The great unemployment saga
After realising that uni would be over in a matter of a few months, and - worse - that if I didn't get a job and somewhere to live sharpish, I would have no choice but to gather up all my stuff and drag myself back to the one-horse town where my parents currently reside, in the middle of nowhere, in Wales, where there's no work even when the economy is good, and miles away from my friends. Not to mention that a long-distance relationship was totally out of the question, this was without doubt a death sentence (my parents' idea of a fun day is going for a nice long walk to the garden centre for a jacket potato and a cream tea). Here began the five stressful months of buying a suit, applying for every job going, doing phone interviews in Smiths and fretting constantly about what would happen if I didn't get a job.

I applied and went to interviews all the way through my finals, signed up with every temp agency going and dressed my idiotic community service making flyers and taking money from old people for their lunch up as "front of house with IT responsibilities" and did everything in my power to hide my lack of experience. I applied to the same McDonald's as Twat Ex With Child worked in, I went for front of house at a hotel, a cleaner, a legal administrator, anything that required basic IT skills and not much experience.

As most of you know, this enraged my already furious father (who sent me an email calling me a selfish little bitch and how dare I not want to come home and play happy families) and he spent my entire results day and graduation days calling me stupid and telling me I was "selling myself short". I crashed with a friend, I moved back into halls, and finally got onto a winner (if the person who told me I'd got the job had been standing in front of me, I'd have hugged her) with the company I've been with since August and want to stay put - preferably after a promotion - but am still not safe, or at least don't feel it. I'm getting a lot of mixed messages and don't feel completely secure in the job - now I have the job and the flat I busted my arse to get, I'm damned if I'm going through all that again.

So, b3tans - how do you keep a job in this climate?
( Maladicta, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 21:42, 14 replies)

Learn things.
Never, ever stop learning things about work, why things work the way they do... making yourself an expert and go-to girl in areas within the company is a very useful position to be in, because it makes you that bit harder to get rid of (think about the problems when people go on holiday or are ill). It's the only way I've kept my job, and while I don't exactly work in a huge company, it always helps - you never know when you'll need something you've learned in your own time.
(Potty Jag har smör i min rumpspringa, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 21:54, closed)

On the other hand...
"indispensible" also means "unpromotable"...

:)
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 9:49, closed)

Depends how big the company is.
If it's a big company, you only exist on a spreadsheet, and how good you are is not a factor. You'll be out the door regardless.

If it's a small company, you have a chance. As said above, you have to be indispensable, and liked by those who count.

To keep your sanity, I advise not listening to:

a) your father
b) any colleagues going round with rumours of the end. Once it's going to happen, if it's going to happen, you'll know. Until then, it will get you stressed and achieve little else to worry.

GOOD LUCK !
( I_Was_Mordred, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 22:40, closed)

Thanks :)
I gave up listening to my father when I was 11 and he told me if I ever got pregnant when I wasn't married, he'd kick me out.
( Maladicta, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 23:34, closed)

Hmm
Not a nice thing to say to an 11-year-old, granted.

However, I would have thought that the issue should be less about getting pregnant "while not married", and more about getting pregnant while still a child and living with your own parents.

Having a baby should be a positive decision - made by people who are in a position in their lives to be able to afford to bring up a child. And that's not a position in which people still living with their parents are in.

Perhaps your father just expressed it wrong. Or perhaps he really genuinely does think that things like marriage matter, and he's just a twat. Sorry :)
(EuroSong I love horse meat: best of all the animals, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 9:54, closed)

big company spreadsheet thing
not necessarily true. my company is large, multi-national.

even in the current climate I've got myself into a position where I can go to them, tell them there is a job on offer elsewhere and they gave me more money.

just got to find an important niche, and get good at it, and be willing to help people.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 8:35, closed)

My tip
Is to always carry plenty of lube around with you.
(powervator and NONE SHALL PASS, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 22:49, closed)

What the others said really
If you suspect you're company's about to go under, don't jump ship (unless they stop paying you, or unless you find a better job). You may find that your company will survive but the company you jump to will go bust. I've seen this happen.

But basically, keep learning skills relevant to your job, and in your spare time, work on a project that will be relevant to your desired career-path. Should you lose your job, have a spell of unemployment, and be asked what you did since leaving your last job, you'd be able to point to your project.

And finally, if you're getting a lot of negative vibes from your colleagues about the company, stop listening to your colleagues.

Good luck.
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 22:59, closed)

It's less a company-wide atmosphere, more a
"we're extending your probation" kind of job threat :(
( Maladicta, Mon 6 Apr 2009, 23:33, closed)

Probation
If there's anybody else started around the same time as you, ask 'em if their probation is being extended too. It's highly likely that it's no reflection of you as an employee, more likely your employers trying to keep potential redundancy payments to a minimum given the current climate.

As others have said, make yourself indispensable, and make yourself known if you can (preferably for good things) - a name on a spreadsheet doesn't mean much to those who decide budgets and staffing and things, but a name they recognise is much harder to get rid of.
(Photon wasting your time since, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 0:25, closed)

How to keep your job
Pray successfully?

First jobs are nearly always crap. Everyone knows fresh graduates arrive clueless and grateful just to be there. But one good entry on the CV is 10000% better than none! So stick at it, but don't worry. The second job will be a more considered choice. Hopefully, you'll be going in with a little more confidence, have a little more experience, know yourself and your chosen industry a little better.

Here are a selection of tools for the Long Haul until death/retirement:

Making yourself indispensible is good, but don't be too good, or you'll never get moved on.

Learn to look busy even if you are not.

Get good at petty office politics by staying away from them. Be super-duper-willy-wooper-fucking careful about confiding anything personal or commenting on anyone else.

Don't get drunk at the party and piss in the punch.

Smile and never moan as you do all the crap tasks no-one else wants to do.

Smile more and moan less as your youth, cheapness, energy and inexperience are exploited for other's gain. Learn all you can along the way.

Don't eat all the biscuits at the meetings.

Don't talk, eat, laugh or fart too loudly.

Be brilliant, all the time, at everything, and don't make any mistakes.(doesn't always work, this one)

Learn to live with uncertainty.

Learn to enjoy the long-term company of a group of people who are like neighbours, but are all in same house. Add occasional and sporadic boredom.

I suck at nearly all of the above, so now I'm self-employed. Fuck all that shit!
(CADmonkey rollllllllled another one, just like the other one, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 0:55, closed)

That's perfectly normal paranoia
everyone in the universe sufferes from that.

Seriously though - I don't think I'm alone in constantly living in fear that they'll find out that I'm not qualified to do this job. That they will realise that I have been bluffing my way through to this point all along.

If this is the basis of your uncertainty then worry not - they never cotton on.
(karnuvap, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 8:02, closed)

bluffing and living in fear
so right! From the manging director to the postroom johnny, EVERYBODY is winging it, hoping not to be called to account for everything they don't know, aren't sure of, etc. EVERYBODY loves to see a bit of confidence walk into the room, like moths to lightbulbs. It's reassuring.

Smile and nod!

Here's something I read once in a book on the subject: (I've done this LOTS)

Whenever you are about to enter a room for a meeting or whatever, pause first, and pretend for a moment that you are a circus trapeze act; the ones that hold onto long ropes with their teeth. Pretend you are jumping upwards to catch the 'bit' in your mouth. Catch it, and hang there for a moment, then dismount.
Then, walk into your room. You will be smiling and standing tall and poised. Best entrance possible!

nb - Don't try this with glass doors.
(CADmonkey rollllllllled another one, just like the other one, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 9:42, closed)

Based on present experience
Avoid over specialisation. Modesty aside, I'm pretty good at what I do. This is still completely irrelevant when the industry to which you have devoted yourself (high end consumer electronics) is itself boned. Sending out my CV to organisations outside this little world is a fairly fustrating experience because although I am not without transferable skills, they are something a would be employer has to take as an article of faith. Such is life.
(Leonard Hatred briefly did some work on, Tue 7 Apr 2009, 9:48, closed)