Dealing with Job Insecurity in the COVID-19 Era

 Dealing with Job Insecurity in the COVID-19 Era

The COVID-19 pandemic, situation has dramatically changed many things that have an impact on us. Until sometimes we find it difficult to stem the many uncertainties. For workers, this condition causes feelings of insecurity about the existence and condition of their careers, both now and in the future, which is often referred to as job insecurity. Greenhalg and Rasenblatt (1984) describe job insecurity as a condition when you feel powerless to keep your job because of a threat. This is caused by the environment, ability, or self-assessment so that there is a lack of confidence to complete the work. According Probst et al. (2014), feelings of insecurity are very common to anyone when faced with certain situations and conditions. But, if you feel insecure at work, your performance can drop and it can cause feelings of discomfort. Therefore, we must be able to overcome job insecurity with mindfulness at work, increase resilience, and write down feelings, hopes, and dreams.

Mindfulness is a type of meditation to fully accept the condition without comparing yourself with other co-workers. The way to do mindfulness meditation is to manage emotions and cognitive thoughts, such as trying to accept. Recognize how job insecurity arise and accept whatever is causing you to be insecure, because all major problems will take time to heal. Basically, mindfulness means being more aware of the surrounding conditions, emotions, feelings, and various job insecurity issues being faced. The benefits of mindfulness meditation are not only limited to physical health, but also mental health. When you do this, you will feel calmer and able to think more clearly.

Resilience describes the individual's way of recovering from setbacks or trauma, as well as how the individual is able to overcome challenges (job insecurity) in life. The factors influence resilience are namely emotion regulation, impulse control, optimism, causal analysis, empathy, self-efficacy, and reaching out. These seven aspects are very important to have for those of you who want to be a resilient person in dealing with job insecurity. Indeed, to shape it takes practice to get used to developing a resilient. Some ways to increase the resilience are by changing perceptions about failure, building self-confidence, learning to relax, and being flexible.

Astarlioglu et al. (2011) shows that writing about how we feel emotionally can help build courage and inspiration to come out of crises, such as job loss and career problems (job insecurity). In addition, visualized hopes and dreams will also remind and encourage us to be stronger to achieve them. Therefore, strategies to deal with job insecurity and fear of unemployment, employees can engage in job-seeking behaviors, such as writing hopes and dreams, looking for vacancies, and networking.

Excessive insecurity in the world of work can be harmful to productivity. Especially if you only focus on insecurity, it can make you afraid to grow. Therefore, don't drag on with a sense of insecurity, do a lot of gratitude because you have abilities that are no less great than others.

 

REFERENCES

Astarlioglu, M., Kazozcu, S. B. & Varnali, R., 2011. A qualitative study of coping strategies in the context of job insecurity. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Science, pp. 421-434.

Greenhalgh, L. & Rosenblatt, Z., 1984. Job insecurity: Toward conceptual clarity. Academy of Management Review, pp. 438-448.

Probst, T. M., Jiang, L. & Benson, W., 2014. Job Insecurity and Anticipated Job Loss: A Primer and Exploration of Possible Interventions. The Oxford Handbook of Job Loss and Job Search, p. 12.