A month or two later, he shows up and tells our counselor, "The job market has dropped dead out there."
What happens in this situation is very much like what happens when we sell a house. We put it up for sale, and in the first few weeks there are serious potential buyers. Some make offers, which we turn down because, based upon what we've seen during those initial weeks, there's a terrific market out there for our house."
Then the stream dwindles into a trickle; we're lucky if we see one somewhat interested buyer every month.
What is a "market"?
When we put a house up for sale, we immediately attract that group of people who are actively looking for a house at that moment. Some have just started the search for a new house. Some have been looking for a house similar to ours for a week, a month, a year, or even longer. They are the so-called market for that house. Once they have passed through and have decided to keep looking, the "terrific market" vanishes.
The same holds true when you're looking for a job. The market for you consists of the openings available when you start to look. As with the sale of a house, some companies just started to look for someone like you, others have been looking for a week, a month, a year, or longer. More than that, the job market is defined by those companies whose needs generally fit what you, the job seeker, have to offer. It's a tiny market at best, and once you've gone through it-and failed to connect with a job -it disappears.
Don't be too independent, especially if you're unemployed or about to be unemployed. It could take many months to come up with a solid offer.
There are, of course, clearly defined job markets! Often they're geographic. Mass layoffs at the largest plan in a small town, or its closing, create a truly depressing job market. Conversely, the opening of a major new plan creates a generally positive job market for a wide array of workers in the area. Cutbacks in certain programs by federal and state governments can produce a depressed job market in specified fields, just as increases in government budgets can create the reverse effect.
I remember once driving with my wife from San Diego to Los Angeles. We were listening to the radio and heard that a major retailer in California was closing all its operations, which meant laying off of eight thousand people within the year. The newscaster interviewed four of the employees who were about to lose their jobs and asked them what plans they'd made to find another position. None of them had made any plans. In effect, they were all waiting, burying their heads in the sand, hoping something good would come up between then and the time they received their last paycheck. That meant that till some point virtually all eight thousand laid-off employees would be looking for a new job at the same time.
Anyone working for a company that has announced its intention to close, even though it doesn't plan to do so in a year, should begin looking immediately and should, from the day of the announcement, consider him or herself unemployed.
Sometimes companies will be so generous with severance pay that they create a false sense of security. Not too long ago, a major corporation laid off a number of people in Florida, giving them what amounted to a year's salary and various other considerations that created in these employees a lack of urgency about finding other work. As in the case of the California retailer, these employees didn't start looking immediately, because they would lose that year's pay. So what? Better to have a new position than to plan to live off a severance package. The act is, a year goes by quickly. Not only that, it is much easier to find a better job while you are employed than if you begin to look after you're out of work.
For most people seeking a better job, the job market means what that individual has to offer to a small group of companies that might need such skills and experience.
Many people use the concept of a job market as an excuse for their lack of success, or for their unwillingness to energetically pursue a career in their chosen field. A young woman who wanted broadcast journalism- said, "I can't find a job in journalism. Everybody got into it."
Nonsense! We heard the same story about young people who wanted to become teachers in the seventies. They were told that the teaching profession was glutted and they'd never find a job. By the time those who didn't listen to such advice graduated with degrees in teaching and entered the work force, the field had opened up and there was a great demand for good teachers-a demand that is even more acute today.
"Any luck?" a friend asks someone who has been job hunting.
"No, the market stinks."
For the steelworker in a depressed area, that might be a valid claim. For most of us trying to find better jobs it doesn't hold water.
The job market! It is as depressed and narrow as people think it is.
The number of men and women who are narrowing their own job market these days is appalling. That young journalism graduate drastically narrowed her job potential by immediately ruling out working for trade magazines or in PR, even though they are two splendid entry-level possibilities in which the writing craft can be sharpened, the experience of working as a writer can be gained, and the beginnings of a network of fellow professionals can be launched.
Rigidity works against you, especially early in a business career. Successful people are constantly finding themselves deviating from their early career plans. Working Woman magazine did a survey of six thousand working women. Only 8 percent of those women were doing what they had originally planned to do in their careers. Don't rule out any options. If you do, you stand a good chance of missing that proverbial golden opportunity.
I've heard it over and over again. There are job seekers who decide that they will work only in a certain section of the city, because the restaurants are better there. They will not travel more than fifteen minutes from home. They must have a private office with a window, southern exposure preferred; medical benefits must include dental and psychotherapy; if the company won't pay for their MBA until after they've been there a year, forget it; they demand generous vacation plans, a day off for their mother-in-law's birthday, a specified make and model of company car-no substitutions; and on and on. I haven't made these up. We've done surveys of employers to pinpoint the most outlandish requests made by job seekers, and these only scratch the surface.
A crazy world?
Crazy people?
The man or woman who will find a better job will bring to an employer a keen sense of loyalty, ethics, and a desire to be productive, to contribute to that company's success. Young people entering the work force will abandon the old army adage "Volunteer for nothing" and will volunteer for almost everything. They'll adopt the philosophy "First In, Last Out" (FILO). Like the pendulum of ethics and loyalty, the pendulum of worker productivity is beginning its arc back toward a more productive and efficient workplace. Those who have been content to "beat the system" by doing as little as possible for as much money as possible will find themselves left behind. It's inevitable. America, and its economic life, can't settle for anything less.
As industry tires (and wilts) under a couple of generations of Me Generation workers, the older segment of our population is returning in drives to the factory, the fast-food outlet, and the office. The decreasing population of young people contributes to this growing trend. The U.S.Census Bureau estimates that by 2000 our eighteen to twenty-four age groups will shrink by 4 million people while our over-forty-five segment will increase by 23 million. In surveys, more than half of retired workers over the age of seventy have indicated that they want to return to work. Obviously, our older population is becoming necessary and valued labor pool for American industry.
But employers are finding added benefits in hiring older people. These men and women came up when the work ethic was firmly established, and they tend to live by it. They're loyal, and they carry the ethical strength to their generation into today's work environment. They'll be taking an increasing number of jobs, which mean younger people seeking better jobs will have them to compete with, as well as their peers.
If you're an older person looking for a better job, keep squarely in mind how much you're needed these days. There often is a tendency for older people to approach the process of job hunting with a less confident, almost apologetic posture. This is not only true of men and women who have retired and are seeking to return to work, it's a common problem with executives on the "wrong" side of forty who assume they're over the hill, unable to compete with younger executives.
Older men and women seeking better jobs are sometimes actually embarrassed to be looking for work, on being interviewed by younger people. If you suffer that feeling, remind yourself that you bring experience, perception, and stability to company- vitally important traits for younger managers looking to enhance their own careers through the work of those they supervise. You must, of course, curb any temptation to lord over the younger prospective boss. The fact that you have many years' of experience and, by extension, might know more about the job than he or she does. If anyone needs to exhibit the team-player attitude, it's the older worker. The new and younger management of a company will be doing things their way, which may well be different from the way you did it. Adopt the philosophy that the new way might be better and that you'll find the means to meld your long experience into the new structure.
Another thing I've noticed about older workers is the reluctance to network. Older men and women often view networking as asking for favors. No matter what your age, if you're seeking a better job, you should go after it, just as younger men and women will be doing.
Make sure you aren't in a rut, particularly if you're out of work. Often this is exactly the time to consider a change in your career. Most people who make a career change in midstream do it after they've been a success for a number of years. They have the benefit of experience, are better able to evaluate their needs and goals, and, presumably, have stashed away enough money to support a transition. Being fired could be viewed as an opportunity to take stock and to set out on the career path that will make you happiest and most productive during the latter portion of your working life.
For younger people seeking better jobs, having a growing legion of older workers with whom to compete is another example of this crazy world. Who would have believed it would happen? At the same time, it makes the point that the term crazy doesn't always mean something negative. In the case of this "craziness," it's welcome.
Reminders about the Job Market
- Be realistic when evaluating the job market for what you have to offer.
- The job market always looks great at first; it dries up fast.
- The minute you know you will be laid off at a future date, consider yourself unemployed.
- Don't blame a so-called bad job market for your failure to find a job. Look for ways to create a new job market for yourself.
- Don't be too narrow in how you view a job market. Be flexible, open to new ideas and possibilities.
- If you're an older person, view the positive aspects of your experience and stability, rather than considering yourself over the hill.
- If you end up with a younger boss, be flexible enough to incorporate your skills and experience into the way they do things.
- If you need to look for a job later in life, view it as an opportunity to analyze whether it's time to shift gears and get out of any rut you might have slipped into.
