What’s the worst thing about losing your job?

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Engineering drafting room, 1962
Worst thing about losing your job … surprise! It’s not the paycheck!

What’s the worst thing about losing your job?

I have first hand experience in answering this question.  You see, back in 1994 I conducted a real life experiment.  I was able to find out for myself the worst thing about losing your job.  I didn’t volunteer for the assignment – it was thrust upon me.  The real-life experiment happened the day my 10 month contract ended and my job went away; no more funding; “you’re free Mr Ives to go ahead and find another job … somewhere else.”

Bottom line … I lost my job.

Nothing personal Mr Ives.  No hard feelings.  It’s just that we’re experiencing budget cuts and your services are no longer required.  We love the work you do.  We appreciate the reports you’ve written; especially the one where you saved us a million dollars by determining the Variable Flow Ducted Rocket (VFDR) drag reduction using computer analysis instead of hiring Hughes Missile Systems to construct a model and conduct extensive wind tunnel testing.  If there were no budget cuts, we’d keep you on-board.  But, we don’t control the purse strings in Washington.  Sorry.

My favorite part of the “you’re fired” speech is the last sentence … “Sorry.”  It says it all.  Once I heard that word, I knew it was time to hustle; time to get the job-search-engine in gear; time to re-group then charge forward and find a new job.

The story has a happy ending.  Within a month, I found a new engineering position with Ball Aerospace supporting the Flight Dynamics Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio.  You can read about it in my book, “Working my BUT off – Reflections of a Property Investor.

It was during this one month layoff period that I discovered the worst thing about losing my job.  It was a surprising discovery because it’s not the thing I would have guessed.  I thought the worst thing would be losing the paycheck.  But, it wasn’t.

Here’s a snippet from my book, “Working my BUT off – Reflections of a Property Investor” that answers the question “What’s the worst thing about losing your job?”

***

And, that’s why a job is financially and otherwise dangerous … when I lost my job, two things happened:

  1. I lost a massive chunk of my income!
  2. I lost my role as the laboratory aero-analysis go-to guy!

Wow!  That’s a lot.  That’s a lot to lose.

And, I would suggest that for most people – especially those who enjoy what they do and have been doing it for many years – #2 above is the more damaging thing to lose!  The role you play; the expertise you’ve accumulated; the friends you’ve made; the feeling of being needed; are the hardest things to let go!  They’re the things you miss the most!  The very things that tend to keep you healthy, happy and alive!

And, did you notice that none of these things … are things!  You can’t touch them.  Have you ever tried to go to the store and buy a pound of experience; a loaf of “being needed”; a six pack of friendship?

And, losing these things – that aren’t things – is what makes losing your job so devastating!  Losing the income just adds insult to injury!

For many people, losing their job is just too traumatic; too upsetting; too devastating.

I’ve seen the effects first hand when my Dad lost his job.  You can read about it in the previous chapter, “But, what if I’ve got a good job?”

And, that’s why I suggest, you never want to get too dependent on a job!

***

So, the worst thing about losing your job is not the paycheck.  The worst thing is … losing the things … that aren’t things!

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Comments

    • Jock Stuart
    • September 10, 2015

    The only time I was fired from a job, it happenned the day before I was due to start. It seems someone else wanted the roster I was given and started bad-mouthing me to the manager, who decided to fire me before seeking my side of the story.

    1. That’s a new one for me … fired before you started. Not good that you didn’t get a chance to discuss with manager.

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