9 Ways To Ensure You Keep Your Job During Retrenchment

People are losing jobs everyday either due to difficult economic times or even if organizations are making effort to cut down operational costs, recently retail stores like Uchumi and Nakumatt laid off employees, even the most popular media houses have in recent years retrenched hundreds of employees to maximize profits.

So how do you ensure you are among the few members of staff who keep their job?

1. Specialize on a particular skill.

Find some task that needs to get done by the organization and make sure that you are the only person who knows how to do it, through this you will have the chance when somebody who already has a unique skill leaves the company, and you step in to replace them. Or it will happen when a new initiative is created that requires skill the company has never before had.

2. Do work that matters, not work that’s easy.

Most employees can find tasks at work to stay busy, pass the time, and fly under the radar of the boss, however become indispensable, you’ll want to dig deeper and really think about the work that matters to the company and its success. Tackle those projects first.

3. Be willing to go the extra mile. 

This doesn’t mean you have to be a pet to your boss but if you’ve got the time and means to give a little more than what’s expected, it can go a long way, Managers need help and support to do their jobs well and having a reliable team member makes a big impact.

Majority of  employees just execute, but if you’re one of the few who are constantly coming up with new ideas and are taking on new responsibilities that aren’t required of you, this will go a long way in making you indispensable. Volunteering for projects that other employees don’t want to work on will also solidify your position as an indispensable employee.

4. Be productive, but don’t make it a race.

Most employees equate being successful and productive with doing the most work, and doing it the quickest, that’s not always the case. You should take your time to do the work correctly and thoughtfully. Often when you do this you can uncover better and more efficient ways to get the job done and once you bring those to the table.

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5. Monopolize an important relationship.

If you are the only person who is a trusted advisor to your company’s biggest customer, you will be essential to the company, find relationships that are crucial to the company’s survival or ability to get things done, and become the point person who maintains the relationship. Build it up over time.

6. Be a team player. 

To be indispensable, you not only need to prove yourself to your supervisor, but to your co-workers as well, if they’re always looking to you to lead them, to be the point person on projects, even though you aren’t their supervisor, this speaks volumes about you. Furthermore, offer to help your co-workers when they run into a problem. If you do, they will see you as their colleague and mentor which can only help your work relationship with them.

 7. Be committed.

It sounds obvious, and it may even sound easy, but what often truly sets the indispensable workers apart from the replaceable employees in the machine is a die hard work ethic and commitment to quality. If you are the best at what you do, you are likely to be the last one to go.

8. Have a good attitude. 

It is easy to find people who don’t appreciate having a job at all, and much harder to find people who make the office a pleasant place to come, everyone likes working with people who seem like they are happy to be there, and if choosing between two employees who are equally good at their jobs, a manager is more likely to relieve the unappreciative one.

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9. Stay current with technology and trends.

Technology and industry trends are constantly changing so if you are continually learning new technologies and keeping up with trends, you will continue to be an invaluable asset to your company. If you’re not already, you will become the go-to person on these matters which makes your knowledge and skills even more valuable compared to those who aren’t staying current.

Keeping your day job is basically determined by how you carry yourself throughout your work days.

Victor is a content writer at Career Point Kenya email him victor@www.careerpointkenya.co.ke