Facing up to Redundancy – the 7 stages you need to know about

Facing up to Redundancy – the 7 stages you need to know about

 

This post has been prompted because there have been several announcements in the last 2 weeks about job losses across traditional media of broadcasting and print journalism. The BBC and The Guardian specifically.

I will not be telling you how to find another job. No. This is about understanding what you are feeling right now, and what you might do to feel more in control of what you are going through.  it will help you prepare for the future, whatever that may be.

Like grief, there are several – seven in this case – stages to experience when you are facing uncertainty such as losing a job.

  • DENIAL & SHOCK – you knew it was coming and that it might affect you, but it is still a shock.
  • PAIN & GUILT – why me? What did I do wrong? How could I have done things differently?
  • ANGER & BARGAINING – they are wrong. It should not be me. I do not deserve this. What can I do to make it not me?
  • DEPRESSION – there is no hope. I will not find another job within the organization. I will not find another job elsewhere. I am rubbish. I have no skills. I will never get anywhere.
  • THE UPWARD TURN – Losing my job is hard because I love it, but I need to evaluate it and work out the pros & cons to work out what I might do next.
  • RECONSTRUCTION & WORKING THROUGH – I need to identify my skills and my values and work out what industry or job I might move into. It does not feel as bad as it did.
  • ACCEPTANCE & HOPE – I have a lot to offer another job. I must find it, and it may even be better than the last one.

We are all individuals and you will experience these feelings at different times to your colleagues and friends, but you are still highly likely to experience some, if not all of them.

It’s quite normal to also feel panic, uncertainty, fear particularly if you’ve worked at a company for a long time, you are passionate about what you do and you have never had to give any thought to what you might do next.

On top of this crap news, we are in uncertain times. Understanding how you are feeling can help you start the process of feeling more in control about your future. Take it one step at a time.  Look out for the different stages. Sit with each stage, acknowledge it and observe how you are feeling. You might then be able to move on. As I say, one step at a time.

 

Remember your first job? I do – and it was character building!

Remember your first job? I do – and it was character building!

I had several ‘first’ jobs.  All character building when you are between the ages of 14 – 18.

I started cleaning for my Mum’s friend on a Saturday morning when I was about 14. It was the start of learning the discipline of turning up to work regularly and on time.  The home owners were heavy smokers. Even then I couldn’t stand the smell. Regardless of how many windows I opened, the smell lingered, and penetrated my clothes. Urgh. It was my first experience of cleaning other people’s toilets too. You only have to do it once, and your respect for those who do this for a living is immeasurable.

I also worked in an old people’s care home.  I was only 16 or 17 and found it way harder than expected.  I was involved in changing beds, washing and dressing clients, emptying commodes.  It was hard physical work, but it was worse witnessing the deterioration of the residents and it was my first experience of death (apart from my pets). I never forget the look in the eyes of the lady we had to turn because her bed sores were starting to rot, despite the regular change of dressings. She could no longer speak, but her eyes said everything you needed to know – sadness, humiliation, pain.

I also cleaned my school as a teenager. It was a role you could apply for once you had reached the 6th form (Year 12 & 13 these days). I remember it was good money at that age and I took pride in my work.  We were paid by cheque every two weeks.  A cheque? Teenagers now probably wouldn’t know what that is, would they?

Then there was the washing up in the kitchen of a small restaurant.  Kitchen’s get very hot.  I worked for the Gordon Ramsey of the 1980s.  He would get SO ANGRY when food wasn’t cooked correctly (bear in mind he was doing the cooking!), staff really had to stay out of his way. I remember fresh steaks – a luxury to my family – being slammed onto the floor because he’d slightly overcooked them.  Most of the time I had my hands in the sink of hot, soapy water, head down, trying to keep out of sight and out of range of his fury.

Then I spent one summer – well, one week – working at Royal Ascot.  In the kitchens.  That previous washing up job stood me in good stead, as there was plenty of it!  Although the women and men in the Royal Enclosure were dressed to the nines, there was no glamour down below stairs.  The waste of food was appalling. Being a naïve 18-year-old I had never witnessed such beautiful food being thrown away for seemingly no reason. Some people older than me, packed it in after 48 hours. I stuck it out until the end of the seven days.  It was not an experience I repeated .

All these ‘first jobs’ were character building and stood me in good stead for future employment.  I turned up on time, was able to follow instructions, not complain (at least not on the job), be diligent (those plates and glasses had to be sparkling clean. There was no automatic dishwasher back then!). Show empathy (with the elderly residents), good manners, kindness.  You forget how important these early working experiences shape you.

Interestingly, each job in it’s own way was people orientated – and that’s where my career has remained.

What did your first jobs teach you?

 

Step out of your Comfort Zone with Confidence

Step out of your Comfort Zone with Confidence

The dictionary definition of ‘comfort zone’ is as follows:

  • a situation where one feels safe or at ease.
  • a settled method of working that requires little effort and yields only barely acceptable results.

The comfort zone is the easy path. There’s no difficulty involved in the familiar. It’s simple, straightforward, effortless.

Sometimes the comfort zone is a good thing. If your job is straightforward and generally requires little effort to carry it out successfully, but your personal life is in turmoil and chaos, then working in your comfort zone may be the best thing for you … at that moment. Occasionally, stability is the order of the day. This is positive.

However, many times we find ourselves in a comfort zone without even realising it. Life happens. You are doing a busy, demanding job, looking after elderly parents, taxiing children around, juggling fitness and family commitments. One day you stop and BANG. You find the comfort zone is well and truly established.

You feel bored, de-motivated, dull, unchallenged. Feel this for too long and you may start to doubt yourself and your own abilities. A slippery slope to low self-esteem, lack of confidence, even depression. This is the negative side of the comfort zone.

But why do we stay in our comfort zones? It’s because they are just that – comfortable. They’re like a blanket; keeping us warm and cosy. Except they’re not, are they? Not if you stay there for any length of time, as I have mentioned above.

The real sticking point for coming out of our comfort zone though is fear. Fear of change, fear of the unknown, fear of being exposed, vulnerable and fear of failure. Fear of failure is particularly significant if you have had a bad experience in the past. No one wants to repeat a failure, do they? Nope. We need to try something different.

Below are seven suggestions for getting out of your comfort zone with confidence. Some are small steps, some are slightly bigger. I am sure there are more and would love to hear from you if you have others. Come and join me to continue the discussion in my private Facebook  group The Thinking Space.

  • MIX UP YOUR ROUTINE – go on give it a try. Do one small thing in your routine differently. How difficult was it to do it differently? What stopped you initially? How did you overcome that block and how did it make you feel once you had?
  • BRAINSTORM YOUR FEARS: what specifically is stopping you moving out of your comfort zone? Make a list of 3 – 5 ideas. What are you thinking when you see this list? Ask yourself for each point, IS THIS TRUE? IS IT REALLY TRUE? What do your answers tell you about your fears?
  • ARE YOU A PERFECTIONIST? You need to have everything perfect and in place before you can move on/do something different? Recognise that. Acknowledge it. Sit with it for a moment, then ask yourself, “what if my life or my job, right now, was good enough?” How would that make you feel to know that it was good enough?
  • CAREER STALLING? PROMOTIONS DRYING UP? Stop. Take stock. Look around you. What are successful colleagues doing to be promoted? What actions are they taking to make them visible to other people in your company. Which behaviours do you like? Could you adopt one behaviour yourself?
  • GET A MENTOR: this is someone you respect or admire but will share their experiences and problem-solving strategies with you. They’ll be objective about your career and what you might be able to do. A mentor is not a coach.
  • Say “yes” to something you’d normally say “no” to – volunteer at a school fete, agree to try a choir, do a sport you don’t normally like (this is for me – I don’t like swimming!)
  • Start a conversation with a stranger. Yes, really. Do it. Try it. You have no idea what the outcome might be – hearing a funny story, offering them a listening ear which might make their day. You never know what could happen unless you try it.

The bottom line is, whatever step you take, however small, it’s significant for getting you out of your comfort zone with confidence.

Good luck!

Stage fright & the importance of practice, practice, practice

Stage fright & the importance of practice, practice, practice

Sweaty palms?  Tightness in your chest?  Mind going blank?  If you hate presenting, this might all sound too familiar.  So familiar perhaps that you avoid doing presentations altogether.  Ouch. But avoiding the issue could be make or break for your career or that promotion you want. First of all, know this:  you are not alone.  Everyone experiences this – even the greatest public speakers do.  Don’t believe me?  Have a look at Steve Jobs and his first public TV interview. See how nervous and fidgety he is?  He’s not remembered like that now, is he?  So, how did he do it? In the course of researching this blog I conducted a totally unscientific survey of the members of my ATHENA network group & my followers on my Helen Foster Coaching Facebook page. The most common answers were:

  • The thought of it – the ‘unknown’
  • Mind going blank – “brain freeze”
  • Talking too quickly
  • Not being able to answer questions at the end

Scary stuff, but all very normal.  So, what do you do about it? I recently read a brilliant book by Carmine Gallo called “Talk like TED – The 9 Public Speaking Secrets of the World’s Top Minds”.  There was great advice – be genuine, tell stories that capture the hearts & minds of your audience and timing: stick to the 18 minute rule! One crucial recommendation though was the importance of practice.  Practice.  Practice and Practice some more. The point of being scared about presentations – literally having stage fright – is that you have a fear of the unknown.  You can’t control the unknown and your instinct is to run away from it.  So, rather than focusing on that, focus on what you CAN control.  And what can you control?  You can control how much you practice. Practice is the key to everything I think.  Practice as often as you can, and then practice some more.  Gallo says that Steve Jobs used to spend hours and weeks preparing for a speech so that he eventually established himself as one of the most charismatic business leaders on the world stage.  But he only did this with practice. If you practice your presentation, you can only get more familiar with it. Get more familiar with it, and you’ll be more confident.  More confidence and self belief = better delivery. 

Think of ballet dancers – they don’t get to be so graceful by just “turning-up-on-the-night-and-winging-it”.  They practice…not for hours, or days or months – but years and years in order to become the professional creators of perfection we see on stage. If you don’t believe me, have a look at this fantastic short film from TEDEd Lessons worth sharing – The Science of Stage Fright.  At less than five minutes long, it may be the best few minutes of your day today. Finally, please have a look at an article featuring me on Psychologies.co.uk – How to be a better public speaker. Enjoy!

What are your values?

What are your values?

I ask this question as I’ve been asking it myself recently.  What are my current values, and have they changed since I started my working life? Well, yes they have.  They’ve changed as I’ve changed. But why are they important?  And how do you find out what they are? Discovering your values with a coach helps you understand why you do what you do and what you probably want to do or should be doing.  It helps you to learn what you like doing and, importantly, what you don’t like doing.  If your values and beliefs are in conflict with your environment, or the people you work with, you’ll find yourself experiencing discomfort, tension, stress even. And who wants to remain in that position? If you are feeling these emotions, then I bet you are wanting to ‘get out’ or ‘move on’, yes? How do I know this? It’s linked to my story and helped me to own my values to bring me to where I am now. In a nutshell, I learnt self awareness of what I wanted and what I did not want.

In my mid to late twenties I worked in the PR industry. I liked the work – writing, meeting clients, lunching in fabulous restaurants.  But I remember I always felt uncomfortable about some of the messages I was being asked to promote. I was uncomfortable because those messages didn’t ring true for me.  I didn’t understand at the time why this was, but I look back and it was because I didn’t believe in the messages. It didn’t feel genuine and by continuing to work in an environment where I wasn’t being true to myself led to unhappiness and ultimately a not particularly successful career in PR. By contrast, working for the BBC was much more successful and happy. I believed in what the BBC stood for.  I shared its values, as they were my own – independence, integrity, impartiality, truth, and accuracy to name but a few.  It made for a very positive, creative and exciting time in my career all because, I believe, my values were being met.

However, over time, people change and organisations change.  My job was moving with Radio 5live to Salford.  I wasn’t going to move as my family and support network were here in the Home Counties. It forced me to reassess my values. I decided I wanted to leave the BBC, I searched unsuccessfully at that time for an alternative position. However, I couldn’t find a company whose values were congruent to mine. This helped with the decision to work for myself. I worked with a coach to identify my new values.  One which had become so strong, I couldn’t ignore it was the need to help women to make a change and transform their lives.  This realisation started me on my path to becoming an Executive & Confidence coach. I job I love and thrive in.

If you’d like to identify what your values are in order to help you move forward, call me to find out how I can help you get to where you want to be – 07976 729 636.