Layoff Preparedness: What I'd Do Differently Now
Proactive Strategies for Building Resilience in an Uncertain Job Market
March 19 2025
Image generated by AI: Imagen 3, with Gemini Advanced 2.0 Flash
N.B.: This is not financial or career advice. Invest money - and in yourself - at your own risk.
One of the topics I’ve been asked about the most in recent weeks is my experience going through a layoff, and my advice on both preparing for it as well as coming out of it.
And as I thought about it, it is a great and simple story of resilience, with very practical lessons, that can be applied almost identically by some, and with contextual adjustments by others. And a very relevant story at that, as layoffs have not yet left news headlines.
But I am not going to tell it as a story today, as I want to keep this focused on the practical steps.
Resilience exists both in the form of preparing for a disruption, and in how the system reacts to and recovers from said disruption. Think of forest fires: resilient fire preparedness could mean controlled burns, investing in detection systems, or setting up regulations for fire hazards; resilient fire response could mean deploying firefighters for fire extinguishing, evacuating areas, and providing aid to displaced citizens.
In this article I am focusing on building resilience through preparation for a shock. In a few days I will be sharing a second part focusing on activating resilience in the response to the shock.
Having gone through a layoff, I have learned a few things that would have helped me be better prepared. Here are 3 things that I would do now to prepare for a disruption such as a layoff:
1. Keep records of my accomplishments
The first big Google layoff was done silently and with immediate loss of corporate access. This meant that nearly a decade of impact numbers, performance reviews, feedback quotes, award data was suddenly out of reach for me (even though they were data that would be externally shareable & non-confidential).
Thankfully, as I had the habit of wanting to move laterally and experience different challenges and parts of the company, I had updated my CV throughout my career. Yet there is still so much more data and insights that I could have used to remind me of some of the beautiful work I had done and magnificent results it had had that will never see the light of day (on my CV, that is).
Now, I like to spend some time every month documenting the work I have done and the results I am seeing and the feedback I am getting. This helps me not only truly reflect on my work and evolution (and celebrate my accomplishments), it makes me more prepared to immediately raise my hand for opportunities that require a demonstration of my expertise.
2. Build an emergency fund
This is more of a “thankfully I did this”, but there is still some learning I got from my experience, which has adjusted how I design my money strategy. Most of the standard advice on this tells us to have between 3-6 months of living expenses in an emergency fund, and to go closer to the 6 months in certain contexts like living in a high cost of living city, having dependents and more.
The reality of being an immigrant with an employer-dependent working visa (I could only work for Alphabet) in a (very) high cost of living area was that 3 to 6 months was not nearly enough. It took me more than one year to adjust my immigration status and be able to work.
Thankfully, because I was an introvert that liked to cook her own food and not leave her home, with no dependents and no debt, I had saved enough to go through this disruption. I also had a support network, starting with obviously my husband with whom I share the responsibility of all financial decisions.
Now, I have a more intentional financial strategy with my husband, including a savings plan that accounts for big disruptions growing in a high-yield savings account, and automated maxed out investments to retirement and brokerage accounts.
3. Foster relationships with advocates and decision makers
As someone with social anxiety, anxiety, ADHD (and probably other nice things starting with “a”), I have struggled with building deep work relationships my entire career, and especially with those at higher levels of the organization (whom I admit I saw as record players for corporate handbook narratives).
I liked building relationships with the thinkers, the doers and makers, the restless, the status quo questioners. And I hated the formalisms that seemed to be required in conversations with leaders, whom we were told to impress with our business talk. I didn’t want to talk business with them though.
So I interacted with them when they needed my expertise, and then went back to work in the shadows. Sort of like Batman, but with less latex and less money.
The layoff unmasked this as my greatest vulnerability. In a world where work is about who we know, I knew fantastic people - but not the ones with the budget to pay me. I knew talented people - but not the ones with the voices to build me up and have me top of mind for opportunities when I wasn’t around.
Now, I am intentionally cultivating relationships, regardless of my comfort level. I continuously invite folks of different backgrounds and career tenures for coffee chats, connect with them on platforms like LinkedIn, genuinely ask about their challenges, seek to provide value to their most pressing issues, ask for feedback and mentorship, curiously learn from their perspectives, and practice communicating my work. I build systems that work despite my propensity to be a recluse (such as setting up calendar reminders to check-in). And I have found a new appreciation for all the people that confidently say “I know someone perfect to help you” and introduce me, when I wasn’t even in the room.
Share in the comments on Substack:
Have you been through a layoff or a similar disruptive event? What other things have you learned and would now do to be more prepared?
