sophisticated resume selection and recruitment software but I'm a little sceptical about how effective it is, though there isn't much choice when you receive hundreds of applicants for any given role.

So what are my top tips for creating or updating your resume?

1. Include basic contact information:  You don't need to provide two email addresses, two phone numbers and your home address. Cut it down. I think a mobile phone number and an email address is adequate. Put them in the header or footer. Will look good and be easy to find.
2. Have a "normal" email address. No bunnybuns69@hotmail.com and no sexymamma81@gmail. Also don't use your current work email address. That's just bad form.
3. Be crystal clear. You can always say something in less words. Make sure you do. Be succinct and if you are not good at this get a friend to read it for you and ruthlessly edit.
4. Be short. I have seen a candidate for a senior role get the job on a one page resume. It can be done. I think 2-3 pages is fine. No more. 
5. Stick to the highlights. No one wants to read War and Peace. No one. I promise, your work history is not that interesting.
6. Be relevant. To the job vacancy. That is all. You look like an idiot when you apply for a job with nothing that matches what the company is looking for. Overseas students pay attention.
7. Spell check. I can forgive one, maybe two spelling mistakes or typos. More pedantic people will not and if writing is part of the job, you are done for.
8. Only include your highest and most relevant qualifications. A massive list of certificates obtained by attending time management 101, team building for dummies and "intro to excel" have no place on your resume.
9. Don't flick it. Online job boards make it very easy to apply for jobs. Don't apply for everything that looks even slightly up your alley. It wastes everyone's time.
10. Tailor your resume for every role you apply for. That might sound like hard work but you should be choosey what you apply for and not apply for that many roles at the same time. 

 What would you like to hear about in regards to resumes? What do you struggle with?

Lisa xx

The war for talent. The battleground has moved.

Much has been written about the war for talent, the term and book made popular by McKinsey & Company and Steven Hankin back in the 90's. The premise is that the competition for attracting and retaining talented employees will intensify due to greater need for talented people (as our organisations and the environment they operate within become more complex) as well as changes to demographics (our ageing population) which will decrease the supply.

I think in part this war for talent still exists but the war is being waged on different battlegrounds

Since the war for talent was written there are potentially other factors at work. Many markets and organisations haven't recovered since the 2009 GFC, there is a decreasing supply of talent to the traditional organisation as well as the potential decrease in organisations as we know them. The one job for life notion is certainly dead and while sitting in Brisbane airport Saturday night (yes my social life is awesome) I read this article called "Kiss the corporation goodbye". It really rang true for me working in big organisations. It talks about everything being cut back, outsourced or temp workers being used to fill a short term need. I certainly feel that a large chunk of my role over the past few years has been spent helping to downsize and cost cut. No one likes to see me at their site.

Some of this is about business models that don't work any more, particularly in Australia and similar developed countries. With high cost of living and high wages, labour intensive manufacturing businesses are just about gone and unions who could have played a role in partnering with organisations to address the issue of low-skill, high-wage jobs, have failed in ensuring their members have ongoing employment. High wages is not the only force at work but they have been a contributing factor in these jobs disappearing from the lucky country.

I think other factors are also at work. Women returning from maternity leave find that either their job has gone (despite the myriad of legislation that supposedly protects it) or they either don't have the skills to negotiate an arrangement that also allows them to support their family requirements, or the traditional corporate environment can't/won't accommodate something different from the 9 to 5 dream (or nightmare) or their partner doesn't contribute equally in the home or childcare is too expensive or the waiting list too long. Or all of the above. I had a little rant about this issue here.

What do these women do? They either decide to look after their children full time, giving up their income, or they do something else like start their own business. I have just been on the Gold Coast with around 500 bloggers, mostly women, many who are making an income from their blogs. Not all have kids and are blogging as a way to have flexible work that allows them to look after their family, but many are. And you know what? These women have attributes that organisations are wanting to go to war over:

• They are smart. Super smart.
• They are organised
• They work bloody hard. Some 80 hours per week.
• They know what is important to them and what they want.
• They are passionate and engaged.
• They are usually working for a higher purpose. They want a different life to what is offered by large organisations. They have built a community of readers that they fiercely protect when brands and advertisers come offering the bucks to market to their readers. 
• They are self starters. They have initiative and are curious and courageous.
• They are inspiring. 

While corporations are struggling and downsizing and losing sight of values that mean something to their customers this particular group of women have moved off the battleground of the offices and towers of big cities and into the homes of (mainly) women. And the women are not at war. They are not competing. They are doing their own thing in their own way. They are collaborating and sharing and connecting and as a result changing traditionally held business models, and making money while they do it. I can't help but think that the traditional organisation has lost the war for this group of talent. Completely.