8/16/2020 Job Security is an Illusion.

And why this is actually a liberating… | by Edith Tollschein | Data Driven Investor | Medium

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Job Security is an Illusion

And why this is actually a liberating thing

Edith Tollschein Follow

Jan 11, 2019 · 5 min read

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8/16/2020 Job Security is an Illusion. And why this is actually a liberating… | by Edith Tollschein | Data Driven Investor | Medium

The year is 2016. I have to pack and leave the home that I had started building in Dubai. I
knew this day would come, I just didn’t expect it to be that soon.

The previous year, I was promoted. Finally, I felt that my career was shaping up as I had
always wanted. That same year I started my MBA Degree, and that same year I got
married, and together we invested in buying a home for our future — how “responsible
adults” do it. Talk of biting more than one could chew, that is what Dubai does to you. It
is one of the best places to work, zero income tax, lucrative relocation packages enjoyed
by the majority of the expatriates, and if you are smart enough with your finances you
can attain financial freedom in your younger years.

As Sarah Townsend puts it:

“Many are lured by the prospect of a tax-free salary, abundant job opportunities and
relatively high standard of living, foreigners have come to the UAE in droves and made it
their home.”

Damn right, that was my motivation to work in this region.

So, what happened?

Simply put, the 2015 Oil crisis; I worked in this sector.

“The impact of low oil prices is being felt across the globe. As of this week, more than
250,000 employees worldwide have lost their jobs, as oil and gas companies were forced to
shut down rigs and tightened their belts to cope with the downturn.” Cleofe Maceda.

This experience got me thinking…actually, I didn’t have a choice but start thinking
seriously;

Is there such a thing as “job security”, and if so, how can one attain it?

I am in my 30s, and I have already held more jobs than my parents ever did. My parents
started with one job and retired in the same job. For them, job hopping was for the lazy,
irresponsible adults, people who do not know what they want. In their generation, the
goal was to get educated, get a job in a decent company, work hard for a promotion, and

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8/16/2020 Job Security is an Illusion. And why this is actually a liberating… | by Edith Tollschein | Data Driven Investor | Medium

keep doing so until it is time for retirement. This sounds sad to me, but somehow my
brain is wired to think that this is what responsible adults do.

In my final year in University, one lecturer advised me that if I want to have a good
future in the job market, I should make sure that I am irreplaceable. The thing is, I am
not there yet, but to be frank, I do not even think it is possible. In my opinion, everyone
is replaceable. What I would tell my younger self is sharpen your skills, but more so,
learn more than one skill so that if one doesn’t work out you have something else to fall
back on. One may argue that having multiple skills makes you a “Jack of all trades,
master of none.”

Unfortunately, I think we are approaching an era where having just one skill might be a
huge risk to your source of livelihood. It is important to have options, even if you never
have to put them into use.

So why do I think job security is an illusion?

This is an era of rapid technological advancement, migration will change the dynamics
of the job market whether we close the borders or not. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is
already causing panic especially amongst those whose task revolve around
administration and data processing. However, according to Mckinsey & Company Report
2017, only 5% of current occupations are at the risk of being fully automated, but things
might change.

Let’s forget about this technological stuff for a moment; Companies shut down,
organizations fail, business owners wake up in the morning and decide that the path
they had taken is just not for them anymore and they close their businesses, they
certainly have the right to do so.

Businesses exist to make profits first before anything else, we are talking about for-profit
companies and organizations. In an ideal world, companies would value their employees
and treat them as humans first. Unfortunately, we are not there yet. We have to work
with what we have and where we are.

So, now what?

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8/16/2020 Job Security is an Illusion. And why this is actually a liberating… | by Edith Tollschein | Data Driven Investor | Medium

This article is not meant to stir up panic. There are still some innate human abilities that
are unattainable to AI. We humans are not completely doomed, and it is far-fetched to
believe that humans will be completely substituted by robots, but we cannot bury our
heads in the sand and just hope for the best, we have to be much more involved on how
we approach this thing called work, a.k.a. “your source of income”.

This is an era of rapid social, political, and technological disruption. To survive it, we
have to be adaptable, we have to accept that continuous learning is our new way of
living.

As Alvin Toffler said:

“The illiterate of the future are not those who can’t

read or write but those who cannot learn, unlearn,
and relearn.”
Putting yourself in the employer’s shoes will help you in making difficult decisions when
it comes to sticking to a job versus taking risks and investing in your future.

We cannot control outside forces, but we have the power to influence how we want to
make a living when we are still in this world. We can do this by being intentional in
where we invest our money, time, and energy. It is important to create options for
yourself before disaster strikes. “Options” is the key word here.

Why is this a liberating thing?

As companies continue to grow whether locally or across the borders, challenges will
arise, with every growth comes new challenges: new management, restructure,
redundancy, outsourcing, offshoring, cost reduction, rationalization, you name it, the
list is endless.

These changes are bound to affect you in one way or another unless you are working for
a company that is not growing, and if you are, you know how that will end.

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8/16/2020 Job Security is an Illusion. And why this is actually a liberating… | by Edith Tollschein | Data Driven Investor | Medium

The good thing is that, with all these new changes, new opportunities are arising. An
article published by World Economic Forum states that: Ten years ago, jobs like App
developers, YouTube content creators, Driverless-car engineers, Drone operators, Uber
drivers, Social media managers, Cloud computing specialists, Millennial generational
experts did not exist.

Who knows what the next 10 years will bring?

All we can do is learn to be adaptable.

The new norm will be learning, unlearning, and relearning.

. . .

To the People Who’ve Been Told To “Get A Real Job”

Spoiler alert; it does not exist!

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Job Loss Introduced Me to Myself

A personal story

[Link]

. . .

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