If My Boss Gets Mad at Me or I Get a Poor Review, Does This Mean I Should Look for a New Job?
March 18, 2010
Fortunate are the people who find themselves in situations where their bosses are demanding of them. I say this in all seriousness and for several reasons. At the outset, I want to caution you this article is not for the faint of heart. It’s for individuals who take their careers and lives seriously. You have chosen to be part of the working world and put the futures of individuals and companies on the line based on the quality of your skills. So it is time you faced some cold, hard truths.
When I was younger, I attended a very demanding private high school. I also took the hardest classes I could. Most of my former classmates are quite successful today, leading in the professions of law, medicine, and other pursuits. I remember when I was in high school working almost every school night until 12:30 or 1:00 a.m. on homework. I also remember being just an above average student and getting tons of criticism from my teachers. My writing was good but could be better. I needed to be more punctual about arriving for practice. When I did math problems, I needed to spell out the proofs of each problem much more carefully. I needed to do this. I did that poorly. I should spend more time reviewing the punctuation before turning in my Spanish homework.
In retrospect, I know all of these criticisms were about things that were true. At the time, I think what I did is something we all do. Instead of making sure I was accountable for every error, I found fault with the teachers and coaches who criticized me, even looking for reasons to find fault with them personally. I even complained about my school and teachers to other students, trying to make them see these criticisms of me were totally unjustified. When we do not like what we hear, we often attack the messenger, don’t we? This is perfectly normal.
When I went to college, I was still somewhat angry with my high school but took everything in stride. I did not change anything I was doing in terms of studying and continued working hard in all my classes. A mere three years after graduating from high school, I remember being informed by my college (a top-ten college) that I had been nominated by the school for a Rhodes Scholarship because my grades were so good. I remember being very surprised when the school told me they had only nominated four or five students for this award–I still thought of myself as an average student. College had been much easier for me than high school.
What I realized then, and understand now is when the bar is raised for people, those who try to jump over it get stronger. You often become so strong you do not even know it until you are competing in another field. The high school I went to was training its students to “go to the Olympics,” both academically and in life. I simply did not know it at the time.
Up until a few years ago, I used to stop at a gas station to get some coffee each morning on my way to work. The gas station was near a public high school in Los Angeles, and the owner spent a lot of time defending his gas station against kids trying to steal this or that from his store. In addition, kids were always loitering outside the gas station, smoking cigarettes, passing unseen items between their hands, and making lots of noise. If I happened to drive by that gas station later in the day, kids from the high school were still horsing around and up to no good, when they probably should’ve been in class.
I do not need to wonder–because I already know the answer–if the teachers of these students were always waiting in the wings with one criticism or another of their student’s work. I would venture to say the teachers probably never went so far as to hover over these students and make sure they were doing their best. I doubt any of these students went to top colleges, and I am pretty confident none of them will ever be nominated for Rhodes Scholarships.
I am also 100-percent confident that each of those students, if placed in the right environment, would be capable of great things. The right environment would encourage these students and would also raise expectations of them. What we believe we can do is very important. What I am willing to bet, though, is that no one had much hope for these high school students hanging out in front of the gas station. Because no one had any hope for them, I knew nothing good would happen to them.
What would have happened to these students if someone had set goals for them and made them accountable?
There are very few people in our lives who will believe in us. For most people, taking the time to give someone honest appraisal is not a fun thing to do. People simply do not enjoy being criticized, and criticizing others is not a great way to make friends. There are also very few people who are willing to work hard to better themselves and overcome criticism. The people who can improve in response to criticism are the strongest people of all.
Certainly no one is perfect right out of law school, and anyone who disagrees is mistaken. I remember when I was a summer associate in a New York law firm and the firm gave me a stinging review that scared the pants off me. I could not believe it. I also remember speaking with the associates in the firm about their reviews at a big dinner. While I did not speak with all of them, roughly half said they had received good reviews, and the other half willingly admitted their reviews were poor. At the end of the summer, the strangest thing happened: the people who had supposedly gotten good reviews did not get offers, and the ones who had received the poor reviews did. This was in the mid-1990s, when the legal economy was in shambles!
When a class of associates joins a law firm, it is likely only one or two of them will still be there when it comes time to make partners. This could be one or two people out of a class of 75. The truth is that the 73 or 74 out of 75 people who are no longer there:
“ not because they have been fired,
“ not because the firm is a horrible place,
“ not because one partner is unfair,
“ not because the firm does not have opportunities available,
“ not because working in-house is better,
“ not because they have always dreamed of doing other things outside the law, and
“ not because the work is boring.
The reason most of these people leave is they do not want to–or cannot–change in response to criticism. It is very difficult for most people to confront their weaknesses. Most people choose to go through life not confronting their weaknesses, and this is fine. However, those who do are the ones who achieve great things.
One of the biggest problems law firms encounter when hiring new attorneys is that most new attorneys believe they are special. Having attended law school and been admitted to the bar, many of these attorneys expect their first employers to do a lot of ego-stroking, telling them what good attorneys they are and how unique they are, for example. I have seen this happen on more occasions than I can count.
There is nothing wrong with this attitude. It only becomes a problem when the attorney or law student is not strong enough to accept criticism. Unfortunately, law schools, colleges, and others do not prepare budding attorneys for the criticism they will eventually face, and they often cannot handle it. Yet taking criticism is a perfectly normal part of becoming a functioning attorney.
When I was practicing law, I often had opportunities to go up against more experienced attorneys, several of whom had been practicing 30 or more years longer than I. I never lost a case against one of these attorneys. However, because I was young and just starting out, the cases were never that complex and my opponents not all that formidable. In these cases, I went up against attorneys from small law firms that did not have particularly good reputations. The difference between the work I did and the work these attorneys did was profound. Their work would typically be littered with typos. Their legal arguments would often be poorly thought-out and just plain wrong. I knew in almost all cases the work these attorneys produced would not even come close to getting out the door at the law firms where I practiced.
When you consider this example, you should realize it does not differ from the example of my high school and their established standards. Contrast a first-rate, demanding high school with a poor one. Contrast a good law firm with a poor one. The difference between first-rate organizations and poor ones–and the people they produce–often comes down to two concepts:
ACCOUNTABILITY AND STANDARDS OF PERFORMANCE
The levels of accountability and standards of performance an organization has for its people make a huge difference in the final quality of what is produced by that organization. The more accountable the organization holds the people in it, the better the organization. The better the organization, the higher the work standards of its employees and the better they will do, no matter where they find themselves.
I recently read the biography of Jack Welch, former Chief Executive Officer of General Electric. In this book, Welch spends a lot of time talking about when a company decides to elect a new CEO, there are usually five or six people who are top contenders for the job. The ones who do not get the position typically leave and go on to immediately assume CEO positions in other leading companies in the world. For example, the CEO of Home Depot, Bob Nardelli, is someone who did not make CEO at General Electric and then left to take his current position.
When I first read Welch’s biography, I was struck that the people who lost the fight to become CEO of General Electric left were welcomed as the CEOs of competing companies. It was almost as if failing was a good thing. How could someone who failed in one situation be such a superstar performer elsewhere?
I thought about this for some time, and I realized what it was all about. General Electric is a world-class organization that sets high hurdles for all of its employees. In fact, I have heard that the hurdles that General Electric sets are so high that it simply asks the bottom 10 percent of its performers to leave each year. When people come from a world-class organization that sets high standards, the world knows the organization has molded those people into world-class performers. Again, the situation is no different than it was at my old high school. Because of the demands made on me, I went on to become as good as I was capable of being.
This brings me to the answer to the question, “If my boss gets mad at me or I get a poor review, does this mean I should look for a new job?” In my opinion, the answer is simple: absolutely, positively not. Instead, you should consider yourself blessed. How many of us have opportunities to be pushed to higher levels of performance? How many of us are lucky enough to have bosses and others who care enough to get us to improve ourselves?
The natural reaction to any sort of criticism is to lash out at the person or the organization criticizing you. I think this is a huge mistake. People in the know will pay tens of thousands of dollars for this sort of guidance and to be pushed beyond their current levels of performance. CEOs of many companies will hire coaches for more than $5,000 an hour to criticize them and push them. Olympic athletes of every sort generally have coaches behind them, pushing them every second of the day.
Is your organization competing in the Olympics? Do you want to be in an organization competing at the highest level? Are you willing to compete at the highest level?
The next time an employer gives you criticism or pushes you along remember you have a choice. You can find a group of people who will never find fault with you, like the kids at the substandard Los Angeles public school. You can also choose to practice law with a lousy firm and get beaten by 25-year-old kids when you are a 55-year-old attorney because you never decided to jump over the bar when it was held high for you and never took the advice of those trying to help you.
I would encourage you to compete in the Olympics, and the next time someone pushes you to improve yourself, smile, put your head down, and follow his or her advice. The next time you look up, you may find yourself on top. If you are like me, you will find the whole experience quite enlightening, and if you have character, you will realize you can never be more indebted to anyone than to the people who challenged you to be the great person you are.
Address Small Weaknesses For Big Gains
January 6, 2009
What You Will Learn
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Several months ago I was trying to sell a commercial property and had the most ridiculous time contacting the selling agent. I would get a call that would go something like this:
“Hi, I have an offer on the property. Please call me back to discuss.” These calls would typically come at 7:00 am or 9:00 pm, during which I was generally unreachable.
Excited about the offer, I would call the agent back. I would try him two or three times throughout the day and never reach him. This process would go on for days. In one case, I could not reach him for over one week.
Although I do not like to go into detail about people’s strengths and weaknesses, I can say with confidence this particular agent had enough business at the time he should not have been using a cell phone to run his business. Instead, he should have had an assistant scheduling all of his calls or at least forwarding him his messages.
One time, after over a week of trying to reach this guy I finally tracked down the agent’s brother and explained to him I could not reach the agent and needed to speak with him immediately. The agent’s brother was also an agent in the same real estate firm. Around 15 minutes later my real estate agent called me back:
“Who the hell are you to be calling my brother? He does not need to know when I am returning my calls and not doing so.”
“You called me 10 days ago and said you had an offer,” I told my agent. “I have another offer on the property and need to know whether to take it or not.”
“I do not care! You should not be calling my business partner!”
“Listen, you need to stop running your business from a cell phone,” I told him.
“You have no idea what you are talking about. I have probably the best reputation of any real estate agent around here. I run my business the right way.”
“No you don’t. You need an assistant. No one should have to spend over a week trying to get in touch with you. It makes no sense.”
The agent then hung up on me. It would be two more days before I would know the details of the sketchy offer his client was proposing.
A few weeks ago I learned this agent was under investigation from the state for various reasons, including not having renewed his real estate license and operating his business without a license. This detail, like the cell phone, may seem like a small one, but life and our jobs are often in the details.
So many people’s careers are stalled and in many cases derailed because they refuse to listen to various forms of advice to improve themselves. People often believe at some point they have “succeeded” and any subsequent advice they receive is something that is unnecessary.
Many people will do one annoying thing in their job over and over again and not realize it may sabotage their entire future. Eventually people notice and this causes their careers to stall again and again.
One of the hardest things for all of us to do is to be aware of our weaknesses and take the appropriate action in response. However, very few of us do this. Instead, we continue to make the same mistakes over and over again. Fixing the mistakes that people are bringing to our attention is something very few of us have the ability to do.
People often succeed for very simple reasons. For example, one of the most common reasons people succeed is because of their ability to practice something over and over again. Another reason for success is an uncanny ability to network or get along with people. Just as people succeed for the smallest reasons, so, too, do they fail for the smallest reasons.
Several years ago a very intelligent young man was working for me while applying to law schools. Because he seemed to have a good amount of potential, I started seeing if there were other areas inside the company where I could use him. We had recently launched a company and I asked him to come up with “The Top 101 Reasons” someone should be using the company.
After a week I met with him and he had only come up with 15 reasons. I was very surprised but told him to come back the next week with 101 reasons.
Like many people, he came up with one explanation or another about why he could not do this. I listened, told him that was fine but I wanted 101 reasons and anyone interested in being a lawyer should be able to come up with 101 reasons to use something quite easily.
The next week he came back and he had about 40 reasons but many of the reasons were very similar to the 15 he had listed originally. I gave him a 15 minute lecture about the importance of applying himself and doing good work and being creative. The next week he came back with about 60 reasons and said for the life of him he could not come up with more. Over the next 10 minutes or so, I sat with him and quickly listed an additional 41 reasons. All I needed to do was be creative, and it was quite simple.
In spite of getting a 99% on the Law School Admissions Test and graduating from a good college with an “A” average this young man still did not know how to be creative.
“What are you going to do if you are defending a client in court?” I asked him. “How are you possibly going to be able to defend someone if you cannot think on your feet? You need to be able to argue a point with convincing reasons all day long.”
“I don’t know,” he told me.
He ended up going to law school and getting a job with a good law firm. I wish him the best. I never in a million years would want to use him as my attorney, though. This weakness is something he needs to improve upon. It is one thing that could hold him back permanently and ruin what could otherwise be an illustrious career.
This particular man could not apply himself creatively. He could probably do a lot of other things very well. However, this is a huge weakness if you want to be an attorney. This is the sort of weakness that could literally stop him in his tracks. When he gets into a law firm and starts being called upon to be creative and create arguments, his inability to do so will likely be a real turn off to his employers. These same people will stop giving him work and may then give the work to others. Pretty soon no one may want to work with him. He will then need to find another job. This process could go on for a couple of decades unless the guy deals with the situation.
Small weaknesses have a major impact on us unless we address them.
One of my first legal jobs required me to be a very good proofreader. While I could proofread things very well, my real interest was always in making in-depth legal arguments. However, I was writing legal opinions for a judge and punctuation and proofreading was extremely important. I learned and, after a couple of very stern lectures, I addressed this weakness. When I got into private practice and worked for a law firm I never had a problem with this. However, over the past several years I no longer carefully proofread my work and have others do it. Recently I read something one of my former employees posted online about how I am a terrible writer and stupid because my work is not well-proofed when I give it to the proofreaders in our company. This is an example of my weakness coming back to haunt me. Our weaknesses will always come back to haunt us and people will always call us on these weaknesses.
About a year ago I was deluged with venture capitalists trying to give money to my business. I never took any money by the way. Due to their sudden interest in giving me money, I started reading books about venture capital because I did not even know what it was. I am someone who helps people get jobs and not someone who understands high finance. One book was written by a venture capitalist talking about things he looks for in the Chief Executive Officer of the company when he is making an investment. He recounted how the venture capitalist came very close to making a $100,00,000 investment in a company but pulled out at the last minute. The reason? The CEO had the habit of coming into work and staying in his office. He never left his office or walked around the company. He viewed this as a huge fault because no one in the company ever saw him. Apparently this was something he’d also been criticized for throughout his career. Due to this one personality foible, the venture capitalist did not make the investment.
When many of us are confronted by our employers with various weaknesses we react in a manner that is not appropriate. We try to blame the person who is giving us feedback and find reasons they are wrong. We may provide them with a series of ridiculous justifications and explanations as to why they are wrong and not making any sense. We may point to someone else who possesses the same issue they are bringing to our attention. This is a huge mistake. If someone is going out of their way to bring a weakness of yours to your attention, you need to do everything within your power to make sure you pay attention. You often do not get a second chance to address a weakness. You need to always do what you can to address your weaknesses because one small thing could hold you back. Examples:
Not having an assistant and running a big business by cell phone.
Not proofreading your work carefully enough.
Not leaving your office to talk to people.
Not pushing yourself to be creative in a profession where it is required.
You have weaknesses. I am confident of this. All of us do. What are yours? Fix them! If you cannot fix your weaknesses, find a profession where these weaknesses do not matter and people do not care about them. If you are in a profession where these weaknesses are holding you back, you need to quickly address them.
Many people know their weaknesses and they have been reminded of them again and again throughout their careers. They will often deny their weakness is an issue. They will continually find reasons to justify what is going on is not a weakness–otherwise they would not be doing well. This can happen in your personal or your work life. Many people simply cannot address their weaknesses.
I know a man who in his late 30s never had a girlfriend for more than two weeks. He is good looking and successful. He has a good personality and is very easy to talk to. He does not have any major personality or other weaknesses except one: he is incredibly cheap.
A gorgeous girl could walk up to him and start talking to him and he might get her phone number. He would then go over to her house and pick her up for a dinner date. Typically the girl would be all dressed up and excited to be going out with such a seemingly great guy. She would be in for a surprise. He would take her to a restaurant like Burger King for dinner. In the car he would explain to her he always likes to “go Dutch” on his first few dates. The woman would be astonished not only because she was taken to a fast food restaurant, but also because she was forced to pay for her share of the meal.
It gets worse, however.
In the car he might bring up the fact he really likes the girl and there is no reason she should have to share the expense of the gas required to get to Burger King. Once he gets to the restaurant, he would only order something like french fries because he will have eaten a peanut butter sandwich or something before going out on the date to save money. If he manages to ever get a girl to come to his apartment, she would be astonished to find he is an attorney living in a 300 square foot studio apartment in a bad neighborhood with furniture that looks like it was purchased at a garage sale.
I have no idea what this guy does with all his money. He does not use drugs and he does not support his parents. I think he just has an aversion to spending a single cent. I remember about 10 years ago a girl I was dating at the time sat him down to have a conversation with him about this because she thought the entire thing was so bizarre. He is a good-looking successful guy with a good personality and girls would go out with him and date him in a second were it not for this. She tried everything she could to show him the error of his ways. I tried this before and at least one other person I know tried this.
“Are you kidding? Girls love me! I do not need to do anything differently,” he always said. He is still denying this is an issue today. He could fix this. I do not know if it would require therapy, but he could fix it. Once he fixes it his life will change. He will know more people and have a different life. This one thing is holding him back, and he is in denial this is the reason his is so alone. It is very sad but it would be easy to fix.
Are you in denial about something you’re doing? You never want to be in denial about anything that can be improved and would change your life for the better. You need to do everything within your power to address small weaknesses that may be holding you back.
The worst thing we can possibly do is be delusional about our small weaknesses. When most people are confronted with a weaknesses they may choose to not pay attention. Pay attention to your small weaknesses.
The worst possible thing we can do when someone confronts us with our small weaknesses is to lash out and attack them. Many of us will discredit the messenger and tell them there is something wrong with them. It is not our fault. There is something wrong with the messenger.
One of the most astonishing things that ever happened to me was several years ago when I lived with a woman I’m no longer dating. For many years, I liked to go to 7-11 in the morning and get a Big Gulp Diet Coke which I would drink when driving to work. One day I went to the 7-11, got my Coke, and as I was driving to work I decided it didn’t have enough ice. Since I was close to home, I decided to get some more ice there. I must have been very quiet when I went into the house because after I got my ice I overheard my significant other in the back yard talking on a cordless phone.
“I just want Harrison to go out of town,” I heard her say. “I am sick of having to meet in hotel rooms for illicit sex with my other boyfriend during the day when Harrison is not home. I want to spend some quality time together sipping wine and just getting to know him. I cannot do this when Harrison is around.”
This particular person had been through a series of relationships which always ended because she could not commit. I thought this history was behind her and we could have a relationship. I was wrong.
I continued to listen to her conversation for the next 30 minutes. She went into vivid detail about how she was having a full-on affair with someone else. I was absolutely astonished at what I was hearing and I remember my knees going weak and my body sinking to the floor.
My significant other eventually ended the conversation and walked into the kitchen where I was collapsed on the floor, my heart racing and feeling extremely confused and angry.
“Why aren’t you at work?” she asked.
“I just heard your entire conversation,” I said. “I’m sorry. I came home to get some ice and did not mean to but I overheard you talking on the phone. I’m in a state of shock.”
My significant other stared at me for about 15 seconds without saying a word.
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” she said. “I was talking to my mother about the dog. You must have been hearing things.”
This was one of the more astonishing episodes of my life. I was confronting her with irrefutable evidence of philandering and she simply denied she’d said any such thing. She turned the evidence around and tried to say I had literally heard a conversation in my head that was not actually spoken. In this case, the messenger of this information was me and I was attacked. Had it been someone else who had overheard this I am confident his or her reliability would have been attacked as well. When many people feel criticized they attack the messenger instead of facing the problem or weakness head on. As far as I know, this person is still unable to commit. Who knows how this is affecting her life. I imagine if she could address this one weakness she would be much happier.
Despite whatever success you have had, there is a good chance there is a weakness you have that is holding you back. Do not blow this weakness off. If someone brings the weakness to your attention, address it and do not attack the messenger. Our greatest improvements come when we fix small things that are holding us back.
The Sun Does Not Always Shine Forever
January 3, 2009
One of the best pieces of advice I ever heard was: “The sun does not always shine forever.” I don’t remember who the person was, or even when I heard it, but the words were so powerful I will never forget them. What this meant to me was good fortune does not continue forever. Instead, the most important thing we can do in our work lives is (1) be ready for change and (2) prepare for change. Instead, what many of us do is guard against change. Guarding against change rarely does any good and usually does more harm than good.
What You Will Learn
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Are you in a role in your career right now where you are guarding against change? It is never good to be on the defensive in your career and life. Instead, you should be on the offensive. The people who win in their careers and lives are always the people who are on the offensive. When you are on the offensive, you are winning, and when you are on the defensive, you are retreating. You cannot retreat forever. Inevitably, you will find yourself boxed in with nowhere to go. At that point, you will lose your job, your home, and whatever you are doing at the moment.
The best possible thing you can do is be on the offensive.
There are many companies in America on the defensive right now. These include companies in the financial industry and numerous manufacturing companies. When I have been out and about in Los Angeles and heard people talking, I’ve heard things like, “No one is hiring. There are no jobs.” While I disagree with this statement, I do believe these people are finding a disproportionate number of firms and companies who are not hiring because they are in retreat. Companies go into retreat when people stop spending, and many give up and simply close their doors.
All over the United States, an incredible number of people are being laid off. What is happening is very sad, and it’s devastating to the people being affected by it. When times are good, companies hire people very aggressively. In many cases, they hire people where their skills are actually redundant. I have seen this happen more times than I can count.
When business is good, law firms and other companies start hiring as many people as they possibly can to do the work. The people they hire become very “cocky” and will jump from firm to firm in search of more money or more prestige. The people inside the organization will make more demands on the company for benefits and other things. They may refuse to work as many hours. They may band together against management. They may go on message boards and complain about their employer. Meanwhile, these same people watch their lifestyles get better and better, and they go out and purchase nice cars, they may move into nicer apartments or homes, and they feel good about the lives they have achieved.
This is what happens all over. When a company is doing well, the people working inside the company decide (rightly so) they have contributed to the growth of the company and want in on “the action.” In the largest companies, the people may unionize. In smaller ones, the people may band together and simply demand more benefits or higher salaries. It may be a good idea to try to get benefits when things are going well. In theory, there is nothing wrong with this idea. This is a process that is repeated over and over at countless organizations around the world when things are going well.
During good times, a customer service department may go from one to five people. Other areas of the company may experience similar growth. When the business goes away, as it inevitably does in many recessions, the people in the department start doing everything possible to protect their jobs. Despite the fact very few calls are being received, the people in the customer service department will band together and claim they are all needed to field the few calls coming in. The people will tell of the incredible need for customer service representatives, and how much the company will be affected if they are not all there. These cries for “good customer service” will often come despite the fact there are no customers. The management will listen to this and fear taking action. The management will continue paying these representatives and vendors.
Inside law firms, you may see memos or emails like the one below being sent from the partners to the associates about the work loads:
From: John Quinn
Sent: Thursday, October 09, 2008 2:10 PM
To: Attorneys
Subject: things are slow right now
More so in some offices than others. Lawyers are funny. In April, May and June we averaged over 200 hours per attorney – an unbelievable, perhaps unparalleled work pace for a firm as large as ours. Many wondered how we could possibly keep that up. Now we’re averaging 150 plus per month and people are worried. So one point to be made here is that “slowness” is relative.
The pace is down significantly because a number of major matters, on which scores of attys were working full time, went away–trial ended, the case settled, etc–at the same time. 10 of the largest billing matters in 2008 thru the end of Sept, 9 have been completed. These are the kinds of cases you do not replace immediately.
This really shouldn’t be a cause for concern though. Our basic practice strategy–focusing on financial litigation, trial work, being able to be adverse to financial institutions, etc–is clearly sound. In fact, in this business environment, we’re better situated than any firm I know. Lots of claims will be brought arising from the financial chaos and they will require firms that can be adverse to banks. We are at the top of that list. Many law firms will suffer. I don’t think we will.
There are lots of business development issues and non-billable tasks to be done. We expect everyone will pitch in on such projects when asked to do so.
John B. Quinn
Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges, LLP
While there is likely truth to a memo like this, the fact is when work starts decreasing inside companies and law firms, people may get very nervous. The attorneys inside law firms become very nervous because the less work there is, the more they realize the sun may not continue to shine forever. It is a very scary world when we realize we do not always have employment stability. This is what happens in all companies and organizations, however. Things eventually slow down, and jobs eventually begin to disappear. There is a cycle of creation and destruction which characterizes all industries.
A few years ago, I was reading about what a big deal Dell Computers was, and how the company was invincible. Now I am reading article after article about its layoffs and declining market share. A couple of years ago, I remember reading articles about how amazing Goldman Sachs was, and how it was the most successful investment bank of all time, and how certain people there were earning 100s of millions of dollars. Now I am reading how this company is no longer an investment bank and had to borrow money from Warren Buffett. Recently, I’ve read about how great Apple Computers is, but even more recently, I’ve read rumors that Steve Jobs is sick and dying. When he dies, the company will lose any momentum it has. Yesterday, I read that, in September the American steel industry had one of its best quarters ever, but the final quarter of the year was one of its worst. Now steel plants all over the United States are being shut down, and workers are being laid off. Things are so bad for the US steel industry they are now seeking a government bailout.
I read articles like this on a daily basis, and what it all says to me is we cannot take anything for granted. Inside law firms, people start losing their jobs when work slows down. The law firms generally begin whittling away their weakest (i.e., the people they dislike the most, or the people they feel contribute the least) for performance reasons. The attorneys are told their work is not up to par, or asked to look for other jobs. This process will generally occur until the law firm is healthy and earning again.
This same process occurs inside companies. The companies will do everything within their power to eliminate as many redundancies as they possibly can so they can return as rapidly as possible to profitability.
The more layoffs I’ve read about in the papers recently, the more I realize how the sun has stopped shining for so many people. All over the United States, and throughout the world, an incredible number of people have built lives for themselves which are now slipping away. Employers are doing everything possible to eliminate waste.
Where does this leave you? First, you need to be ready for change. You simply cannot expect that your job will go on like it has forever. The idea that the steel industry in America could go from one of its best quarters ever, to one of its worst almost overnight, sends an incredible message: nothing is secure. My grandmother lived through the Great Depression and after this she lived her life in an incredibly frugal way. While this extreme may not be necessary, it is important to understand you need to be ready for change and should have a rainy day fund. If you do not have one now, start creating one.
You should also be prepared for change. This means being aware of other potential jobs you could have and knowing what is going on in the market – one of the most important things anyone can do. While I am the Chief Executive Officer of EmploymentCrossing and am biased, I can assure you using a site like this is an incredibly intelligent and very good use of your time. A site like this is no different than checking the stock market to check your worth and the worth of your stocks. You need to be watching the market because the market is your job security. In a good market, you are fine, and with a poor market, you have something serious to worry about. You need to be prepared for change.
Do not spend your life guarding against change. It will do you no good. You need to be proactive with your life and your career. If you find you are protecting yourself and guarding yourself in your existing career, this is not a good sign. Generally, this means you feel you may not be providing value commensurate with what you are paid. If this is the case, you need to step up and provide more value, or find somewhere you can provide value that matches your contribution.
Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss it, you will land among the stars.