It felt like a ticking time bomb was waiting to go off.

The stock market had tanked, taking funding for many engineering projects with it.

At first, I breathed a sigh of relief as nothing happened immediately at my employer.

In the months that followed, I watched friends and former classmates get laid off, and in some cases their offices closed forever. As months turned into one year and then two, I learned some of the most technically proficient engineers I knew were now struggling to find jobs.

Next, my own hours were cut, and a round of layoffs occurred at my employer.

I wondered if I would be next.

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Everyday I’d go into the office, looking around at the empty desks where my laid-off colleagues and friends had formerly sat. Tension caused by economic uncertainties constantly filled the air, short tempers and silence replacing the water-cooler chat.

I kept waiting for the next shoe to drop, and the stress kept me up at night as I ruminated over what might happen.

Those worries kept creeping up at unexpected moments.

Snapping at my partner. An inability to fully focus on the task at hand. Struggling to get a solid night’s rest, even when I went to bed early.

I worried about what the economy was going to do next and how it would impact me. Those worries occupied my every waking thought. I worried about finances, long-term career prospects, if we would need to relocate, and a thousand little things that I can’t even remember.

As I publish this blog, the year is 2020, and everything I wrote above occurred between 2008-2010, a decade ago. I wish I could say those fears “went away” when 2011 hit, but the truth is that they lasted for years afterwards, even when the economy and the availability of engineering jobs was on the upswing.

That sequence of fears triggered by an economic downturn wasn’t even the first time it had happened to me (it was actually the third!).

This time feels different, but the fears in the engineering community are the same. Those fears hold us back in a million tiny ways that add up to a unconscious sabatoge of our current work or job hunt.

Quoting from Battlestar Galactica (which I binge-watched a few months ago when things first shut down):

“What happened before will happen again.”

In hindsight, most of the stories I told myself about a worse-case scenario never happened. That didn’t stop me from feeling stressed and anxious for those years, playing small at work, and staying stuck in a mindset of scarcity that I am STILL recovering from.

That hard truth I have learned is that mindset, especially in times of economic or career turmoil, is EVERYTHING.

It’s the difference between despair and doubt versus confidence and success. It’s the difference between who will emerge from the current local and world events strategically placed for success on their own terms versus someone stuck in a mediocre job they hate.

Recently, I had the honor of interviewing Gina Covarrubias, a certified life coach for engineers who has expertise in some of the areas of mindset where engineers struggle most. She has a BS in Aeronautical and Astronautical engineering, an MS in mechanical engineering, and knows what it’s like to face layoffs.

We met virtually to talk about how to deal with worries about losing your job in the context of juggling work and life in the current pandemic, with the goal to share some tools that will help you stop stressing about keeping your job or finding a new one.

If you're struggling to be motivated about your work or a job hunt, this one is for you!

You can watch the full interview by clicking on the graphic below, or read on for a summary in this blog.

THE PROBLEM ISN’T WHAT YOU THINK

Economies are cyclical, and every field is impacted when there is an economic upswing and a downturn. Yet, I’ve talked to many engineering students and young professionals who’ve told me that they became engineers partly because they believe engineering jobs are secure.

I used to think that too, until I graduated college right after the 9/11 recession and learned that my expectation did not align with reality.

Job security is an illusion, especially when you are working as a technical employee with no direct access to clients.

Gina puts this bluntly: “Unless you are a tenured professor at a university or a Supreme Court justice, your job is not secure.”

Additionally, engineers are well-known for their work ethics and problem-solving abilities. Raise your hand if you believe you can outwork almost any problem with enough effort (me too)! Engineering attracts high-achievers who are proactive and take responsibility for and pride in their work and see perfection as a thing of beauty.

When you combine the myth of job security with engineering identity, you find a group of people who believe (consciously or unconsciously) that if they are laid off, it is their own fault, and that if they simply work harder the problem will go away.

They will ruminate and worry as I did, convinced that working harder is the solution to the problem.

The real problem is fear.

To cope with that fear, we create stories in our minds of “If I do this, x will happen.” Those stories often have no basis in fact. As a result, we stress. We are anxious. Here’s a few examples of the types of things engineers do (speaking from personal experience!) when fear is the root cause:

Feel obligated to work late or on weekends because we think that will protect us from layoffs
Say “yes” to all work requests, even if our workload or work/life combination is already overwhelming
Ruminate over what we can do differently as compared to others to avoid layoffs
Become hyper-competitive with our coworkers, believing that if we prove ourselves more we will avoid layoffs
Stop sharing our thoughts in meetings, especially new or innovative ideas, because we think that will preserve the status-quo of keeping our current jobs
Pulling back from interactions with coworkers, managers, and our professional networks
Struggle with feelings of powerlessness, despair, lack of focus, and lack of motivation
Feel guilty if we have a job while others have been laid off
For women: revert to gender roles like submissiveness and people-pleasing, often due to subconscious belief that “If they like me more, I won’t be laid off.”
Feeling shame if we’ve been laid off
Make excuses to avoid investing in our long-term career growth (Example: putting off enrolling in a certificate or degree program, signing up for an online course, or studying for the PE)

Want help keeping or finding your dream engineering job? Grab our FREE Engineering Jobs Bundle, which includes the jobs chapter of SHE Engineers + Biggest Resume Mistakes + Resume Checklist.

THE STRESS GOES DEEPER THAN MONEY

One of my mentees said she’d been picking up some extra projects at work recently due to layoffs, to the point of overwhelm. When she approached her manager about her workload, she was told that she should be grateful to have a job at all.

As a result, she was experiencing many of the “symptoms” of fear we outlined in the previous section, making her feel exhausted, stressed, and even more overwhelmed and powerless at work.

She’s not alone in this feeling.

Gina notes that when you are trying to deal with any type of stress, it’s first important to understand the root cause of the problem.

In this case, that fear can cause worry about what other people think, resulting in challenges around people pleasing and setting boundaries which has been triggered by the fear of not being good enough in your role. Those feelings can be particularly acute for women in male-dominated industries, minorities, those in their first jobs, and young professionals.

Gina elaborates:

“People-pleasing is a very common problem. Management may be making unfair demands on some of their employees…I have also heard, ‘you should be lucky to have a job.’ At the time I, I believed it. They were my management, they were older, I was younger. I felt like they had power over me.”
“If anybody in your management team suggests that you should either be happy or feel lucky that you have a job, they are incorrect. The reason for that is because happiness does not come from your job… It comes from within. When you rely on externals [like your job], they're very good at letting you down.”

When it comes to the idea that you are “lucky” to have a job, Gina shares this perspective:

“Luck did not get you your current job. It did not get you to where you are today. The reason you are where you are today is because you have a brain and your brain is capable of learning and planning and failing and creating a future for yourself.
…You've created a situation where you have been given this job opportunity that you are pursuing right now. It did not fall into your lap. It is not a stroke of luck. It is something that you earned and you sacrifice and you interviewed your way to this position. So, don't let anybody tell you should feel lucky or happy to have a job.”

HOW TO SAY NO AT WORK, IN AN ECONOMICALLY UNCERTAIN TIME

What should you do if you’re being managed by someone who tells you that you should be lucky to have a job or increases your workload beyond your comfort level?

Gina shares her approach to navigating this common challenge:

Management may try to take advantage of you because they can. This could be a form of bullying, especially if they are leaning on you because they think you won’t say no.
The best thing you can do in this situation is to stand up for yourself and set clear boundaries.
There’s usually a bigger issue here, in that you aren’t feeling confident about your abilities and value to your employer. This is a very common feeling especially for inexperienced employees. However, just because you are new/lacking experience does not give someone else the right to walk all over you. Seeking internal validation instead of external validation will ultimately stop the fear of saying no.

It’s worth noting that women are more likely to be asked by men AND other women to take on additional non-promotable tasks, like note taking or administrative work. For specific examples on how to say no at work in a variety of situations, see THIS blog so you can say no while preserving critical relationships with management and coworkers.

There is an art to saying no diplomatically. To approach this discussion with your manager, Gina notes that it is very important to be mindful of the energy and emotion you are bringing to the discussion.

“Don't approach this conversation from a place of fear or resentment, guilt, or anything negative. Rather, approach this type of conversation from a place of peace and calm and respect for yourself, for who you are. That will show up in the conversation and improve your outcomes when the time comes.”

She also offers more insight into WHY we hesitate to say no.

“The reason we struggle to say no…is because we're afraid. We believe these things that we're telling ourselves, like:
If I say no, I might get fired.
If I say no, or if I refuse to do something, they're going to think poorly of me.
What will they think of me (and my reputation) when I do say no?
The reason we struggle to say no…is because of insecurities. The real question is, how much are you going to let this insecurity get in your way of saying no? And, how much are you willing work on your insecurities?
In a world where your self-confidence was sky high and you had immense respect for yourself, you're not going to be afraid to say no.”

JOB DESCRIPTION IS NOT SELF DESCRIPTION

It’s easy to fall into the trap of being too dependent on a particular employer. We all want to make a good impression, and we’ve been brought up to believe some version of the following:

Do well in school >> go to college >> get a job >> work hard >> rewards!

Instead of being dependent on your employer, Gina advises that engineers shift their mindset to consider their employers as a partner in their life instead:

“When you think in terms of being dependent on your employer, it makes you feel like you're obligated and it puts this fear inside of you. Break free from that fear. You don't have to be dependent. Instead, view your employment as part of your human experience. You are going to have many different jobs throughout your life… It's always a partnership. They're getting something out of you, and you're getting something from them.”

Many (if not most!) engineers take a huge amount of personal satisfaction in a job well done.

It’s starts with college, where it quickly becomes clear that only an elite group can cut it in engineering. I personally remember an early math class where the professor told us that only 40% would make it through that class, and even less would graduate with an engineering degree.

For those of us that “made it”, it’s then little wonder that this work ethic carries over into the workforce. We take personal pride and satisfaction in a job well-done. While in general this is a good thing, it can also lead to thoughts that you ARE your job.

Then, when layoffs inevitably come at some point in your engineering career, this adds an extra layer of stress. Put another way: Do you know who you are if you aren’t working as an engineer?

Gina shares how to shift this mindset:

“We have a problem when we rely on our job for happiness and fulfillment. If the job is going well, things at home go well. When the job takes a downturn, life at home can be miserable…we intertwine the two, and we don't even realize that they can be separate entities. Job description is not self-description. They are two totally separate things. When you rely on your job for happiness and security and fulfillment, eventually it's going to let you down.”

The biggest takeaway? Understand that if you are relying on your job to make you happy, you’re going to be stuck in a cycle of fear that affects all aspects of your career and your life. That fear will get worse every time your employer or the economy hits a bump in the road (which - statistically speaking from history - occurs at least once every 5-10 years).

Gina shares some specific words of encouragement here, reminding us that WHO we are and WHAT we do are not the same:

“These are two separate things. You are a human being who is 100% worthy, because you're human. It doesn't matter what you do or what you don't do or what kind of education you have.
Who you are in the world, which is a human, a son or daughter, it could be a spouse, it could be a parent, a cousin, you have hobbies that you partake in, and do things for entertainment. The other thing you do is work.
We believe the harder we work and the better worker we are, the more worthy we are. It's not true. Don't think you have to work really, really hard in order to be seen as worthy. You're already worthy as a human being, we're all 100% worthy. Your job is just a small part of your human existence.”

PRACTICAL STEPS TO STOP STRESSING AND AVOID THE FEAR TRAP

Now that we understand the mindset traps that are easy to fall into around engineering identity, dependency on your employer, and feeling like you can outwork world-wide economic conditions, what can we do when we are “in the moment” stuck in the fear trap, and stressed about losing our job or finding a new one?

Gina shares a practical framework you can use. Below is a graphical summary, of which you can get a full explanation in my video interview with Gina by clicking on the big gold button below.

S stands for situation or circumstance, and our situations and circumstances are external. One example is COVID-19. We can't control circumstances and situations. Other examples include our boss or our job.

T stands for thoughts. Our thoughts are our beliefs, our perceptions, and our interpretations of the world around us. Separating your situations from your thoughts and beliefs is extremely important because they shape what we think is true. Just because you say no to your boss (a situation) doesn’t mean you’ll be first to be laid off. Yet, unconscious thoughts like this are very common.

E stands for energy or emotions. These come from our thoughts and our belief systems. Energy is the difference between a positive or negative emotion, and is the difference between assuming good or ill intent from those with whom we interact.

A stands for actions. We act based on our feelings and our thoughts.

R stands for reality. All the actions we take in life produce your reality.

Below is a specific example of how you might apply this framework to a common situation at work.

Note: The above is a summary of the STEAR framework. Please see Gina’s website HERE for more examples and further explanation.

Do you see how this tool can produce very different the outcomes when you approach work from an empowered perspective versus a powerless perspective?

YOU get to choose the perspective you take. Your thoughts are creating a cycle where the decisions you make and the actions you take reinforce your beliefs.

Even in the EXACT same situation, you create very different realities based on the way you think about the situation. Choose wisely.