Facing Redundancy during a Recession
During a recession, the fear of being laid off is on everyone's mind. If your job is redundant, you may have an even greater fear than your other co-workers. There are some things you can do when facing redundancy during a recession that can help protect your job.
Be innovative - Carefully review everything that you do in your job. Find out how your job could be done more efficiently, at a cost savings and add benefit to your company. Be prepared to present to your superiors a list of reasons why your job is critical to the company and should not be considered redundant. During times of recession, companies are looking for cost savings methods. If you can provide avenues to those savings that may eliminate you facing a layoff due to redundancy during recession.
Be proactive - Find out what your other co-workers are involved in for projects. Determine if there is something you can add to the overall value of the project and dig in and help. This could result in your superiors considering you less redundant during a recession. Be careful to not take over, remember, you are there to assist and to add value, not make yourself the center of the project.
Communicate - One of the best things to do when facing redundancy in a recession is to sit down and have a discussion with your supervisor or manager. Let them know that you are aware that your job could be considered redundant. Ask what you can do to help in other departments, in other positions and find out where they stand. This is a very proactive approach and one that could potentially backfire, but you won't know unless you try.
Educate yourself - Even during a recession, most companies continue to offer training courses across many departments. Be aggressive in pursuing all of the avenues that are available to you to help your career development. If you do not commit yourself to continued self-improvement within the company, you can set yourself up for potential problems. Do not let the fact that you are facing redundancy during a recession be a deterrent. In fact, if anything use it to motivate yourself to do bigger and better things.
Prepare for the worst - If in spite if your best efforts you still feel that you might face a layoff due to redundancy make sure that you are preparing yourself. Beef up your resume, start putting out feelers for other jobs and contact people in your network. If it is at all possible for you to do, put a few extra dollars a week aside to prepare for a possible layoff.
Summary
There are often times when most of us feel superfluous in our jobs. There is a greater risk when you are facing redundancy during a recession when you know your company is trying to find cost cutting options. Do not be a victim, instead take the lead and face the issue up front.
