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More on “Layoff Immunization”

I recently had to switch over to entirely new systems at work (new email, new cell phone, new computer, etc) following our company’s acquisition. It was a great opportunity to ‘disentangle’ my work and business life. I’d like to share three lessons I learned (without getting laid off!).

[b]One: Businesses know you by your work email. [/b]

It’s not just personal contacts in your computer at work. You’ve probably got your frequent flyer/buyer accounts set up with your work email. To change it, you just need to respond to an email sent to…your work email. Oops. Likewise your 401k. How about Amazon (for those work-related books you ordered…)? And so on.

You need a personal computer at home, which is yours. (See this post for a great way to get a good computer for low cost: http://www.manager-tools.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1874&postdays=0&post...) Add a broadband connection to the internet, with a personal email address (yahoo, hotmail and gmail all provide such). My college allows alumni to set up “email forwarding for life” so that folks can send email to my alumni address, and know it will reach me wherever I go.

You should change any of these ‘not-directly-about-work’ emails so that they come to your personal email.

[b]Two: Forget your password?[/b]

What about all those passwords you’ve forgotten….they’re all ‘saved’ in a cookie or the browser. Can you log into the New York Times or WSJ web site from home? Amazon one-click? Security experts say you shouldn’t write them down, but it’s a lot to remember. However you do it, make sure you can access all these from home.

It’s not the end of the world if you have to set up a new Amazon account. But when you’re already stressed, it’s best if you don’t have to spend time reestablishing contact with all those online vendors and services.

[b]Three: How will they find you?[/b]

Turning off my old email was harder than I thought. My network needed my new one. Many folks only had my work email (they didn't have all my other contact info). They had to be notified, update their address books, etc. Fortunately, I was able to turn on “autoreply” for many weeks, letting folks know. In a layoff, they’d be cut off immediately. And most companies don’t bounce invalid emails, they just delete them.

So you need to let people know your new email. For many (like that old college buddy who sends you interesting tidbits from time to time) you should switch them over now to your personal email.

These activities will take time – that’s the point. If you get caught in a restructuring and need to move on, you can be most effective if you’re not trying to do all this, too.

John

FlatFeeKing's picture

Thanks for the tip, I have been wondering what will happen if I switch companies, or if my email exchange account gets shut off.

have you made it so all your work emails auto forward to your personal account? so when you switch jobs you will have copies of all the important stuff?

lazerus's picture

Thanks jhack. It's like a personal "business continuity" project. Your ideas dovetail right into the MT immunization.

garyslinger's picture
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[quote="FlatFeeKing"]Thanks for the tip, I have been wondering what will happen if I switch companies, or if my email exchange account gets shut off.

have you made it so all your work emails auto forward to your personal account? so when you switch jobs you will have copies of all the important stuff?[/quote]
Careful with the auto-forwarding advice - some places, that can and will lead you in to disciplinary and/or regulatory compliance issues.

G.
(Who previously managed global email operations for a $5bn multi-national)

jhack's picture

I was amazed at how much work it was to switch email addresses.

And , No I do not forward work emails to personal. Many companies treat these as their own intellectual property and one must be careful not to cross that line. The forwarding set up was from my old (being acquired) company to my new (acquiring) company. No issue there. In practice, I used "out of the office autoreply" instead: it told everyone that I was moving to a new address.

But that was only for business continuity.

What I've done is switch all my not-exactly-work emails: LinkedIn, Continental Airlines, Avis, Amazon, M-T, etc. I did this by logging in or calling them, and actually changing the email address they have on file for me.

I am very careful not to have work artifacts on my personal system. I have contact info for my network, on paper. Amazon, LinkedIn, etc, emails come to my personal accounts. No forwarding - that would cease if I were to leave the company anyway.

John

sholden's picture
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This podcast series has a great list of recommendations. I have my work cut out for me in several areas - especially on recruiters.

I do have a couple of suggestions:

When you print out your contacts, consider printing them to Adobe PDF and then to the printer. You can then move the PDF to an electronic place of reference on your own personal computer or up in the Google cloud. I have a copy of my work PDF on my personal smart phone, and it makes for an easy reference without doing any syncing.

If you don't want to get a dedicated personal cell phone, then you could consider a service like Grand Central (www.grandcentral.com). It will route calls to email or web accessible voice mail; or to one or several phone numbers of your choosing.

Don't forget to periodically save off your bookmarks and if you are reading your RSS feeds on a work system to a file that you can move off when you capture your contacts. Google has a nice tool called Google Sync that I use for bookmarks, and Newsgator has some pretty good RSS solutions that are now free that work with the web, Outlook, Macs, and PCs. You might not be able to use these two tools on a well managed work computer with a lot of restrictions.

Any one have any other hints or suggestions?!?

Steve

sbaleno's picture

I use Outlook 2007 and store certain details about contacts in the "Notes" section of each contact. Some of these can be fairly verbose if there is alot of history.

Aside from printing in the "Memo Style" (i.e., an option from File/Print), what methods have you found helpful such that the output is not 600+ pages?

Thank you in advance,
Steve

HMac's picture

[quote="sbaleno"]I use Outlook 2007 and store certain details about contacts in the "Notes" section of each contact. Some of these can be fairly verbose if there is alot of history.

Aside from printing in the "Memo Style" (i.e., an option from File/Print), what methods have you found helpful such that the output is not 600+ pages?[/quote]

That's the beauty of gmail (and possibly ther online email applications or things like Plaxo). When you upload your Outlook contacts into gmail, all the notes are preserved.

So you have 'em no matter where you go, or where you access gmail from.

-Hugh

jrumple's picture
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I recently found Funambol ([url]www.funambol.com[/url]). In addition to printing your contacts, this may be an option for transfering the contact information to a personal address book or cell phone address book.

It is basically a web based contact management system which can sync with multiple mobile platforms.

I don't think this replaces having a printout at home, but can supplement that.