The recent news sounding off a barrage of layoff news from many of the big tech is probably a new experience for many of you.

Around the industry as I speak to many of the people in my network I came to realize that this time around the news of mass layoffs was not overly worrying me.

Maybe I should be worried?

This is the forth economic crisis I have had the opportunity to work through, and I have learned a lot about who I am through each crisis. It is likely that what I am about to share with you may not change the way you are feeling right now. Especially so if you have a young family and major expense commitments such as a mortgage.

Living in the UK I do remember a number of events from 1987 - 1991 which left me with a mortgage rate of 13.4% APR, I had managed to fix after a discount, when the variable was trending at around 16.1% APR. That was a pretty tough time when it came to how much spending power money had. I never lost my cool. In due course when the situation became better I learned that there is a cycle and nothing stays where it is for too long. I remember becoming super frugal and when mortgage interest rates dropped, and they did to 3.4%, I was left with surplus income after a refinance.

The next big event I experienced was the dot com boom and bust mid 90s to 2000. That was a crazy time. Share splits were becoming common, 1 share becoming 2 - 2 to 4 and so on. I remember one of my friends who worked for Sun Microsystems. He was following previous trends which showed Sun shares to soar in value after every split. This one time in early 2000 he was buying a new home. He needed the equity from his old home as a down payment on the new home. All was well until he decided to stall buying the new home and invest all the equity from his old home into Sun shares. Another share split was eminent and his calculations shown that the price gains would leave him mortgage free in the new home. So all his money went into to Sun shares. After the split took place the adjusted share price stalled. It started to decline. Investors had lost confidence in internet investments and we saw the dot com bubble start to burst. The dot com decline lasted till 2002. My friend lost all his money through the drastic fall in Sun share price, and consequently lost his home on this gamble. Pretty tragic. However the company I worked for was Sun Microsystems distributor and as you can guess we saw a huge drop off in demand, and we came under margin pressure to reduce our fixed cost. I got to say what we did as a team was a bit of genius. Our leader and his leadership team we're facing making layoffs. They followed the normal business practice of letting go of those who were part of the company where profits were weak. We found the economy kept tanking and needed a second round of layoffs. This time the leadership team came up with a different plan. If we were to survive the dot com bust we needed to pivot. To do this we needed to retain the staff we had. The leadership team called a town hall and explained the new plan to pivot. However it would require some capital. To help with the capital requirement the leadership team proposed to all employees to take a 15% pay cut for 18 months. If we were successful with the pivot plan our salaries would be put back up and what we sacrificed would also be paid. Every one agreed. We had just signed up to our new just cause. We were successful and continued to be thereafter.

The next big event I experienced was the crash of 2008. Subprime mortgage fiasco. It ruined many lives. Some of you may have experienced your parents go through hardship. The USA was probably the worse hit. I recall the dollar being 2:1 against UK pound. I remember being in the USA in Sept 2008 - San Francisco at an Oracle Open World Event. I was walking around Union Square one evening and most of the stores were empty, not the usual hustle and bustle one had come to expect. I walked in to Macy's and went over to the watch counter. 40% off was the red label. The store was almost empty with still 3 hours left to closing time. I saw this watch I always wanted and my eyes lit up. With time to kill I started to negotiate a lower price for this watch, which was already 40% discounted. After almost one hour of hustling I wore down the sales person. He went and got his manager. The mood was so somber that the manger just asked me out right "What would you like to pay?" Was he serious? I named my price and the shop manager said to the sales person "Sell it to him". I paid and left swiftly. When I did the final calculation, after the extra discount and the fx rate back to UK pounds, I managed to get myself 85% discount. Back in 2006 one of the pivots we had made was to start a relationship with Oracle. We were now in the business of data not servers. The recession fueled our growth and I was able to take advantage and buy my dream watch.

Here we are in 2022.

It's been a long time since I experienced an economic event. It sort of excites me when such events take place. I have only given you a glimpse of things that happened with myself. I had many more positive outcomes during previous economic down turns. I am your average worker bee. Nobody special. I could easily have been collateral damage as many end up being. I still may be collateral damage from this economic crisis, but I would like to think not.

Here are my thoughts for anyone who is facing an economic situation like this for the first time.

• You can't control what other people or your company does. Obsessing about future potential outcomes which may or may not happen, will only serve to take you away from doing your job and make you anxious.
• Try to remain grounded in the present and be vigilant about whats happening right now in this immediate moment. 100% focus here in the moment can show up new opportunities for you, if you are paying attention to the job at hand.
• Treat your employer as your customer not your employer. I have always treated my employer as my customer. I see my salary as a fee paid to me for a service which my employer has ordered from me. I treat myself as the product my employer buys from me. If you adopt this attitude then I assure you, just as your customer will come back to buy more from you if you treat them well, the same way your employer will want to buy more of you, if you give them great service. Think about when you have been at risk of losing a customer. Sometimes its because they may have not been given enough attention. Or maybe a competitor is offering a better service. What would you do to retain your customer. It is no less a job with your employer.
• Finally - You can't always win every game with rules set by others. However treating your employer as your customer does mean you are playing by different rules defined by yourself. Don't just see your employer, who is your customer, as an entity to buy something from you. Make your employer, your "just cause", by making it your mission to enable their mission.

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