How to Lose a Job

As crazy as it seems, in times like these, there are people who are intent on getting high up on the list of people we can do without. When we look at who is on the list of people to separate first, here are the kinds of behaviors and attitudes that surface:

1. Making the boss mad by barking, shouting, or simply talking back.
2. Denying what everyone else already knows or what really was true—whether good, bad, or somewhere in between.
3. Getting angry and threatening others.
4. Acting like you’re a victim of forces beyond your control, but forces that should be controlled if those in charge really cared.
5. Trivializing real threats to the organization by focusing on just yourself; avoiding the truth.
6. Claiming that you’re being treated unfairly.
7. Minimizing the damage that your own behavior is causing and asking irritating, irrelevant, insolent questions.

If this is you . . . even if it’s only one or two of these behaviors or attitudes, you might want to examine your life and your attitudes. The more items on this list that reflect your daily habits, the more likely it is that, relatively soon, you’ll be working for someone else or not working at all. These are job killers.

For more information about layoffs, visit the article in my eNewsletter, The Dark Art of Laying People Off.