Building a Safety Net in Uncertain Times

The Washington Post has an article about the employment outlook for highly skilled workers and it isn’t particularly encouraging. The basic jist of the article is that highly skilled workers are finding it more difficult to obtain a new job and when they do find one it is often for less than what they were making at their previous position.

In such uncertain times, it might make some worry about the future may hold. But worrying doesn’t put food on the table or pay the rent. If this news concerns you, do something about it. The best thing you can do is to put together an emergency fund. Typically financial advisors recommend a cushion equal to 3 months of your current salary. Some of you might be choking on that. 3 months?! I haven’t got 3 days. The good news is that it’s never too late to start saving to provide protection against a layoff. Analyze your finances to determine how much you can save and what, if anything, you can cut out from your budget to increase that amount. Then put that amount aside and continue to do so until you have a sufficient nestegg put aside to cover. It won’t assuage your concerns today, but like most things money related, doing the right thing over time gets you to a good place.

At the same time you are doing this, consider taking advantage of any opportunities you may have to improve your skills to make yourself more marketable (especially if your current employer will pay for them). I’ve been taking free online classes from Microsoft lately for example. Additionally I’ll be attending a training course this spring to tighten up my core skill set.

And finally… start refreshing your network. You don’t need to start reaching out to friends and family for a new job, but it never hurts to touch base with people you haven’t spoken with just to see how they are doing. I make 2-5% of my income each year though small projects which come from my network. It’s not a large percentage of my income by any means, but at the same time I’m not actively soliciting work… things just occasionally drop in my lap. Making sure that my network is up to date is therefore not just good on a personal level, but also on a professional one as well.