Recession is a time of transitions. It is an occasion for a soul searching exercise to find if what we currently engaged in is the right vocation and our true mission.
Many lost their jobs. Especially, youngsters who were earning huge amount as salaries, some time even more than their parents were earning. Those who got affected include newly married working couples, middle aged people, elderly, business men, small traders, construction workers etc. For some it is job loss, for some others substantial reduction in their salaries. There are entrepreneurs and established business men who had to close down their companies due to recession.
Coping up with the crisis is often a difficult process for most. Often people have to identify new vocations.
For a large majority of young people in the developing countries where Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) business boomed up had highly paying jobs in the IT and BPO industry. BPO industry could train a mechanical engineer or a civil engineer or teacher or even doctor to work in a IT or IT Enabled Services (ITES) enterprise, thereby enabling him to earn a better salary than that one could earn from one’s own vocation, just for instance as a teacher. This has created a shortage of skilled workers in non-IT sectors.
I know a friend of mine who is highly talented in making various sculptures as well as paintings. Whereas his education helped him grab a highly paying job in the booming IT industry immediately after his college. As the recession progressed, he lost his job, which was a shock for him.
For two months he kept on looking for a suitable opening which would fetch him a salary equivalent to what he was earning previously or something close to it and then was prepared to settle for half. But nothing worked out. As this was happening, he thought about his favorite hobby and talent. He then started doing it. The art works that he created could probably give him his livelihood as well as much needed satisfaction, which was lacking in the previous jobs.
This crisis, the current recession, is an eye-opener for many such people who got migrated to other sectors from their own industry.
Such crises are required for to re-invent ourselves.
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