In case you haven’t noticed yet, the economy sucks right now. And with economic suckage comes layoffs. Of course, in this industry layoffs can, and do, come at all points of the economic cycle. If you have been doing this awhile, you start to develop a sixth sense about when things might be coming.

This is even more important as a team lead as it is your responsibility to make sure there there are not (big) knowledge gaps on your team. Things like how the build is tooled, or to how to configure the automated tests and technical details of a feature can absolutely kill a test team’s velocity.

According to this article there is a much larger problem looming ahead. And that is that the job market recovers.

Huh? How is that a problems? Well, here are some choice quotes:

  • Fifty-four percent of employed Americans plan to look for a new job once the economy rebounds
  • Of those ages 18-29, 71% say they are likely to look for new jobs once the economy turns around
  • “I can’t wait for the job market to improve,”

Take a look at your team. How many people are there because they really want to be there, or are they there because the market conditions prevent them from leaving?