PREPARE YOUR CAREER FOR THE COMING RECESSION

2015 is expected to be another strong year for the U.S. economy, but are you prepared for what may be coming in 2016 and beyond? Hopefully this career checklist will help you prepare for the inevitable.

Founded more than 40 years ago, our Edina, MN based technical recruiting company, George Konik Associates, has seen our fair share of recessions (six to be exact). Although Minnesota’s economy can seem resilient while other areas of the country falter, rest assured, another recession will be upon us soon enough. Given that we are beyond the average length of economic expansion (63 months), we should not be surprised when another significant economic downturn is upon us. I’d like to share some time-tested insights to help you survive the next dip in economic charts.

• Practice Pay-It-Forward Networking. Networking while the job market is going well may seem like a complete waste of your time. That’s the last thing you have time for, right? Wrong. What better time to reach out to your connections to catch up and learn how you can help them. Can you introduce a recently laid-off contact to your current or previous manager? Can you refer them to an industry Recruiter you highly respect? Authentic helpfulness in today’s hyper-rushed, overworked business culture is becoming increasingly rare. Finding out how you can help others professionally will leave a very memorable and refreshing impression.
• Build up your professional equity. Few qualities will thwart a layoff notice like being irreplaceable. Build up your professional equity by volunteering for special projects, meeting tight deadlines or suggesting money-saving process improvements. Is your company planning a software or system upgrade and need extra help on a project? Don’t wait to be asked to help out, instead, ask your manager what needs to be done to make the roll out a success. Is there a business process you feel can be improved to save the company on the bottom line? Do your well thought out research and offer your findings to management for review. These extra 10% actions will be remembered when the company is in budget-cutting mode.
• Diversify your skills portfolio. Is there a skills gap in your organization that you’d be excited to learn? Perhaps it’s a needed programming language or advance Excel or Access skills that would benefit the organization? Companies are more willing than ever to train someone who has a strong interest in learning new business tools. Learning these skills will not only help cement your place in the organization, but it will also make you more marketable to a future organization.
• Be more conservative on personal spend than you’d like. During good economic years, it can be very tempting to splurge on personal items and trips, especially since you lived on a very minimal salary during the Great Recession years. Resist this urge, and prepare for the down years ahead. Having a minimum six month salary in savings will give you the liberty to be somewhat choosy with your next position versus taking your first job offer. Instead, even after a layoff, you can make a more strategic decision about your next career opportunity.

Hopefully you’ll find this checklist helpful as you look forward to a prosperous New Year!

Tom Goettl is a Technical Recruiter in the Minnesota market for over 15 years. He is focused on placing superior engineering, architectural and IT candidates for growing, successful companies in a variety of industries including medical device, consumer products, manufacturing, alternative energy and retail.