This year, one out of three Americans are grappling with “layoff anxiety,” and roughly one in three “would take a 10-20% pay cut to avoid being laid off,” according to a recent survey by Clarify Capital.
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The survey of 1,000 Americans also found that many would take other measures to save their jobs. Specifically, 46% indicated that they’d accept additional responsibilities or workload. Moving to an undesirable role is something 25% of respondents said they’d do. Some — 25% — would even go back to the office full time. Cutting down to part-time work is something 18% would opt for.
Andy Thomas, the owner of Andy Thomas Careers Now, a full-service career and executive coaching firm that works with clients nationally, told GOBankingRates what steps you should take to safeguard your job and position yourself for another one.
Thomas stressed that taking initiative is key. He explained that if you’re sensing that a layoff is looming, then it’s best to not be idle and wonder if it will come to you. Instead, you should get ready as if it will.
“Have your resume done,” he said. “Have your LinkedIn up to speed, regardless. Begin to look at the marketplace, regardless. Don’t wait for the anvil to come crashing down.”
If you aren’t proactive, he warned, you might end up in a situation where you’ll “have to settle on a lower-priced job or a lesser position.”
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However, according to Thomas, there’s value in remaining employed. He said, “Unless you’re being physically or mentally abused in a job, it is always better to stay employed rather than riding the unemployed rollercoaster in between jobs.”
As far as whether the trade-offs some respondents indicated they’d make in the Clarify Capital survey –opting for a pay cut, increased duties or a heavier workload, being reassigned to a position that’s not appealing, shifting to full on-site work and slashing their hours to part-time — could they work?
“In some cases, the answer is actually yes,” Thomas said. He believes that all companies undergo tougher times.
“Here’s the key: if the company has been good to you in the past, if the company, you feel, has been fair to you in the past, why not help the company by riding the ride a little bit if you can?” he said.
However, he stressed that “you see leadership at the top that knows what it’s doing, that’s trying to get around the corner and that is disclosing where they are, disclosing the many issues that they’re dealing with as a company.”
“[By being] very transparent in what’s happening,” Thomas said. “[It] would buy a little bit of trust in you as an employee to maybe give them a little bit of the benefit of the doubt, at least for a while.”
If you see that your company has bad leadership that does not know what they’re doing and is losing money, he emphasized that being proactive and leaving the company would be the best option for you.
If you decide to start a job search, Thomas advised considering smaller companies.
“The amount of reward that I see for my clients in smaller companies is extraordinary,” he said.
Other types of companies he recommended job seekers look into are well-funded startups, private equity-owned companies that have finished their initial streamlining, and private equity firms. He also emphasized exploring opportunities at companies that are in traditional blue-collar industries, such as HVAC. These, he said, have white-collar work as well.
“These are still businesses,” he said. “They still have C-level staff, [like] CEOs, COOs, they have analysts … sales, [and] … directors of sales. They have all the same ingredients that banks and all these big, perceived white-collar corporations have, but you can make just as much money and have even better job security.”
If you decide that you’d like to try to stay and avoid getting laid off, Thomas recommended talking to your boss or your “skip boss,” which he said tends to be your boss’s boss.
“It’s really critical that companies communicate and be transparent with employees, but it’s also important that employees show their fervor and passion and desire to help the company,” he said.
Two-way communication, Thomas noted, can go a long way.
“Usually, if you have communication going from both ends, it ends up strengthening the relationship between the company and the employee, and both get through tough times,” he said. “Both do. Employees do, and the company does. And yes, there should be a reward for the employee at some point in that equation, that they stuck it out — we’ll get them back up to a higher level, give them an advancement, remember what they did.”
Thomas gave an example of how you could approach such a conversation. Say you’re willing to take a pay cut. In that case, Thomas explained that you could start by telling your skip boss or boss, “‘Obviously, I would hope that you can keep me at my current pay rate.’”
From there, you could continue that conversation with the dialogue, “‘I want you to be aware that I’m one of the people you can count on to come to the assistance of the company. I understand what we are going through as a company and am willing to make a sacrifice in terms of a pay cut.’”
Thomas added that while making this offer, you should also politely request that management recognize your sacrifice once the company gets back on track by stating, “‘[I] ask you to remember my sacrifice as we begin to stabilize and rebuild.’”
He noted that you should not explicitly state you’ll leave if not rewarded. However, he advised that if the company doesn’t reciprocate your help when conditions improve, then you should leave.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: Roughly 1 in 3 Americans Would Opt for Pay Cut Instead of a Layoff — How To Safeguard Your Job While Positioning Yourself for a New One
