By Simon Halstead, Founder of Halstead Incubation Partners and NDA columnist
As another year draws to a close, and the team at New Digital Age shout at me for not giving them an article, I felt inspired by some recent conversations with my network to write this piece.
It’s been another incredibly tough year for everyone – and as people chase down the last remnants of Q4 budgets, and try to get activity booked and live before the holidays so January starts well, all businesses hunker down further into planning.
Unfortunately for some, that also leads to this time of year ending with redundancies being announced, or rumours swirling of possible layoffs. So I wanted to share my experiences of both making and being made redundant.
It’s not you
Being made redundant is one of the hardest things to take. You can feel like you have failed, or you have done something wrong – but it isn’t the case. The drivers are business strategy changes, be that refocus of priorities to other product areas, or growth needed not being met, or business failure.
When making a decision around redundancy in a team, the focus is what’s needed for the next path, and what can be achieved with resources. It isn’t personal, and it’s always a hard decision to make.
You can feel it like a punch, or you feel you have let others down, but it is important to remove that emotion and blame – to put your energy into positivity moving forward. Redundancy is a fact of life in the modern workplace, and we will all likely be impacted at some points in our careers. It really isn’t you, and it isn’t your fault
Here are my recommendations on managing being made redundant
- Grieve for the role, but then put it behind you
- Take time to get over the role, and to focus on what you really did and didn’t like about it. Use that analysis to inform your next steps, and sharpen your focus
- Limit time searching for your next role
- It’s tempting to spend hours on Linkedin, and to hunt down every opportunity – but you can’t create roles that don’t exist, and you can damage your mental health. Set yourself goals, and boundaries on how long, and where you search – don’t enter a doom scroll or vicious circle
- Use time to train, read and stay connected to the industry, and your network
- Don’t spray and pray – focus.
- It’s really tempting to apply for all roles you possibly could fit for – Don’t panic and be strategic about where you apply
- Over applying can make it hard to keep track of opportunities
- Working out the areas of the industry where opportunities are emerging, and shape your skills to them
- Consider the opportunities for a career shift, or focus.
- It could be the time to find a new path
- Move to a parallel industry, or chase a dream
- It could also be time to start something for yourself
- Consider consulting and or contract to support yourself, and fund ideas and exploration
- Use your network well, but don’t abuse them!
- Ask friends to keep an eye out for roles, and to refer you to contacts in target companies – but understand they will be balancing this alongside their own work
- The same goes for recruiters – be nice to them, they also only succeed when someone is placed, and it may just not be you for this opportunity
- Persevere
- Keep fighting, and you will find success eventually. It can take a long time, and it’s hard. But keep going.
Reasons to be optimistic for 2025
Roles are out there, and the feedback seems to be more expected roles next year.
We are also seeing increased activity in the mergers and acquisitions market, which suggests some renewed confidence for the industry, and the next few years will see more innovation in our space.
