Unexpected unemployment....

I have a friend who was informed last week by his employer that they plan to terminate the majority of the finance department. The plan is to keep the two highest positions in the department, but the others (8 people) will be out of work. The company plans to re-staff the department with five positions of which 3 are data entry positions and the other two being an analyst and director position. Now of the 8 people almost jobless, 3 had been there for over 12 years, and 2 for about 8 years and the others were hired within the past 3-5 years. And they have to interview for those positions......go figure. So not only are 5 people left to fight for 2 jobs, the other 6 are over qualified for the last 3 positions............

Said friend had a slight indication this was going to take place, as did three of the other people. So said friend had a plan devised. But it got me to thinking............what would I do? how long would I be able to survive being unemployed?

Some years ago, I was unhappy with my job, so I started lumping away money to cover expenses in the event I became unemployed. The plan was to have 3 months of expenses to cover for any lapse in employment. And lucky for me I was also working a part time job, so I would also increase the hours worked on the part time job. But I've since moved on from that
employer and that fund dwindle slightly. Sure I still sock away some on a regular basis, but my expenses have since increased three times over.



So now, I'm in the midst of devising my own "no job" plan.



My previous post regarding savings will stay in place, but I think I'm gonna try to pay off two small credit cards by the end of the year as well. One is a store credit card that I paid off countless times before, but emotional shopping is the reason for the existing balance. And the other, well I was just paying the minimum until the top of the year. The card expired, so when they sent a new one I didn't activate the card and have been making twice the minimum required payment ever since. Once I clear these two debts then I can use the snowball effect to tackle the last credit card. Luckily for me I only have three credit cards. And I refuse to get any more, although the credit limit inconveniently increases.

And as far as securing another job, well my resume stays updated. And I'll keep it posted on job posting sites like career builder, monster and washington post. And since I really want to get back into the government, I'll also keep an eye out for positions of interest. Another option is local temp agencies. In fact, that would probably be my first step, signing up with local agencies in an effort to have some sort of income.

At any rate I'm not gonna stress over it. I'm positive I'll handle a hurdle such as being laid off effective and efficiently.

Peace, Blessings and Laughs