Churn jobs to avoid ?

In different countries there are wildly different rates of churn in the job market: attrition, or put mathematically: Delta jobs created - jobs destroyed per year.

You do have to exclude that horrid London phenomenon of perpetual contracts from the uk market, and instead think about looking that gift horse of a job offer well and truly in the orthodontic fashion.

The key question is ' am I accepting a job which is purely project perishable'? Further, will the job be downsized soon regardless of your goal scoring?

I have had four jobs in fact which were invented if you like for me. Two were fortuitous project related. One was a 'minister without portfolio' while yet another was more or less an act of charity. Adding working to fill in or cover at friends companies and half my cv is littered with fairly perisable 'suck it and see' job scenarios.

Coupled to outright project work and companies going bust, then more than half of my time in the labour market has been spent in shakey positions or looking for work. I'm not abnormal for the uk at all, just a higher threshold for risk than most.

The one greatest weakness I have had is not recognising I am in a perishable or untenable job soon enough and doing something to G.T:F:O. to a job which is more permanent or is a hard lead to a stable career.

Another side to this I hear you say in retort, is that if I had really performed in the job I would have 'gotten on'. Become part of the family. You know yeah. My heart is just not IN working for a-holes. So this makes me doubly expendable.

I write this as a wry cautionary autotale because you have to be careful with employers in the recovery period we are perhaps entering. The permanent pick up jobs will be grabbed fast. So by all means take a temp or wing-and-a-prayer position, but from day minus one, look hard and actively market yourself for more permanent opportunities.