BETA
This is a BETA experience. You may opt-out by clicking here

More From Forbes

Edit Story

Employees Who Stand Out Stay Standing: The Secret to Job Security

This article is more than 10 years old.

Employees who stand out in a company are the employees who stay standing through downturns, layoffs, and corporate restructurings. Standing out is the secret to gaining peace of mind that your job is secure. Whether you stay employed with the same company you are with today, or whether another company picks you up, your future is bright when you make the effort to be that person who can’t be overlooked.

For the CEO of any company, nothing is more important than finding the right people to hire. Once the leader finds that right person, she has to figure out what position to assign that person to so they can put their talents and abilities to good use. After all, if a company is going to pay a person, they need to know that they are getting the most out of every dime they put into them. It is critical to figure out the role each person should have in order to maximize their impact in the company.

As important as it is to assign people to the right role, in my years as a CEO I learned that an employee who is good will be good in many roles, because good = good. If someone is smart, has a good attitude, is teachable, is willing, is humble, is enthusiastic, then you can plug them into several positions throughout the company and they will excel at each one of them. Certainly some talents are so specialized that a CEO is smartest to focus a person on that one talent, like programming or IT, but the reality is that a good employee is one that you will literally make a position for in the company.

When someone was good in his job, I would move heaven and earth to create a position for him in order to retain that person in the company. I would find a way to use his talents and skills anywhere, because a good employee is really hard to find. That is why, over the years, I had so many employees that I moved from one area to another during their life at my company. They were so good that I found ways to use them in any area I could in order to retain them, and in order to continually teach them in order to maximize their impact on the company. I transitioned good people from position to position throughout the organization, moving them to wherever the need was greatest at the time.

When a company experiences hard times, the great leaders must ensure that their good employees are retained. Even during the downturns and layoffs. If layoffs become necessary, leaders should look to cut five other people in order to retain just one good one, as that one good employee will bring far more value in the future than five average employees will. In addition, great performers set the standard for other employees as the company begins to hire and grow again, whereas average employees don’t elevate their fellow workers.

Job security comes from making sure that your daily performance is so amazing that any company would be crazy to let you go. Be smart, be willing, be excited, be humble, be dependable, be a top performer in whatever job you are given so that you will always STAND OUT!  Job security should have nothing to do with the position you hold in a company – nothing. If you are genuinely good at what you do, then any company worth a salt will always keep you as a top choice to retain even if it means moving you to another more necessary position in order to keep you. An employee who stands out and is a top performer should never have to worry about their job security again.

Some might be thinking, “What about when the entire company shuts down?” or something more catastrophic like that occurs. The fact is that even in those circumstances, a top performer who stood out will be the very first to be referred to a different company when their company goes under. A top employee will have other companies who go out of their way to recruit them when things like that occur, because a good reputation of hard work and integrity will spread faster than wildfire in the business community. A good employee is hard to find, so word can’t help but travel fast.

Each of us has control of whether we will be that person who stands out. Each of us has control over whether we will be a top performer. If we go into each day with a focus on standing out and doing a great job, then we can all go home at night feeling confident that our jobs will be secure, one way or another.

~Amy  (you can follow my daily blogs at www.amyreesanderson/blog )