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Increasing Your Value - Part 2
By: Brian Tracy
Whatever job you are doing, you should be preparing for your next job. And the key question is always: Where are the customers? Which businesses and industries are growing in this economy, and which ones are declining?
I continually meet people who ask me how they can increase their income when their entire industry is shrinking. I tell them that there are jobs with futures and there are jobs without futures, and they need to get into a field that is expanding, not contracting. There are three forms of unemployment in America: voluntary, non-voluntary, and frictional. Voluntary employment exists when a person decides not to work for a certain period of time, or not to accept a particular type of job, hoping that something better will come along. Non-voluntary unemployment exists when a person is willing and able to work but cannot find a job anywhere. Frictional unemployment is the natural level; this includes the approximately 4 or 5 percent of the working population who are between jobs at any given time.
However, there are always jobs for the creative minority. You never have to be unemployed if you will do one of three things: change the work that you are offering to do, change the place where you are offering to work, or change the amount that you are asking for your services.
If there is no demand for your particular skills and experience, you will have to learn to do something else and provide skills that are in demand at the time. Employers don't care about your past. They care only about your future and your ability to contribute value to their customers.
You can change your location. Sometimes you will have to move from one part of the country to another, from where there are few jobs to where there are more jobs. Many people transform their entire lives by moving from an area of high unemployment to an area of low unemployment.
The third thing you can do to get back into the work force is to lower your demands. Remember, because your labor is a commodity, it is subject to the laws of supply and demand. If you ask too much, people will not hire you, because customers will not pay your demands in the price of the product or service that your organization produces. It is not the employer who is forcing this downward revision in wage requirements; it is the customer, through his or her buying behavior.
There is a small, creative minority in America who are never unemployed. No matter what happens, they always have a job, sometimes two jobs. If they lose a particular position in one place, they find another position doing the same thing, or something else, somewhere else. They are fast on their feet. They move quickly and they don't accept unemployment as an option. And they always have jobs. There are always jobs to be done. Even in the worst economy, there are always problems to be solved and consumer needs to be met. For this reason, all long-term unemployment is ultimately voluntary.
There are more opportunities for you to fulfill your dreams and aspirations in the American economy than have ever before existed, or than exist anywhere else in the world. You can be, have, or do anything that you can dream of by preparing yourself for better and better jobs. It is never crowded at the top. There are no traffic jams on the extra mile. Your job is to get good, get better, and then make yourself indispensable.
Part 1
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