We already talked about underemployment but what about a situation where you’re basically forced to take a survival job (ie. a job that perhaps requires less skills than you have and/or pays you less than what you’re worth) because reality has set in and you simply can’t afford to stay out of work any longer?
In some cases, people take jobs that pay and require less than jobs that they’d ideally like to have because they can’t find anything else and if they’ve been out of work for awhile, simply can’t afford to stay out of work any longer.
Sometimes, people decide to switch careers and realize that the new job is perhaps a step down from where they were but might also realize it will make them happier. I recently read a story about a guy who was laid off from a professional management position and ended up taking a job at Home Depot to make ends meet and has (at the time of writing the article anyways) had decided to stay at Home Depot because he liked the work also recognizing that in his own words he was taking a job where his skills weren’t being fully utilized.
Taking a survival job might become a necessity for people if they have run out of money and can’t remain unemployed any longer.
The issue is that it can have an impact on your future employment options since presumably you’re going to have to explain to a future employer why you’re now in a lower paying job with less job requirements than what you’re used to handling.
It’s possible that taking a survival job might end up being one that you hold for a lot longer than expected which means the chance that you’ll have to explain why you took (and continue to have this job) will increase.
Having said that, I guess if you look at things positively you might feel that there is always a chance that your employer will recognize that you’re being underutilized and promote you to a better job. I’m not sure I’d take a job and hold out hope for this to happen but I suspect it could happen in some instances.
While taking a survival job might end up making you more motivated and positive since you’re at least working again, the opposite might hold true if you end up having to keep this job for longer than you anticipated as mentioned above.
As a recruiter, I recall many cases where someone was out of work and had taken a survival job which often had nothing to do with their preferred line of work and when they put the survival job in their resume, it stuck out like a sore thumb. In this instance, I don’t know if putting the job in the resume helped even though morally it was probably the right thing to do and it at least did show the hiring manager that the person was keeping busy and trying to work.
Still, if reality sets in and you can no longer afford to stay at home not working, it might be an option you have to look at. In this instance, the best options would probably be larger companies (ie. with potentially a better chance to move elsewhere in the company when things get better) and companies that have good reputations and ideally are well-established.
