Four Easy Career Strategies to Banish Workplace Blues

A recent article in Investors Business Daily1 identified some of the actions managers could take to “cure the survivor blues”. I’m not sure it’s something to be cured, maybe managed, but I’ll let you decide. I found some great points to take away from the article that would be valuable for today’s career professional. These lessons for managers can be revamped for career professionals as easily implemented strategies to banish workplace blues by shifting the focus – to you!

Express yourself

• Emotions are heightened when people around you are being laid off and you’re a survivor. And if you’re the one selected, the mix of fear and joy is not uncommon. But it’s important for everyone, no matter which group you land in, to express the fear, hopes and desires for the future. There are some creative ways to give your expressio “air time”! Create a free blog and talk about it – you’ll help others – and that feels good. Create a vision board -- taking a poster board purchased at a craft store, and place pictures, words symbols on it that reflect your thoughts and desires. And finally, participate in groups that are coming together to help both those who have been laid off or are workplace survivors.

Explore the possibilities

• What long kept secret career desire do you have? Is that “inkling” starting to tickle? You’re likely doing what you’ve been trained or told to do based on what your education, parents, friends, family, etc. have advised. Well, here is your opportunity to explore the hidden desire within and see where it leads. Perhaps more joy? More security? What this means is talking with those who “do it today”, researching what it would take and taking a no holds barred approach to learning how to achieve what you want. Put on your pith helmet and get going!

Extract the benefit

• Even in what is perceived to be a bad situation, there is something good. It could be a lesson learned, a new friend or connection made, deeper clarification of something wanted or a positive change to be made. The value of being in this space is often overlooked? Why? Because when you’re in the “bad” you tend to see more downstream bad. You’ve heard, no doubt, about the law of attraction, right? When you’re thinking of bad, more bad thinking joins it. So to shift it, find or extract the benefit and have more benefits join it. It’s always there, it just requires a desire and your miner’s light and pick ax to extract the gold.

Enlarge your network

• One of the positive outcomes from these workplace layoffs and changes has been the increase in social networks. It is the hottest topic for speakers, conferences, associations and webinars. More people have joined LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc. to expand their networks and create more avenues for themselves. They use these online networks for collaboration, job hunting, expressing themselves, sharing tips and techniques and just staying “connected”. Offline networking is up as well! More groups are being formed and joined to help workplace survivors and those laid off to stay active and explore opportunities. It’s the greatest time of connection on a career/life basis (other than the dating networks) than ever before. Take advantage of a good thing. Put together, your online and offline networking strategy and expand your personal rolodex.

By implementing these four easy strategies you may not cure, but you can banish the workplace blues by investing in some “me” time to create a more powerful future. The degree to which each strategy is relevant to your current conditions is up to you. However, there is something – no matter how small – that will benefit everyone, today, attract even more downstream benefits, tomorrow.

1. Ease the pain of layoffs, by Cord Cooper, investors.com, 6/12/09