Fired, Laid off, out of a Job: A manual for Understanding, Coping, Surviving

Citation

Noble, R.D. (2004), "Fired, Laid off, out of a Job: A manual for Understanding, Coping, Surviving", Library Management, Vol. 25 No. 3, pp. 154-155. https://doi.org/10.1108/01435120410522406

I have never bought the sort of book that arrives wrapped in brown paper (honest!), but as I read Fired, Laid off, out of a Job: A manual for Understanding, Coping, Surviving on the bus, I wished that the cover was not quite so explicit.

This sensation is illustrative of the stigma that is experienced – whether real or perceived – by many people who find themselves facing involuntary unemployment. As a place to start the recovery process, this book has some useful advice.

The book is co‐written by two highly experienced people in their field. The first is an executive in the area of human resources and the second a lawyer. Whether they are well qualified as authors will be up to the readers of this book to judge.

I was initially surprised when I began reading to discover that the first two chapters are basically “Introduction to American employment law 101”. Readers on the other side of the Pacific or the Atlantic who delve into the book may find this introduction to the topic somewhat dry and potentially irrelevant. Although there may be a tendency to skip over these chapters, many principles apply equally around the developed world when it comes to employment law and useful lessons – or at least issues of which to be aware – might be gleaned by a faithful reading.

The authors are devoted to tables and models and the book is full to the brim with both. Many examples may seem banal and irrelevant, but there are others which can be used as tools to take control of one’s life at a time when self‐determination seems to have evaporated.

Throughout the book there is a great emphasis on the unemployed person behaving proactively. At one stage there are six instances of the word “must” in one paragraph (p. 47), followed closely by a very Western view of the nine ideal characteristics for workers (p. 48). I wondered throughout the book whether the authors would be classified as ENTJ on the Myers‐Briggs Type Indicator – people whose preference is towards extroversion, big picture, thinking through difficulties and readily making decisions – and if they were aware that other people with different personality profiles could also contribute to the workforce.

There are many useful phrases and quotations in this book. The authors quote Tischler (2001, online) when she says that “… being laid off is not the worst thing that can happen to you … remaining in a bad job for security reasons is worse” (p. 60). The occasional thoughtful statement along these lines is very useful for all sorts of people, employed or otherwise.

The book’s sub‐title promises to provide a manual for understanding and coping when unemployed. In the end it is strong on the suggestion that one copes by programmed activity and weak on dealing with the sort of self‐worth issues that often arise during counseling of unemployed people.