Minimize the Sting of Separation – No Matter Why an Employee is Leaving

iStockphoto.com | Chris Ryan

In the United States, salaries are climbing and unemployment is at 3.7% – the lowest in 49 years. It shouldn’t be a secret to employers that job seekers have more leverage than they’ve had in years.

Employment branding – how a company portrays and differentiates itself as a great place to work – is more important than ever. This is the age of Glassdoor, where reviews of employers are abundant and readily available, and many firms invest a great deal of money in their employment image as they recruit talent.

Despite this investment, these employment branding efforts often diminish at the end of the employee lifecycle, as an employee is on his or her way toward exiting an organization. That’s a mistake. Managing employment branding at the point of separation (whether the employee is being laid off, leaving voluntarily or even being fired) is essential, regardless of the reason for separation. Employees are very sensitive (and perceptive) about how their exits are handled.

Former employees tend to talk freely about their impression of the company, and remember, everybody knows somebody. If an employee separation is handled with dignity and respect, the former employee is more likely to speak positively about their time at the company. Conversely, if the employee is unceremoniously pushed out the door, the net result could be bad feelings, accompanied by the spread of negative feedback online and across the broader talent market.

Here are some ways for employers to effectively manage employment branding at point of separation:

• Demonstrate empathy and dignity. There are many valid reasons an employer might want to initiate a separation – whether layoff or firing – but it’s important to remember that, for the employee, losing a job is a painful and emotional experience.
  

• Perform an exit interview. Asking a separating employee to talk about her or his experience at the company can provide valuable information about the environment, the culture, and the work itself. It might also yield valuable insights into what factors led to the employee’s separation. Build a standard set of open-ended questions, and have a skilled interviewer probe tactfully into the answers. The employee’s description of their work situation and performance may vary in substance or accuracy from the company’s, but it’s important to hear the employee out.
  

• Consider offering outplacement services to ease the employee’s landing. Outplacement can include resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, job search coaching, and other tools designed to help the employee get back on his or her feet quickly. An outplacement package can increase soon-to-be-ex-employee satisfaction by demonstrating empathy and providing assistance. It can reduce employer risk by giving the separating employee something of value in exchange for releasing the company from any separation-related liability (always consult an attorney, a good lawyer will help you work through such a release). And, a separation package helps the individual focus forward on the next role, rather than backwards – and the faster he or she gets back to work, the less time will be spent thinking about being unemployed and trying to assign blame.

---

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, career coaching services, and outplacement services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercareerstrategies.com.

You Can't Tell Them Your Boss Is A Jerk – Explaining Why You're Looking For A New Job

iStockphoto.com | AntonioGuillem

A common reason people look for new jobs is because they hate what they’re currently doing. It could be that the work is a grind, the boss is a jerk, and the pay is insufficient for the level of responsibility – or some combination of these factors.

If you’re in this situation, it’s understandable that you’re on the job market.

But here’s the problem. They don’t want to hear you say that your current work is a grind, the boss is a jerk, and the pay is insufficient.

When you’re in an interview with a potential employer, he or she is looking for a candidate who is upbeat, positive, and would add to the overall morale of the office. Negative talk about your current employer could knock you out of contention.

It’s not that your reasons for seeking new employment opportunities aren’t true – they are all probably quite valid. But appearing to “trash talk” can raise concerns to a recruiter or hiring manager, such as, “What is this candidate going to say about us when he discovers something he doesn’t like?”

The interview process is a dance, and answering the question “Why are you seeking new opportunities” is a step in this dance. And. like any dance, it’s best to approach it with finesse so that you don’t step on any toes in the process. Here’s how to prepare to answer this difficult question.

1. Understand Your True Motivation For Changing Jobs. Every job comes with its own annoyances and frustrations; we tend to tolerate the negative aspects of the position because they’re often outweighed by the positives. Dig deep and ask yourself, “What is it about the position that’s truly making this job more trouble than it’s worth?” The rest is just noise.
   

2. Identify The Aspects Of Your Current Job That You Have Enjoyed. Maybe you truly love your day-to-day core duties, or perhaps the company has given you great training opportunities, or they’ve exposed you to new career growth avenues.
   

3. When Presenting Your Reason To A Potential Employer, Sandwich The Negative With The Positives. By starting and ending your explanation the the things you like about your current job, you provide valuable context and soften the negativity.

Here’s an example: “(Positive) In my current role as a project manager, I absolutely love the scope of responsibility I have – I’m able to work on a variety of programs with some truly wonderful customers. (Negative) As the years have progressed, the company has gone through several reorganizations which have made the role more difficult. (Positive) I’m very grateful for the opportunity the company gave me – I’ve been promoted multiple times and I work with wonderful people, but when this role with your company was posted it seemed like a good fit for the next stage of my career.”

---

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercareerstrategies.com.

We're All Replaceable – Are You Ready?

iStockphoto.com | nytumbleweeds

I once read an opinion piece in the New York Times by Dan Lyons, who worked at a software company where involuntary turnover (i.e., getting fired or laid off) was the norm. The fact that you could be fired on any day, for any reason, was routine.

Rough and tumble corporate cultures are nothing new. And while not every company is a meat grinder, the truth is that deliberately tough work environments do exist, and employers aren't necessarily selling themselves as best-in-class places to work. They demand results. The social contract is simple enough: We give you a paycheck, and you work in the environment we choose to foster.

Websites like Glassdoor will show you reviews of companies' work environments by former and current employees. My guess (and it's just a guess) is that this increased level of transparency has led some companies to embrace the fact that working there isn't going to be a Shangri-La. It's kind of freeing for executive leadership, in a way - if people know you're not too worried about employee engagement, you can focus that energy on simply producing results.

Going back to the opinion piece mentioned at the beginning of this post, the detail that really caught my attention was that Lyons' employer evaluated employees in their appraisals with a metric called VORP - Value Over a Replacement Player. This is a baseball statistic that general managers use to decide when to trade or cut players. In other words, if there's a second baseman on the market who can do the same job for less, or deliver better stats at the same rate of pay, the GM has data that can support making a personnel change at moment’s notice.

This, according to the article, is transparent to employees, they can tell immediately how much the organization values them. What's scary about this is that Major League Baseball is a truly elite work environment - at any given time, there's only 750 positions available at the highest level. And these players are paid elite money to deal with this uncertainty - and to reward them for the level of performance they are expected to deliver.

The average MLB player knows the odds - there are hundreds of thousands of people competing for his job. And his career averages 5.6 years in length. Longevity isn't necessarily part of the equation.

But the fact that this practice has entered the mainstream should serve as a wake-up call to employees. We are all replaceable. There is always somebody ready to come along and do our job.

How can you prepare?

• Be self-aware. Are your skills up to date? How about your soft skills, do you get along well with others? Your employer and coworkers are very aware of your strengths and weaknesses, and you should be, too. If you realize you're lacking in a certain area, work on developing your skill set. It's worth it.
  

• Know where you stand. Have regular touch-bases with your manager. Engage in open dialogue about your performance and expectations. Make sure you're both aligned, and you know what is believed to be a personal strength or development area.
  

• Keep your resume and your LinkedIn profile current. Change may come faster than you anticipate, and not necessarily on your terms. You need to be ready in case opportunity knocks.
  

• Always be networking. The worst time to start building up your connections is when you need a job. Have your network in place and give it some TLC. Pay it forward - help people in your network when you're in a position to do so, so that others have a reason to give you a solid. Be nice to people – it pays dividends.

---

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercareerstrategies.com.