Do this so you don't lose your job

Welcome to the You Unleash podcast with Femi Akini, the podcast where we explore how to unleash your potential in the workplace, your hustle, and life in general with practical real life steps. Sometimes I use stories from my past, and trust me, as usual, as I say, I've got stories for you, and sometimes I'll just there's stuff I've learned, and other times we get people who know a lot more than I do to chop it all up with us. On that particular note, I'm pretty excited that in the next few weeks I should be having someone pretty special to come and talk to us about something awesome. So keep your eyes peeled and your eyes and ears peeled for that. Um, this is our 10th podcast, so I guess I'm well on my way to the magic halfway point where you acquire a new habit. Psychologists like to say it takes 21 days or 21 times to start or drop the habit. So if I'm at number 10, I'm halfway there, I become a believer that done is better than perfect, so we continue to keep the show on the road and kind of get better as we go along. And again, you will very soon notice that I'm going to start rolling out changes, and that's the whole point of starting. You start and then you get better. Don't try and nail perfection because we all know if you wait for things to be perfect, they never happen. Please don't forget to like the podcast, share it with your friends, and leave some feedback on our different platforms Spotify, Google Podcasts, um, Apple. Um, I appreciate the feedback and I continue to take it all in and learn from it. On to the next one. There was a Friday, and I got an email from the director of the company I was working for. At the time, it was my first graduate job, and I was excited that the world was my oyster. I was gonna shake things up, and then I got an email from the director's secretary, really, the director's secretary, and she said, Femi, this is hard for me, but I have no other way to tell you that to tell you this, you're being made redundant. Basically, I was getting sacked. Now, this is me, the second year in my first role, and I was effectively sacked. I was shocked and I had no clue this was gonna happen. And how does a person know he's gonna get sacked anyway? How does a person know that their product or service is coming to its end and your customers either don't want your money so they're taking it somewhere else, or the company you work for is letting you go? I mean, you it'd be nice to know if someone's gonna tell you they're gonna be fired, but welcome to today's session. I guess that's a nice segue. And this week I'm gonna be sharing the formula to tell if it's time to stay or leave before you get kicked out. I've had the displeasure of being fired from my work, and I've also had the displeasure of having to encourage people when they lose their jobs. And one of the things I hear most is I didn't see it coming. Another one I hear is I believe my job was safe. Well, how could they do this to me? I hear you folks, I've been there and it's a horrible, horrible feeling. The first time for me was a shock, really. And the second time wasn't completely surprising, but I was still a bit blindsided. But after this, I went into a change of industry really. I became a contractor and a consultant, and the nature of that kind of job means that you get let go a lot because you're not meant to be there forever, or it's not a permanent role. And I decided you know what, I'm gonna learn and I'm gonna try and figure out when they're about to let me go, or tell me that my contract is coming to an end. I've had a contract for three or four years, but I've also had one that lasts three months, and I studied each time everything in between, and I always ask the question how can I tell when they don't want me? How can I tell when they want to let me go? I studied, I observed, and I've arrived at a formula, and I'm gonna share this formula with you. This formula will literally open your eyes and help you to see clearly to help you to see things for what they are, and it will also help you to remove the emotion and give you a clear idea that it's time to get out or it's time to activate plan B. And this is the formula listen carefully. If you need to get a pen, get a pen. And if you need to just memorize it, do so, and here it goes. Drum roll, you will only be rewarded for the service you provide. I'll say that again. You will only be rewarded for the service you provide. Now, if you're a business person, this probably makes a lot more sense because someone will only pay you for a product they like. But if you work in the if you're an employee, if you're an employee, let me put it in a way you can understand. The money you are paid for by the person you work for will always be proportional to three things. Write this down the letters N A D. N, what does it stand for? The need for what you do, a your ability to do it, and D the degree of responsibility involved, or the degree of difficulty involved in replacing you. I'll say that again. N the need for what you do, a your ability to do it, and D your responsibility your the difficulty involved in replacing you. Now let's pick this apart. N how much do they need what you do? I mean, let's be honest here. Can the company do what they do without you, or can they do their business? Can they perform and sell their products or whatever it is they sell if you were not around? And if no one did their job, would the business fall apart? If you don't do it, could it be done by someone else or something or even something else? And when I say something, I mean I mean computers. Look, in the world we live in today with machine learning and artificial intelligence, if a computer can automate your job, they will literally do it to save money. So the question I'm asking you is how important is what you do? Number two, your ability. Can they even do it without you? Look, you're probably asking, how do I know? But you know, you know, you know if you know everything about your job, and you know if you're the top in the top percentile of your industry, you know if no one can do your job better than you, and that you're on top of your game and top of the industry. And if you don't, I encourage you to read up, investigate the industry, and find out what's out there. And D, how easy is it to replace you? If they can't replace you, they won't let you go. If they can replace you easily, they will let you go. Be honest with yourself, can someone else do your job? If they place an ad in the job in the market for your job tomorrow, how hard will it be to find someone to come in to replace you? How quickly? Look, true story, I'll share this with you. I was speaking to a recruiter a while ago and he told me that whenever he places a job on the internet before he goes to bed, by the time he wakes up in the morning, he usually has about 800 applications in his mailbox. I'll repeat that the job recruiter told me before that sometimes just before he goes to bed, he posts a job on the internet looking for someone looking for pos looking to fill positions, and by the time he wakes up, there are almost 800 applications. So my question to you is Is your job that easy to fill? And even if they wanted to fill that job, are you within the top 20% of people who applied for that job or who would apply for it? So my question now is now that we know this thing, N the need for what you do, a the ability to replace you, and D the degree of difficulty to replace you. My question now is what do you need to do? So let's think about it. You need to learn how to think and innovate your way out of this area of whatever whatever you do. L Nightingale, the Dean of Personal Development, says the only thing about a man that makes him a man is his mind. Anything else you can find on a horse or a pig. It sounds rude, but it's the truth. It's our brain and our ability to use it that differentiates us from animals. So, here is how you can use your brain to think about your career, your business, and make sure that you're prepared and you're never caught on the back foot, you're never told you're not wanted without you knowing it's coming. I need to take a piece of paper and ask yourself these questions: How well do I know my job? If someone was the absolute best at my job, what would they look like? And what would they be able to do? And if you don't know, find out about it and determine to do everything you can to get to that level. If you need to get a mentor, get a mentor. If you need to read a book, read a book. If you need to watch videos, watch videos. You could also listen to you on leash with Female Academy Weekly. That's what you do already. But attend a course if you need to on a more serious note. But do what you must to become the best or the top on the top 20% in your industry. You become irreplaceable if you're like that. Number two, make yourself replaceable. Add value to the company or your work or your cut your customers. If your business person asked, add value to your customers, make them buy your product in order. I would rather out and make your customers think I would never go anywhere else but here for this product. And if your staff add value, add value to your employer, go out of your way to make sure they say, Wow, go the extra mile and don't settle for mediocre. They're mediocre people everywhere, they're all there's a long queue of mediocre people, there are loads of them, but you go the extra mile, differentiate yourself. And if you need to volunteer for extra work, volunteer just to show that you're different, you have a different thing about you, there's something special about you. And number three, think about the future of your industry and your job. In five years' time, what will it look like? What will your current what will your industry? What will your job look like? 10 years ago we didn't have testers, and now they're one of the top popular and selling cars. Nothing we do or use today will look the same in 10 years' time. And the same goes for your job. The way your job is done today won't be done that way 10 years from now. So, have you have you done anything to imagine what it would look like? How can you do your job differently? Brainstorm it, come up with different ideas, and try and come up with about five ideas a day. The way to do this is look for some quiet time daily, get a notepad, and just brainstorm ideas around how what your industry and your job will look like five years from five, ten years from now. And you'll probably come up with about five ideas. Three might be nice, one will be really good, and one will be very good. And that one very good idea, just go for it. And after this, it's really about your attitude. Develop an attitude to change and implement these changes. Start to behave like this new person you're seeing yourself as. Start to behave like this innovative, creative, focused, driven person who wants to be the best and is excellent, and knows that they're irreplaceable, knows that nobody can do your job, and and and and they also know that you're the best at it. Start to behave like that and think like that. And this is a mindset I always like to encourage people like Coach and I talk to you to use. Imagine the company you work for is a ship, and the ship is on the high seas, and it's about to sink because there's too much stuff in it, and the captain says, get rid of everything we don't need, and think you're on that ship. When the captain comes to you and he looks at you, and will he say, This person adds value to this ship. This person brings something we can't do without, so we have to keep them and throw everything else off, or does the captain look at you and say, We don't need you? That's the question because they don't need you, they'll throw you off. I don't want that for you, and you're definitely not gonna get thrown off. But here's the point: make sure no one can do without you. You're special, why should they get rid of you anyway? And if and uh and if you change your attitude, they certainly won't want to get rid of because any you bring something to the table. My parting gift to you though is this jobs don't have futures, people do. I'll repeat that jobs don't have futures, it's people that have futures. Listen, guys, this life is the only one we get, it's not a rehearsal, so let's live it. And don't be an extra in your own life movie. Be you and just go for it, backed up by putting in the work. I hope you enjoyed this episode of You Unleashed, where we share ideas and how to rock it in the workplace and life. And don't forget to share our podcast with your friends, family, whoever you want to get unleashed as well. We're not where we want to be, but we're not who we used to be because we're much better. And done is better than perfect. Episode 10 is done as in the books, and have a great week.