This short paper is designed to give you a few simple ideas and steps you can take to help get through and get past being laid off.

1. What To Do When You’ve Been Laid Off
Okay, the worst has just happened to you. You
received your pink slip. You’ve received an
email telling you that your services are no longer
required. Your manager came into your office to
tell you that you are being “right-sized”,
“downsized” or some other equally stupid
corporate phrase they use to depersonalize the
process and make themselves feel better.
In short, you’ve just been laid off. However and
whenever it happens, whether you were
expecting it or not, it still comes as a shock.
This short paper is designed to give you a few simple ideas and steps you can take to
help get through and get past this. As a veteran of working in the technology industry
for several decades, I’ve been through this process myself and have also seen
colleagues come and go.
Yes, it’s true, being laid off sucks. Unfortunately, the concepts of lifetime employment
and company loyalty no longer exist. It’s all about the bottom line, about satisfying the
investors, about meeting market expectations. People are now just another part of the
equation.
So…, what do you do to help you move on with your life? Here are some suggestions
that may help:
 Realize that in today’s world, being laid off is no longer a stigma. Everyone at
one time or another either has been or will be laid off.
 After being laid off, the first thing you should do is to file for your unemployment
benefits. You’ve paid into the system, so now it’s time to take some of it back
out. That’s what unemployment benefits are there for. Don’t let your pride get in
the way of your filing for unemployment as soon as possible. Realize that it won’t
be much, but at least it is something and will help fill the income gap.
 Give yourself some time off to clear the cobwebs. Being laid off is a shock, so
you need some time to process what has just happened.
 Realize that you will go through the grieving process, as being laid off is similar in
impact to your life as a death in the family. It’s okay to grieve, be mad, get angry,

2. yell, cuss, scream. This is why you take a few days off to get it out of your
system. Then you can move forward.
 Don’t make any rash decisions until you’ve had a chance to calm down a bit.
 One upside (if you can call it that) to being laid off is that it gives you time to
evaluate your job or career and decide if you want to keep doing the same thing
you’ve done, or if you want to make a change and go do something else. Many
people forget this, so take advantage of this time if you want to.
 If your education is out of date, take classes to bring your skills up to date or to
learn new skills.
 If you want to learn a new field or trade, see if there are continuing education
classes you can take to see if you like it, or volunteer opportunities where you
can learn while doing.
 Contact a temp agency and let them know that you are immediately available for
work. This is another way to help bridge the income gap.
 You will likely have to scale back your lifestyle to some degree, so take stock of
what your true needs are income- and expense-wise. This will help you prioritize
your expenditures and show you that you may not need as much to get by on as
you thought.
 Look at online sites that list 1099 contract jobs or temporary jobs in your field. A
lot of jobs can be done remotely, giving you time to both work and job hunt.
 Tell everyone you know (friends, family, neighbors, former co-workers, former
employers, club members, church acquaintances, teachers at your child’s school,
people you meet, etc.) that you have been laid off, don’t be prideful and try to
hide that fact from people. People want to help, so let them. You never know
where your next job lead will come from.
 Network, network, network. If you’re not good at that, learn how to do it. It may
be uncomfortable at first, but it is simply a skill that can be learned.
 Don’t burn any bridges at your old job. You never know when someone there
could help you in the future.
 Don’t be afraid to call or email people and ask for suggestions,
recommendations, or even just to ask about what they do. People like to help.
Just be respectful of their time if they do offer to talk with you.
 There are job support groups out there that may be helpful to join. If they work
for you, great. Be careful though, many of those groups are really nothing more
than complaint sessions, full of people who would rather whine than take positive
steps to find a new job.
 Realize that the only one who is really interested in finding you a new job is you.
 Realize that job hunting will now be your full-time occupation and that it is much
harder than any paid job you have ever had.

3.  It never hurts to talk to recruiters and headhunters, but don’t expect them to find
a job for you. Unless your resume and a job description hit their desk at the
exact same time and it is an exact match, they’re not going to call you.
 Help others. You’re going to feel bad about yourself right now, so the best way
to get over that is to help someone else.
 Update your resume. If you don’t have one, create one and then get someone
else to review it. In fact, ask several people to review it for you. Ask for their
critical feedback to help you polish your resume. Just remember, don’t get
offended if they do what you ask.
 Update your online profile. If you don’t have one, create one. If you don’t know
how, ask for help.
 Make sure that you have a professional email address that you use for any job
hunting correspondence. Using something like “hotdog@blitzo.com” is probably
not going to help you get a response.
 Be prompt in responding to any inquiries, letters, phone calls, emails that you
receive.
 Be sure and check your spelling, punctuation and grammar in everything that you
send out. Your written word is now a literal representation of you, so it needs to
be polished and professional.
 Contact people for informational interviews, where you can ask them about their
job, their industry, what they do, if they like it, etc.
 Put a plan in place to help you organize your time and then follow that plan.
 Know that you will spend more hours per day job hunting than planned.
 Realize that you will receive many more “no’s” than you expect. That’s okay, job
hunting in many ways is a numbers game.
 Polish your personal presentation to ensure you present a professional image –
how you introduce yourself, how you shake hands when meeting someone, how
you speak, how you respond to and answer questions, etc. Remember, first
impressions do count and do make a difference.
 Dress for success (yes, it’s really true). Regardless of what you are told by HR
or the recruiter, dress professionally when you go to an interview, do not wear a
casual outfit. A good rule of thumb to remember is to always dress for the role
above the one for which you are interviewing.
 Prepare answers to likely interview questions. There are many online resources
to help you anticipate the type of questions you may be asked during an
interview. Prepare and rehearse your answers so that you are able to confidently
respond during an interview.
 Realize that there are many different types of interviews (phone, conference call,
video conference, in-person, panel, etc.) as well as many different approaches
used in interview (formal, informal, behavioral, stress-inducing, psychological,

4. scripted questions, case, competency-based, etc.), so research them and be
prepared for all different types of formats that may be used.
 Practice interviewing, especially if you have not gone through the interviewing
process for a while. Ask someone to act as the interviewer and actually walk you
through a full interview. This will help you identify your strengths and
weaknesses in the interview process.
 Set goals for you to accomplish each day/week/month and track your activity to
those goals. Whether it is X number of emails to send out each day, or Y
number of phone calls to make each week, or Z number of new networking
contacts to make each month, setting goals will help you see that you are moving
forward and making progress.
 Take some breaks throughout the day. You can’t sit at your desk for hours at a
time, making phone calls, networking, sending emails, etc. without going crazy.
Get up, walk around, go outside and get some fresh air, play with the dog,
whatever. Just take a break occasionally.
 And finally, give yourself some small rewards throughout the process. For
instance, if you meet your weekly goals, then maybe your reward is to go out for
an ice cream. It shows you that you are accomplishing your goals and will help
make the process a bit easier to deal with.
The reality is that job hunting sucks, that’s all there is to it. It’s hard. It’s stressful.
It’s time consuming. It’s depressing. You may even feel that it is humiliating (after
all, you’re now having to sell yourself to potential employers). All of that will wear
you down over time. Realize it, accept it, deal with it, but don’t let it stop you.
Finally, one last recommendation. Once you have gotten through this time in your
life (and trust me, you will), then take some time out of your schedule and help
someone else who is going through this same situation in their life. By going
through this process you will have learned a lot about yourself, about what you can
accomplish, about what your hidden strengths are, about change, coping, surviving
and moving forward. You learned a lot, now it’s your turn to share that knowledge
with others.
It’s highly likely that a lot of people helped you get through this difficult time in your
life, so now it’s your turn to repay the favor. Help others realize that while this is a
difficult time, they can get through it. You did, so you know they can too. Help them
see that they can move on and life will continue.
Pay it forward and help someone else, like others helped you.

5. I promise you that if you follow some (or all) of these steps it will make the process a
little bit easier.
Good luck!
© 2016 – Richard Hatheway
All rights reserved.