YOU CAN ALWAYS FIND WORK
The best people don’t get laid off. If you’re good, there’s work out there for you. Those were the overall opinions of experts gathered recently at BLACK ENTERPRISE’s Career Roundtable. That’s a hard pill to swallow if you have been laid off and unemployed for a year or longer. Since the economic downturn in 2001, more than two million jobs were lost. There was little recovery in 2003, with projections for 2004 seeming optimistic. The downsizing and restructuring of the corporate landscape, however, has had residual effects that will continue to impact the work environment and employment. It’s still a buyer’s market, which brings and supports a high level of corporate arrogance.
“Companies are now leveraging their power in the marketplace,” explains Sharon Hall, managing director for executive search firm Spencer Stuart’s Atlanta office. “During the war for talent, if you were a strong talent, you could get hired because they couldn’t find anybody to change jobs. Now, there is so much excellent talent on the marketplace, corporations want to write … the whole resume. They are that specific.” So employees have to be smarter, more strategic, more visible, and more flexible. These changes in the market have imposed a variety of psychological pressures on those navigating in and out of corporate America on an old paradigm.
“[Companies] no longer hire on potential. They hire on results,” offers Joe Watson, president and CEO of executive search firm StrategicHire in Reston, Virginia. “And when you’re a person of color, that tends to impact you because of the historical lack of access to the right schools, the right career opportunities, the ability to build a foundation that would allow you to excel. You can no longer rely on your potential. You can no longer rely on the interview, on being smart and insightful and intelligent and driven and passionate and all of these buzz words that [in the past meant] great things.”
The experts, however, caution against allowing such new demands to deter you from working or advancing in your career. Success today will be determined by how well professionals compute these changes and how efficiently they react to them.
The pressure is being felt by everyone–white and black–remarks human resources consultant Ron Mason. Today, hiring managers are looking for tangible evidence that you can indeed perform the task and show results. Just being a great individual is not enough of a sell anymore. Job hunters as well as employees have to learn how to restructure their approach to interviewing, networking, and assessing their skills. And the packaging has to be airtight. “Put on your game face,” says Mason. It’s time to play hardball.
Participants of the roundtable include Hall; Mason; Watson; Katherine Giscombe, senior director of research at Catalyst, a nonprofit research and advisory organization working to advance women in corporate America; and Liz Riley, assistant dean and director of M.B.A. admissions at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. They offer specific guidelines to moving past the psychological blocks that prevent many from succeeding.
Know when to change gears. Learning how to be more flexible is probably the biggest challenge for people of color, mainly because the connection between title and accomplishment is a tightly woven mindset, says Watson. The person who loses an executive position mentally often has a hard time settling for a job of lesser rank. As a result, he or she will have difficulty identifying opportunities outside of their sphere of familiarity.
“If I’m the VP of Tide, that’s a big deal,” he explains. “I worked 18 years to get there, and now you’re saying I should think about going into manufacturing of auto parts.” What becomes a bigger deal, however, is not realizing that it may become necessary to change gears, such as considering a new industry or accepting a less prestigious title–just to stay marketable.
As Hall states, professionals also often have a hard time assessing their capabilities beyond a title. A vice president of marketing has difficulty seeing how the skills that he or she developed could serve in another position or in another industry. Declining to interview for a job based on the title and not what the position requires will oftentimes result in lost job opportunities. Enough lost opportunities can keep a job seeker out of the market for an extended period of time. “I can’t tell
BLACK ENTERPRISE / blackenterprise.com / FEBRUARY 2004
you how many people I have talked to now look back and [regret turning down offers] because they weren’t right,” says Hall.
But, as Mason points out, being flexible extends into a number of areas that include relocating and accepting a pay cut. “You’ve got such a [high] concentration of people and a low concentration of availability in major cities.” He suggests that candidates should consider places like Abington, Wisconsin, or St. Louis for work. “Headhunters themselves are feeling better about the talent, being able to draw them to those places,” Mason explains. “In the past you couldn’t get them to leave [the major cities.]”
Learn how to play ball. Giscombe, in her groundbreaking study for Catalyst, Women of Color in Corporate Management: Opportunities & Barriers, among a number of discoveries, found that there is reluctance by African American women to share personal information such as hobbies, family concerns, etc. with colleagues on the job. This creates a potential problem of perception. Unfortunately, she says, “Because you are [perceived as] an outsider, people will assume things about you or make up things about you.” It puts you under significantly more scrutiny, she notes. There are also professional repercussions.
“As people of color, we’ve got to challenge this particular notion that somehow we can stand apart and say, ‘Well, you know, I just don’t socialize,'” adds Watson. “If you make the choice to play on a field with rules, whereby golf is part of the rules, or socialization after work is part of the rules, understand by choosing not to participate, there are implications.” As a result, Watson adds, many corporate executives spend years on the sidelines, screaming, “I’m open. I’m open,” waiting for someone in upper management to toss them the ball. Their resistance to participate in the culture of the corporation–either intentionally or unknowingly–prevents them from ever getting noticed. They are never considered part of the team. “You could either try to create a whole new path of promotional progress and change everybody’s mind in the organization” says Watson, “or you can learn how to play golf.”
Don’t hide out in school. Business school is only a good option if you are clear on your career objectives and have determined how a second degree will enhance your goals, says Riley. “Some people are rushing back to business school. Some of those people have been laid off [and see it as] a good place to hide out for two years. The M.B.A. environment is not the place to try and find yourself,” she explains. At a school like Fuqua, where students are “aggressive and hungry,” it could be “an extremely intimidating environment.”
You should know, however, that many business schools have also made curriculum adjustments that speak to the tough job market. Some competitive schools like Fuqua now provide programs that allow candidates to keep their jobs while pursuing a second degree.
Stay busy. Being unemployed, particularly for long periods of time, can erode self-esteem and throw you into an altered state of reality, say the experts. Mason says unemployment may trigger haunting questions like “Am I as good as I really think I am? Does my family see me as a failure? Am I adding va
lue here?”
Long bouts of unemployment can also make it difficult to accept ownership. “It’s very hard for people who have been out for a long time [to be honest] about why they’re not employed, about the choices they may have made,” says Watson.
All of the experts agree that it is important to stay busy. “Go to work,” says Watson, “whether it’s for pay or not.”
Read on for more of the experts’ strategic advice on battling the corporate storm and setting your sail for success.
OFF TO A GOOD START
The brutal economic climate has stalled the careers of many young professionals, but Lakila Richardson’s future already looks promising. Even before beginning her senior year at North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University in Greensboro, the finance major won a coveted offer to join General Electric Co.’s prestigious, two-year financial management program after her graduation in May 2003. Richardson, 22, notes that the highly competitive program has launched the careers of many GE chief financial officers and blue chip chief executives and CFOs.
Richardson credits her entree into corporate finance to two successful internships in the finance department of GE Plastics and to her commitment to developing mentors and seeking opportunities to network.
Other young professionals can easily follow her example by thinking ahead. According to Watson, that means developing a career plan.
Professionals “should pay a much higher level of investment of time and attention learning about managing [their] careers,” he says. A good career plan, he explains, should include strategies for networking and mentoring and a realistic assessment of your career goals and the path most likely to attain them. He also recommends examining external and personal obstacles that could possibly derail your plans.
Work your network. Effective networking can raise your profile and put your name in front of influential people who can boost your career. As a student, Richardson worked in the business school dean’s office and took advantage of the access she enjoyed there. “I was always in someone’s office or delivering something from here to there,” she says, which led to informal networking with professors and administrators. Consequently, when opportunities for added exposure arose, she often got the call. “A lot of times I didn’t even really have to go out and seek out opportunities,” Richardson says. “Because I made myself well-known in the school of business, my name would come up.”
On several occasions, the Fayetteville, North Carolina, native was one of five or six North Carolina A&T business school undergraduates invited to attend dinners with visiting executives. She used those opportunities to ask questions and learn more about the finance industry.
Request an informational interview. Most trade publications profile executive promotions, appointments, and achievements. In another form of effective networking, Mason recommends calling such executives who are in a position you’d like to achieve and asking for career advice. Not asking for a job takes the pressure off and may allow for a freer exchange of information. “It may not be germane to the moment, but the key is you got another name of a person that you never had before.”
That strategy has widened Jeffrey D. Powell’s network and raised his profile in his industry. Powell, a 29-year-old assistant vice president in the personal financial services group at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. in Houston, has created a monthly “target list” of executives culled from several publications, including BE.
“Every month I’m going to meet someone new,” says Powell, who manages about $160 million in assets for about 200 affluent clients. He also keeps a record of executives’ birthdays and/or hobbies and is meticulous in following up and creating new opportunities to interact.
Make the connection. Mentorship is another opportunity to not only expand your network, but to understand the unwritten rules of a corporation and the industry. Giscombe recommends that professionals rely on a diverse slate of mentors–a personal board of directors, of sorts, that can provide career counseling, act as sponsors, and make recommendations for high-visibility positions within your company on your behalf.
Watson agrees. “People of color should have all types of mentors,” of all races. “The real value of mentors is the knowledge and information that they give you that allows you to make better decisions in your place of employ.” Powell’s mentors have schooled him in everything from corporate codes of conduct to grooming. Financial services executive James Graham, who Powell credits with his present status, got Powell his first financial services internship and taught him the importance of aligning himself with diverse corporate supporters.
Although many of her relationships with mentors were informal, Richardson chose them carefully. “I gravitated toward people I felt had some level of experience in what I was trying to do,” she says. Her mentors included several North Carolina A&T professors and Quister Craig, dean of the school of business, who Richardson says was instrumental in helping her obtain the internships that led to her current job. After the first GE internship, Richardson was offered a second one for the following year. The company made its job offer after giving Richardson high marks in the second internship.
Cultivating relationships with mentors, as well as supervisors and managers, requires time and follow-through. However informal, it is a two-sided commitment. As Hall explains, “I’m happy to give you some tips that can get you started, and I expect when you call me you will have done those things, or I can’t take you seriously.”
Honor their time and your commitment. People who are successful are busy and have limited time. If you tell your mentor you’re going to send her information or if she asks you to read an article, do it. “When you do what you say you’re going to do, you build credibility,” Watson says. “That distinguishes you from the pack and indicates that you take the work that you’re doing with them seriously.”
Request informal evaluations. Talking informally about your performance with your supervisor can help you avoid unpleasant surprises at evaluation time and could even help you influence the outcome of your review. “You don’t want to get all the way through the year with something you could have fixed six months before,” says Watson.
Richardson, who is currently doing a six-month rotation in commercial finance in GE’s Sealants and Adhesives unit in Charlotte, North Carolina, often meets with her manager on upcoming projects and seeks informal evaluations. “I just want to make sure that I’m doing what’s expected of
me,” she explains, “and if I have any concerns I have the opportunity to voice them.”An open and regular flow of communications between management and employees reduces misunderstandings and misjudgments.
GETTING BACK ON TRACK
When Melvin Alexander’s job as acting CEO and president of a Baltimore manufacturing firm ended, he and a partner began charging $100 an hour as consultants for business and operational analysis. “That seemed to be the quickest thing to get into without making [a large] capital outlay,” he says. Though, because of the economy, he found the market to be flooded with consultants, it helped keep Alexander’s family afloat as his severance package dwindled.
There was another benefit: It kept him productive, which makes him more valuable than the person who is just sitting at home lamenting a tight market. “People need to work,” insists Watson. “Being unemployed, being home is not the way to go. Go to a nonprofit, volunteer, wor
k for free.” Unfortunately, even in this environment, hiring managers believe that the best people don’t get laid off, offers Hall. “They’ll say, ‘We’ll look at [this prospect]. He’s only been out there for three months. We won’t look at person number two because he’s been on the market 18 months.'”
If you’ve been laid off, know that getting back into the marketplace is going to require more strategies, more resources, and more effort than you may have thought. And according to the experts, if you’re qualified and talented and have been unemployed for more than 12 months, you just haven’t worked at it hard enough. Here are some tips to get back in the game:
Rethink your networking strategy. “Networking in and of itself is not happenstance,” says Watson. “Folks need to have a plan.” The highlight of a networking event should not be the open bar. “[Too often,] there’s no process given to who is going to be there, what is the background to the people on the board, have they published articles,” mentions Hall. “How great is it to walk up to somebody at a networking event who you have an interest in [and say], ‘I loved the piece you just had in the San Antonio Express.'”
Mason offers another suggestion: “If there is someone who you need to meet, call [someone from] your Rolodex and say, ‘Who in XYZ industry do you know? I would love for you to somehow arrange a lunch for the three of us to go.’ [It’s] a phenomenal technique that has really worked to expand my network.”
Focus on function. Titles and tenure mean less today than they did 10 years ago, suggests Mason. “There seems to be less emphasis on time spent on the job versus accomplishments in the job. [You want] to give a sense of the kinds of problems that you handle, because those problems oftentimes are generic across other industries and other companies.” Showing your effectiveness in those areas makes you more valuable to a prospective employer.
“You have to reposition how you look at the skills in your résumé,” adds Hall. “What are the arrows in your quiver? I have leadership; I have marketing; I’ve got management. If you look at your résumé that way, that goes a lot of different places.”
Be prepared. Just as the job market has changed, expect changes in the interview process, which, according to Mason, is designed to find reasons to eliminate candidates.
“Smart people know what they are going to be asked in an interview. … You should have your answers drawn up, they should be scripted, they should be tight, you should have tested them with friends and family and other people that can provide you with candid feedback, and when you sit down, you should be ready,” Watson says.
That means being focused and concise. Don’t try to present your résumé to every question, advises Hall. “Nobody has four minutes per question to hear you go on and on about how great you are. If you understand what they are looking for and you are asked a question, you ought to be able to answer that question in 90 seconds or less and stop. Let them probe and ask you more. You want to be crisp, clean and focused and confident.” You also want to be proactive, which can be accomplished by “peppering the conversation with little insights into the company,” she says. “You set yourself miles apart just by answering questions with, ‘I know you historically had high turnover in marketing and it could be a result of X. The way I approach that kind of thing differently is …'” It shows that you really know something substantial about the company.
Being properly prepared requires time between interviews. “If you’re someone who says with pride, ‘I’ve interviewed [with] six companies in the past six weeks,’ there is no possible way you could have put all [the necessary] effort into each of those different businesses,” states Hall.
Be flexible. Being flexible extends into several areas of your job search, says Mason. It requires you to consider other industries, to consider relocation and oftentimes a pay cut. Recognizing the extent to which you may have to leave your comfort zone necessitates introspection, offers Giscombe. “Before you are honest with your interviewers about their questions, it’s really a self-assessment of what you honestly want … then figuring out the tradeoffs.”
Alexander credits his ability to be flexible to his faith and family. The former manufacturing executive left behind his industry and comfortable life in Columbia, Maryland, for a new opportunity to work in real estate in North Carolina. “I always believed that God would provide,” he says.
If you keep the faith, and proceed with an open mind and a plan, you can get back on track.
MAKING THE SWITCH
Seven years ago, Rod Mcdonald was a computer programmer and developer who had worked for such companies as IBM Corp. and Martin Marietta Aero & Naval Systems and had just secured a job with Dow Jones & Co., providing computer support and managing information technology projects for the newsroom.
“I was happy in tech. When I came to Dow Jones, the first two years were good because there was [challenging] work,” Jones says. “After that, it became mundane and I realized it wasn’t something I wanted to do anymore. I was thinking that I wanted to go back to grad school for something that I really felt passionate about.”
After five years with Dow Jones, McDonald enrolled in a film and video production program at Washington, D.C.’s American University. He had been taking classes part time for only a couple of weeks when his career transition plans took on a whole new urgency. In November 2002, Dow Jones laid him off.
At first, McDonald started sending off résumés in desperate search of another technology job. “That really wasn’t working. The economy was really bad when I initially got laid off–at its worst–and I wasn’t hearing anything from anyone.”
After fruitless searching, McDonald reconsidered his plan to make a career change. Fortunately, because he had taken note of the massive layoffs that had been taking place across the technology industry, he had prepared financially in case of a job loss.
“By the time I got laid off, I wasn’t debt-free, but I was prepared.” Relying on savings and severance, McDonald, 36, decided at the beginning of 2003 to devote his energy to new career goals.
Volunteering helped jumpstart McDonald’s early gigs in video production. “I volunteered on student films. If someone was coming to town and [was] working on a small film, I would volunteer. Then I started getting calls from all these different avenues–people [I’d met] where I volunteered, people from the school. I’ve had to turn things down.”
In the past year, he’s worked on the filming of the Fourth of July Concert on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the NFL Kickoff Show, and Black Entertainment Television’s Walk of Fame show honoring Aretha Franklin.
While McDonald was successful in finding a new career path that fulfills his passion, there are many opportunities in a variety of fields that professionals often overlook in seeking employment. Experts offer advice on how to be more proactive in your search.
Forget your job title. “We need to look at the résumé and not the job title and job level in [the] industry,” explains Hall. “[Opportunities are lost when] we don’t connect the skills from our résumé to the skills industries and companies are looking for.” She gives an example of a vice president of marketing with a consumer packaging background who limits their search to similar positions. “[As a recruiter,] I can call and say, ‘Here’s an aluminum company in a B to B market who needs exactly that skill.’ [Th
e candidate] says, ‘Oh, no. I want Kraft or Tide.’ I say okay. We don’t push.”
Thinking about skills more conceptually than literally, says Hall, helps job seekers think more broadly and become more receptive to opportunities they may come across.
Look at nontraditional industries. “A lot of folks who are very positively-motivated like to go after what I call the ‘sexy’ jobs,” says Watson. “In an economy like this … maybe a person who was in high tech [should consider] distribution.” There are many instances when experience in areas such as sales, project management, and marketing can be transferred to other industries. According to Watson, many less popular companies have “upgraded their workforce significantly [by] pursuing refugees–the best and brightest from the glamorous world of tech.”
Once you’ve established yourself in your new position, you may have even more opportunities than before. “[If you’re] a person who delivers results,” he continues, “you are able to distinguish yourself fairly rapidly.”
Expect a pay cut. It may not be the case in every situation, but professionals should expect to make significantly less money when switching industries.
“People look at their salary history and they feel that because they made X, then that’s something that they always should continue to make,” Watson explains. “But salary history is directly tied to the value that the company [where] you worked placed on the specific knowledge that you have. Once you move outside of being a holder of significant knowledge and specific knowledge in an area that company is interested in, your value goes down.
“You are paid for your ability to impact results,” he adds. “The faster you can impact results, the faster you can engage, the more we can justify paying you.”
David Pailin, a senior partner with Dallas-based executive search firm the Pailin Group, was actually able to increase his salary when he switched careers. In the mid-80s, Pailin, an accountant by trade, sought the help of an executive search firm to find work when his employer planned to relocate him to Tulsa, Oklahoma. The firm was looking for recruiters to deal specifically with the accounting industry. “The manager noticed that I had a sales background and obviously accounting because I was an auditor and said I could double my income by being a recruiter,” he says.
“In the first year I became the record recruiter for the agency by no more than just going through my Rolodex. I found an occupation where my previous background could serve me.”
Begin training at your present job. “Identify an area of interest–marketing, sales, etc.–and cross-train within [your current] organization,” advises Pailin. “You’ve already built your tenure up there, you know the culture, you know the major players, you know the politics at the company.” Experience in the new area can then be taken to potential employers in the new industry.
Volunteer. Career experts suggest job applicants consider nonprofit organizations as a way to gain transferable expertise.
“Nonprofits are always looking for people who want to help, who want to bring value,” says Watson. Oftentimes they have limited budgets and as a result are eager to accept help. “Let’s say you’re in banking right now and you want to move into Web design. If you were to go to a nonprofit and say, ‘I’ve taken a look at your Website, I think there are some things I could do to help tweak it, I’d like to volunteer my time,’ they’d probably say, ‘OK.’ So now when the employer says ‘Well, you haven’t really worked in Web design,’ you can say ‘Well, actually I have. I’ve done a number of nonprofit consulting assignments.’ ” If you’re out of work, volunteering is also a proactive way of keeping relevant in the marketplace.
HOW THE GAME IS PLAYED
To hear Steve Edmonson tell it, missing out on a promotion was one of the best things that ever happened to his career. The year was 1984. A self-professed “nerd-technical type of guy,” Edmonson was employed as a computer technician.
“I was working on a project with a group of people. We were all peers on the team and at the end of the project, everyone got promoted to director except me. And one of my friends who got the job said, ‘You know, Steve, we come to you for these technical things, you’ll do the job, and we can count on you. But you’re not someone we can count on when it comes to business decisions. You’re not viewed as a business guy. You don’t speak our language and this time you didn’t get invited to the dance.'”
Fast-forward to 2003. Edmonson, who is in his fifties, now holds the position of vice president for information technology business management at Dublin, Ohio-based Cardinal Health Inc. He credits his ascent not to his technical skills, but rather to learning a lesson that so many black professionals miss–the key to climbing the corporate ladder is not so much the written rules of the job description, but rather the unwritten rules of mentoring and networking both inside and outside of the organization.
“I was a great technician and became noted for my technical ability. But once I started to look upward, it became even more important that I actually networked and I got other people to value what I brought to the table,” Edmonson says. “It’s a matter of just getting to know what people need and understanding their needs so you can help them and they can help you.”
Understand what networking is. Effective networking isn’t looking for what someone can do for you, but rather what you can do for someone else, says George C. Fraser, author of Success Runs in Our Race: The Complete Guide to Effective Networking in the Black Community (Amistad Press; $13.95), newly revised and updated for 2004.
Whenever Angie Pace Kirk, a human resources generalist for an investment management firm in Baltimore, has a conversation with someone at her company, she always tries to find some bit of information she can provide to that person at a later date. “If something comes across my desk that’s useful to them, I may send it, or give them a call and let them know [what’s happening].” Even if the person can’t use the information, Kirk has opened up the dialogue and deepened the relationship.
Make time to network. “Successful people–people who are at the top rung of every ladder in America–spend about 54% of their time working on cultivating, nurturing, and developing relationships,” says Fraser, who in 2001 commissioned The Gallup Organization to conduct a study that looked at the networking practices of black Americans. “According to this [Gallup] study, 70% of black professionals spent less than five hours a week cultivating, nurturing, and developing relationships.”
But where can busy professionals find 50% of their time to network when there are deadlines to meet and projects to complete? Mason says it’s an investment you have to make. “You have to say to yourself, ‘I’ve got to make sure that I take time to keep myself vibrant, to keep myself contemporary, to keep myself known. Without it, I’ve given them 110% but when they are done with me, what do I have?'”
Lunchtime and coffee breaks provide an excellent opportunity for informal meetings, while workplace organizations such as affinity groups, softball teams, and voluntary committees offer more structured methods of getting to know people from all walks of the organization.
Networking also often spills over after hours in the form of happy hours and other social activities.
“There’s a work-life balance that comes into that–to be home with the family and children or at a bar drinking with some guys after work,” says Edmonson. “You don’t have to do it every night, but you need to build it into y
our program and make sure it’s effective. So you need to plan it just as you would plan a meeting. Make sure the right people are going to be there.”
Kirk draws up a schedule and sets aside money for networking. “I actually have a little budget that I set up for myself that says, ‘Every month I want to try to do at least this many lunches,'” she says.
Develop an internal network. One of the reasons black professionals often have a hard time with inter-office networking is because there is no clear set of blueprints on how it is done, says Jylla Moore Foster, chief executive officer of leadership training and executive coaching company Crystal Stairs Inc. and author of Due North! Strengthen Your Leadership Assets (Crystal Stairs Inc.; $24.95). That’s why, according to Giscombe, “Mentoring is the number one factor for success.”
Edmonson credits his mentor with suggesting that he get his M.B.A. so he would feel more comfortable networking with the upper-level executives in corporate America. “One of the things I didn’t do is I didn’t speak the language of business. I spoke the language of the technical guys in the organization. They were going nowhere just like I was going nowhere,” he says.
His mentor, a white, male executive, pointed that out to him and also introduced him to people in the industry that could open doors in his career. It was then that his career began to take off.
But while acknowledging the importance of having a mentor, Edmonson also notes that “Effective mentors really select people they think have potential. Not everyone who wants a mentor has potential and the mentors–especially if they are executives–have limited time and want to make sure that the people they’re working with have potential to actually climb the ladder.”
Be a success enabler, suggests Watson. Aligning your goals with those of your manager and helping him achieve them will increase your status. “The things that are important to your boss should be important to you,” he says. “They want to reward those who make them successful.”
KEEPING YOUR PROFESSIONAL STOCK HIGH
Once you’ve secured a position, or if you’ve been fortunate to have tenure with a company, you should never be secure enough to exhale, feeling overly confident in your standing. Stay uncomfortable, say the experts. “In comfort lies complacency,” explains Joe Watson, president and CEO of StrategicHire. And complacency, he believes, begets a number of professional ills: inactivity, arrogance, and weakened competitiveness.
There’s also a corporate component. “Almost all companies go through a process of qualifying who to lay off because they want to minimize lawsuits,” offers human resources consultant Ron Mason. “They put scores to it, and based on your score, you become a candidate [for being laid off]. Further to that point, they are not letting all the people of color go because that is automatically a class action suit waiting to happen. So the question becomes, ‘Why was I one of those people selected?’ ”
Performance is a major part of that score. Of course, the degree to which your job is relevant within a department or company is more difficult to personally impact. But there are strategies you can implement to keep your professional stock high within your firm. The more valuable you are perceived by a company, the less likely you will end up on the list for layoffs.
Add value to your position. Companies today are focusing on results. It’s important for employees to take the lead on company projects and initiatives. Join task forces that cross several departments to broaden your exposure among other department heads and volunteer for the some of the less glamorous and popular assignments. “The person who is giving out the assignment recognizes that they are going to have [to] pull teeth to get people to volunteer,” says Mason. “What [a manager will] remember most is that you were willing to take the risk.”
Blow your own horn. Don’t be modest about your accomplishments, says Sharon Hall, managing director of Spencer Stuart’s Atlanta office. “Make sure that a lot of different people know what you’ve done and what your bottom line contributions to the company have been.”
Stay progressive. Education does not end with a degree. It is important to continually upgrade your knowledge and skills. Take advantage of company offerings of tuition reimbursement and special training seminars. Says Watson, “It’s amazing how when folks finish their schooling, all of a sudden they stop learning. That’s a dangerous thing.”