Last Thursday, Cal Poly Pomona announced a voluntary separation of service program to begin in March, resulting from a Cal State University budget shortfall. I experienced these actions in 2008, working for the Long Beach Press-Telegram at the beginning of the financial crisis, at that time, a fraction of employees accepted the offer, and I anticipate a similar response. Unfortunately, higher education, like journalism, is underappreciated and underfunded. These are the steps I use to prepare ahead of potential layoffs.
- Freeze voluntary retirement contributions in favor of expanding my existing emergency fund.
- Audit my website, journals, sketchbooks, and files for new portfolio content; these can prompt ideas and blog posts and boost my personal website’s SEO ranking routine updates.
- Unsubscribe from pointless email newsletters, reduce incoming spam, and boost the visibility of important emails as they arrive.
- Review my social media and professional accounts for tone to reflect my authentic personality.
- I intend to add an introductory section to this website linking to my portfolio and social media, making it easier for clients and potential employers to find me.
- Website theme customization doubles as a working example of my web developer and communications specialist abilities.
- Correct any broken bits on this website; I know of a few.
- Add Now and Post Status to my sidebar. I’m not active on social media and prefer to share content on a platform where I can control my presentation.
Finally, get Docker Desktop running in Ubuntu; seriously, I can quickly spin up and down web hosting environments for development in LAMP, but the world has moved on to Docker. Get with the program Joe.
Featured Image Credit: RoZie on Pixabay.
