In my career spanning thirty your years after passing out from the Govt. College of Engineering, Trivandrum, starting from my first job at Cochin Port Trust to my present job at Alliance University, Bangalore, I have had the good opportunity to voluntarily change jobs five times, get kicked out two times and presently I am in my eighth job in the eighth year .. Don't know what will happen. A 120 micron pathogen, Covid 19 virus is doing damage this time, not just locally, but world-wide.
How does it feel like to lose one's job ? This question is more valid and meaningful during the present Covid times as all of us are staring at uncertain and unclear futures when Covid virus is breathing down our necks.
It is said during this Covid time almost 122 million daily wage workers from across India lost their jobs and almost 200,000 white collared workers from the management side too lost their jobs. But do we need to get unduly agitated over this development ?
How does it feel to be kicked out of one's job ? We are usually wedded to our job as we tend to give our best to the job and spend a good part of our waking time, almost 50% to it. When our employers find a misfit between our qualifications and experience with the job requirements, we become a suitable candidate for firing. Usually it does not happen overnight, but our incompetence gets developed over a period of time.
Firing from our job usually causes a massive shock for the first week, but over time, one gets over the shock and tries to find the good part of the act, get up from where we have fallen, blame ourselves for our misfortune, sharpen and hone up our skills in other relevant area and look for a new job.
My earlier experience in the firing zone has given me enough courage to write about it and wait and watch to see what would happen to me if the situation gets bad in the near future over the Covid virus.
The post-firing period in this Covid time would also have four stages
1. Understand the situation
2. Accept the reality
3. Hone up one's skills and
4. Be positive of the future.
While going through this paper in HBR of April '20 by Sally Maitlis from Oxford Said School of Business, Making sense of the future after losing a job you have, it brought back interesting thoughts of how to cope with job layoffs that would happen in this Covid time.
I hope people take it in the right spirit and go ahead. The world is not going to end tomorrow or the day after.
George..
