I had some experience of been laid off. It was not good when you heard the news. But, from a long-term perspective, I really appreciate the experience. It forced me to go out of my comfort zone and to be confident about my next journey. It also helped me to find the things I love to do. During COVID, many people were impacted or will be impacted on their career, so I wrote this post to share some tips, and hope it can help the people to move on.
Figure out what the problem is
Is it just about financial? Or is it a business strategy? What the problem that the business has, and what's your position according to the challenge? Try to put yourself in the employers' shoes and figure out the problem.
Think about possible options
Usually, employees have opportunities to give feedback before the redundancy decision is made. Use the feedback opportunity to win back. You can suggest to get paid less or cut off work-hours. Considering some options such as furlough if you are happy.
If your proposal can help employers cutting the cost or keeping the bottom line, you have a good chance to secure your job. For example, if you can help to do customer support so that your company doesn't need to pay for an outsourcing team to do that, you can help the employer to create more value.
Get what you can get from your current spot
If you find the chances of securing your job is quite small, you can focus on getting the most of it before you leave. Check the redundant details on your contract first, do some negotiation, and be bold to ask. E.g., if you don't have a personal computer but need to use one for job searching and preparing your job interview, ask for keeping your work computer a few weeks.
Personally, I would like to focus on the non-money benefits and the support you can get. Things such as recommendations and endorsement from your colleagues, feedback about your strength and weakness from your team, and career advice from your boss are invaluable. It would be a good opportunity to reach out to your boss to ask for career advice and ask for a reference as it's critical for your next job, especially the referrals from senior managers.
You can also ask your team or boss about the key achievements during your work and be sure to get some numbers such as NPS score, Daily Active Users, or profit growth. You will definitely need this information for your next job interview.
Goodbye
Many people don't know how to say goodbye when they leave the company they worked for years. People don't remember the days you worked with them, but everyone, including you, will remember the last day. So when the decision was made, don't complain, just be nice and say a proper goodbye to everyone. That's the thing you and the people you worked with will remember.
Write a short and sweet goodbye email, and it would be the best time to ask for a recommendation.
One of my tips is to invite your peers to write a recommendation on your LinkedIn profile. To do that, you will need to add them individually and request for a recommendation. Most of the time, people are happy to help.
On your last day, do some house cleaning, and copy the necessary files for your next job interview (be careful with the confidential files).
Prepare for your next journey
Now it would be the best time to review what you've learned in this journey, write case study or review as soon as possible (after a couple of months you would find it's really hard to recall the details, believe me.)
You can check the key achievements you've accomplished and start to think the best way to show them to your next employer.
Last and most importantly, let it go! It's time to move on to your next journey, and it will be much more exciting than the previous one!