No Job Is Safe Anymore. And That’s Exactly Why You Should Prepare Now.

I was quoted in a Business Insider article about Robinhood’s decision to lay off around 10% of its workforce.

What made the story interesting wasn’t the layoffs themselves. Unfortunately, layoffs have become so common over the last few years that they barely make headlines anymore.

It was the reason behind them.

Robinhood isn’t a company in trouble. Quite the opposite. According to CEO Vlad Tenev, the business has “never been stronger”. Revenue is growing, trading activity is up, and by most traditional measures the company is doing exactly what shareholders would want it to do.

Yet hundreds of people still lost their jobs.

The explanation given was that Robinhood wanted to increase what it called “talent density” – essentially operating with fewer people and a higher concentration of top performers.

When Business Insider asked for my thoughts, I gave a fairly simple answer:

“No job is 100% secure.”

The more I thought about it afterwards, the more I realised that this is probably the single most important career lesson people can learn today.

Because many of us were raised to believe a completely different version of how the world works.

We were told that if we worked hard, stayed loyal and did a good job, we’d be looked after. That employers valued commitment. That stability was something you earned through years of service.

And while there was never a guarantee, there was at least a sense that if a company was performing well, your position was relatively safe.

That assumption feels increasingly outdated.

Today, companies don’t need to be struggling to cut jobs. They don’t need falling revenues, shrinking market share or a financial crisis. They simply need a reason why fewer people might help them achieve their goals.

Sometimes that’s automation.

Sometimes it’s AI.

Sometimes it’s a new leadership team.

Sometimes it’s a shift in strategy.

And sometimes it’s simply because somebody has decided the business can operate with fewer people than it currently employs.

None of that is personal.

That’s the uncomfortable part.

Most redundancies aren’t a reflection of individual performance. They’re a reflection of business decisions.

I’ve spoken to countless people over the years who were genuinely shocked when they lost their jobs.

Not because they were underperforming or they had received warnings, but because they’d convinced themselves it could never happen to them.

They were the person who always stayed late. The person who never said no. The person who had been with the company for ten years. The person who trained half the team.

Then one day they found themselves sitting in a meeting being told their role no longer existed.

The reality is that your employer is responsible for your current job.

You’re responsible for your next one.

The mistake most people make is waiting until they need a job before preparing for a job search.

Their CV hasn’t been updated in years.

Their LinkedIn profile still describes a role they left three promotions ago.

They haven’t spoken to anyone in their network for months.

They don’t have a clear record of their achievements.

And suddenly they’re trying to fix all of that while dealing with the stress of redundancy, financial pressure and uncertainty about the future.

It’s a terrible time to start preparing.

The people who recover quickest from layoffs are rarely the people with the fanciest job titles. They’re usually the people who were already ready.

Their CV is current.

Their LinkedIn profile reflects who they are today.

They understand their market value.

They know how to position themselves.

Most importantly, they can start moving immediately.

That’s why I think everyone should occasionally ask themselves a simple question:

If I lost my job tomorrow, how prepared would I be?

Not how confident.

Not how employable.

How prepared.

Would your CV be ready to send?

Would your LinkedIn profile support your application?

Would you know where to start?

If the answer is no, don’t wait until you’re forced to deal with it.

Nobody buys home insurance after their house has caught fire.

Nobody starts saving for retirement the week before they retire.

Yet every day I see people waiting until they’ve lost their income before they start thinking about their career safety net.

The good news is that getting prepared doesn’t take weeks.

Update your CV.

Refresh your LinkedIn profile.

Document your achievements while they’re still fresh in your mind.

Understand where you stand in the market.

Most people don’t need to overhaul everything. They just need to stop assuming they’ll have plenty of time to do it later.

Because later has a habit of arriving without warning.

If you’d like to see how competitive your CV currently is, I’ve created a Free CV Score tool that will give you an instant assessment of where you are today.

And if you’re starting from scratch, you can also download my Free CV Template.

Hopefully you won’t need either of them any time soon.

But that’s exactly the point.

The best time to prepare for a job search is when you don’t need one.