EXTRACT:The threat of redundancy alone is a stressful experience; actually losing your job is considerably worse. Here, Lisa O'Callaghan takes a light-hearted yet instructive look at the ways people react when their jobs are on the line
Loss is nothing else but change, and change is nature’s delight
JM Barrie
Loss is nothing but a pain in the neck, and if it is indeed nature’s delight, she has a sick sense of humour
Lisa O’Callaghan
IT ALWAYS SUCKS when you lose your job, especially when you have no other job to go to. Even when you hated it, thought your boss had stepped out of a scene from The Officeand believed that the place carried a strange smell of dead animals. Yes, it always hurts, and invariably leaves you with a sense of failure. Sometimes you see it coming and can mentally prepare for it, to help ease the pain. Sometimes you don't suspect a thing and feel like you are caught in one of those candid-camera TV programmes, because everything seems so surreal.
Redundancy and the threat of it is a stranger beast again, because it brings out a wide array of characteristics in people. But one thing is for sure: both you and people around you will change once the threat begins to approach. This is understandable. We tend to work a little harder, for a start. But something else happens too.
And it’s not always bad. Sometimes it is downright funny: certain personality types emerge. In my experience, these can be categorised into 10 distinct types.
THE ESCAPED PRISONER
These are the ones with a sense of wide-eyed urgency and ready smiles (and sometimes raucous laughter), their calculators constantly clicking, totting up how much they plan to earn with their pay-off, and helping others tot up theirs. They’re hoping, praying, it’ll be them. If a voluntary-redundancy package is on offer, they are first up. Escaped Prisoners hate their jobs, may have something else lined up, want to travel, or just want to be at home for a while.
Nothing, but nothing, is going to come between them and the pay-off. These are often the best people to hang with. They’re not interested in playing games, back-stabbing, or any kind of manipulation, except that which will lead them out. The only downside for you is that their enthusiasm about the prospect of leaving may infect you. If you genuinely want to stay, don’t let yourself be swept away by it. In this group, you tend to find working mothers with young children, anyone under 26, and finance and accounts personnel.
THE PANIC MERCHANT
“It’s us, it’s us, it’s me and you and you. I know it is. I know it is. I saw them looking at us when they came out of their meeting. They turned their eyes away from me when I passed. It’s definitely gonna be from this group. Def-in-itely. Mary from accounts thinks the same thing. So does Paul in IT. We’re doomed . . . doomed!”
Unfortunately, it’s illegal to shoot people, but if you could, these would definitely be the first people against the wall. They will break your heart. They will wreck your head. They will drive not only themselves but also you to paranoid psychosis. Don’t have coffee with them – or lunch – and if you do, tell them they can’t mention the “R” word. Panic merchants tend to be either relatively new or just insecure. They may have jobs with no clearly defined responsibilities. They most often don’t like or don’t trust their boss. But the strange thing about Panic Merchants is . . . they tend to be right.
THE FANTASIST
“It’ll never be me. I’m too important. My boss loves me too much. They’d be lost without me. I’m the one who keeps this company together. If it hadn’t been for me . . .” The Fantasist acts as if nothing is happening, laughs at others’ anxiety and carries on with their request for the latest phone, a business trip to Taiwan, a training day in the Four Seasons. They will tell you not to worry and that it’s going to be someone else. People in this group tend to be young graduates or old-timers, or on drugs: in other words, too young, too old, or too spaced to know better. Don’t be fooled.
THE BORN-AGAIN CONSCIENTIOUS
This is where monthly sick days, 9.30am-ish starts and long-winded explanations on why nothing ever happens are suddenly replaced with rude health, zealous timekeeping and regular, loud updates on “achievements”.
Annoying? Yes. My advice? Swallow your pride and do some PR of your own. And let’s face it, we could all work a little harder.
THE PROTECTED SPECIES
We know them and hate them: the ones who know that no matter what happens, it ain’t gonna happen to them.
You recognise them in their false concern and all-too-ready cheery smile; their regular coffee breaks with the head honchos to discuss how much territory will be given over to them when Ms X or Mr Y gets the boot; their insistence that all of the bad things that are happening are good and healthy and that we’re all better off without our jobs anyway.
Protected Species have nothing to say about the state of the jobs market or recruitment agencies, because they haven’t looked: they haven’t needed to. They always insist on changing the subject when the conversation turns to the topic of redundancy, because “It’s sooo boring”.
People in this category tend to be the boss’s offspring, the boss’s proteges, long-time faithful servants or top salespeople.
Advice: get to know them or, better still, find some embarrassing information on them, and their protective coat may save you too.
THE ESCAPE ARTIST
It would be worth doing a full anthropological study of the Escape Artist, because we have much to learn from them. Unlike the Protected Species, they have no connection to anyone in particular, no golden reputation with which to blind employers, in fact no real reason to be there in the first place.
I have a dear friend who has managed to avoid five redundancy programmes in the space of two years without ever having any specific job specification or, believe it or not, much to do. But each time redundancy seems imminent, the hatchet man just passes him by. Amazing.
I bow to these people. They are true survivors, and every company who has them should listen to them, for they are wise and knowing people who will never go hungry.
People in this category tend to be quiet (very quiet) but still manage to know, and be known by, everyone.
THE FRIENDLY ASSASSIN
Have you ever had someone approach you on the quiet to explain that “sticking together” is the best way to hold on to your job? #Have you ever had anyone promise that they will “watch your back” while they are actively trying to get rid of other people? Well, we’ve seen enough TV survival shows to know that we should treat such people with great suspicion: you’re probably the one they’re after.
The way to handle someone like that is to appear to go along with them, and confidently say things such as: “We all agree that it’s the best way . . . I have to go to a meeting now but, rest assured, I will watch your back too.” Make him wonder: one, where you’re going; two, who you’re meeting; and three (most important of all), who’s “we”?
THE BLEEDING HEART
These people will look for any excuse to get out of being treated as an equal target for the hatchet man. Whether their plea is, “but I’ve only just arrived”, “but I’ve only just bought a house”, or “but I’ve only just found out I’m pregnant”, you can be sure that preferential treatment will be meted out to them. Advice: get in there with your own sob story. Even the hatchet man has a heart.
THE MORAL MAJORITY
This species will huddle in groups for hours and talk about the poor unfortunates who got the chop as if they had died. Hushed tones, bowed heads, even a tear or two.
Perhaps there’s a little bit of survivor’s guilt and a few grains of genuine concern, but really they’re just bloody relieved that it wasn’t them. If they truly cared as much as that, they’d act on it in some way. And some do: I’m happy to report that I’ve met them.
THE LEGAL EAGER
Against the threat of redundancy, some people run to their calculators, and others run to the pub, but you can always be sure that some will run to their solicitors.
Sometimes, if handled correctly, that can be a smart move. But Legal Eagers will speak loud and proud about it, and sometimes even parade their solicitor around the place like a prized bull. Legal Eagers are great for the after-work gossip-fest and are welcome at any table. People in this category tend to be those who have massive egos or who have genuinely been badly treated.
Surviving The Axe: The Irish Guide to Handling Redundancy and Finding a New Jobby Lisa OCallaghan is the first of three titles published this spring in a series called Liberties Practical - covering topics such as buying your first home and making your own will. Three further books will be published in the autumn. The books cost €9.99 and will be available from www.LibertiesPress.com and bookshops nationwide.