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How to hold onto your job in a downturn

By Selby Mills

If the worry of redundancy is keeping you up at night, there are some things you can do. You may need to evaluate your attitude towards work.

• relatively introverted, private and serious?
• less interested in detail and deadlines and perhaps more set in your ways than many of your colleagues?
• someone who doesn't really socialise at work because you believe work is to be worked in and not for socialising?
• someone who's critical of your colleagues and who may participate in the gossip in the organisation?
• someone who doesn't really network or put time into networking but only talks to people when they have a specific purpose?

A couple of years ago Selby Mills, the psychometric assessment specialists, had the opportunity to assess 1,000 employees who had been deprived of their employment through redundancy. The list above is a summary of what this survey produced.

Do you recognise yourself when looking at the above list?

If so, make sure you read the following and do something about it.

There are several actions which employees can take, no matter how senior or junior, in order to protect their employment. Here's a list of them:

• Stay informed about your employer. Set an alert on your PC so you know when anything the company does hits the headlines. Keep in touch with what's happening in the company so you can understand how what you do fits into the larger picture. This way, you will have an understanding and be able to anticipate when downsizing is about to occur.
• Make sure that your boss and your boss's boss recognise you and know what you do. This might involve preparing things in order to open a conversation with them at an appropriate moment, understanding what they do so that you're in a position to display that kind of insight when the opportunity arises. People lose their jobs when they're not seen to be involved. However, do not mimic or copy anything about them or their lifestyle in any way. This is as likely to attract rejection as anything else.
• Empathise with your boss. These are difficult times for everyone. Make sure that your boss finds you easy to talk to, that you understand his or her problems and that you're willing to help out. Otherwise you may be seen as outside the central activity of what's going on.
• Evaluate yourself. Try to imagine what your boss and your colleagues would say about you. How do they judge effective people and the rest? How would they rate you against their criteria? How important and visible are you? The more you can understand these things the more you can do to make yourself central and well regarded.
• Try to come in early and stay late when you can. This is how people get noticed, and while you may not do very much in the additional time you spend in the office, it's also a way to make sure that people don't think of you as a slacker. Make sure that you're visibly working during contact hours and put your mobile phone away.
• Understand how what you do contributes to the company and, if possible, how it contributes to profit. If you do, you must then communicate this to the people around you including your boss.
• Offer to take on additional work. If you know the organisation is under pressure why don't you help somebody out in a congenial way, including your boss? This will help you be seen as someone who is valuable. Don't worry that this may suggest to others that you haven't got enough to do, so long as you also put the hours in.
• Point out successes you helped achieve. Don't be shy about acknowledging when you have done something effective. Make sure that you communicate regularly by email with your boss to summarise what you have done in the preceding week or month. This kind of initiative is valued and saves people checking on you. By doing this you'll create space for yourself and be seen as an effective and goal-centred colleague.
• Look forwards, not backwards and avoid complaining about things. Don't make yourself prominent by asking for a pay rise or promotion. For the moment, be grateful that you have a job. Work in the office and not from home. Most bosses don't trust people they don't know or who aren't in the office regularly. Make it your business for your boss to know you and what you do.

If you follow these tips you are likely to make yourself as indispensable as an employee can be during this tough time.

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