No Guarantees in this Economy By: Scott Craft

You’ve spent the last three and a half years going to classes, staying late nights in the library, and practicing interviews—and for what?  To get a great job right as soon as we graduate and have a fulfilling career.  Well for many of us, that may not be a reality as soon as we graduate.  As the economy worsens and uncertainty grows, many workers fresh out of college are seeing their start dates pushed back and their offers rescinded.  I’ve gathered some helpful tips in case one of you finds yourself in this situation either at the end of this year or next.

Say you’ve landed a job in another city.  You’ve already signed a lease for a new apartment, then you get there, ready to work, and you hear that your job offer has been rescinded.  What do you do?   First of all, don’t panic and act fast in order to try to minimize your losses.  You need to get a reason for what happened, so calmly ask the employer why they changed their mind and whether the job might become available anytime in the near future—for your records, you may want to get that in writing.  If you really wanted that job, you should try to negotiate for a lower salary—on the condition that you’ll be considered for promotion in the future.  If that doesn’t work, try to at least get back what you lost.  Try to get your old apartment back and go crawling back to your old job, if possible.  If it’s too late to get back what you had before, it may be possible to get compensation from the company that rescinded your offer.  But before you attempt to get that, think carefully about it, because burning that bridge may be more damaging than the compensation you would get back in the first place.  Hopefully this doesn’t happen to any of you, but in case it does, you’re ready to deal with it.