ith hordes of suddenly jobless financiers knocking
at her door every day, Cheryl Yung is working flat out.
In more than 10 years as a career coach specializing
in helping sacked investment bankers rebuild their careers, Yung has never seen
anything close to this. After the collapse of Lehman Brothers and rapid acceleration
of layoffs all across Wall Street, her work now stretches to 12 hours a day and
into the weekends.
"The word people on the front lines use around here
is ‘bloodbath,' " says Yung, a senior vice president at outplacement firm Lee Hecht
Harrison.
The tumult is shifting into overdrive at the companies
that help people reassemble their professional lives. The outplacement industry,
created largely to serve displaced workers in the Rust Belt, has been becoming white
collar-and moving eastward-in recent years.
In the past 12 months, more than 20,000 New Yorkers
have lost their Wall Street jobs.
Thousands more are certain to follow in the coming weeks,
including as many as half of the 10,000 former Lehman employees now at Barclays
Bank under 90-day contracts as the British owner sorts out its staffing needs. Major
layoffs also loom at Merrill Lynch as it is merged into Bank of America and at American
International Group, which was effectively nationalized.
"Every industry takes its turn for big restructuring
and layoffs," says Celeste Calfe, president of the Association of Career Firms North
America. "It's finance's turn now."
Many banking industry executives are warning recently
laid off Wall Street workers that their former jobs won't return anytime soon and
they should cast their lots elsewhere.
The tough part is finding positions that pay anywhere
near the ones that saw the average Wall Street employee collecting $180,000 in bonus
pay alone last year.
"In the past, there was a belief by people like me that
you ride the cycle, cut people and expenses when you need to, and when it's over
you rehire," says Jim Fitzgerald, Wachovia's regional president for wholesale banking
in New York and Connecticut. "That's not going to happen this time."
Networking no longer an option
For those who assist the professional casualties of
Wall Street's implosion, the problem is not simply the volume of displaced workers.
Experts say job opportunities are evaporating all across finance.
"In the past, people got jobs through networking, but
now there's nowhere to network to," Yung says.
Generally, financial institutions pay for up to six
months of career transition services, which don't come cheap.
Counselors typically charge individuals $500 just to
review a résumé, according to Calfe. Outplacement has grown into a $10 billion business
worldwide with more than 800 firms, including leaders Lee Hecht Harrison, Right
Management and DBM Career Services.
Those who have just lost Wall Street jobs at first tend
to view her much like they would a doctor, Yung says. They welcome the help but
at the same time are fearful of what they might hear-and she often delivers a bleak
prognosis about their staying in finance.
In the end, many financiers will follow in the footsteps
of people like Angela Jameson. Laid off late last year by Moody's Investors Service,
where she had worked for 15 years rating the credit of such retailers as Wal-Mart,
Jameson began attending weekly two-hour meetings at Lee Hecht Harrison with half
a dozen other displaced executives.
Changing careers
"I had to go before these people and account for everything
I did while looking for work-interviews, conversations, networking," Jameson says.
"It meant I had a goal."
Her focus paid off this spring, when she landed a spot
as a researcher at the International Council of Shopping Centers, a trade group.
Others have had to reinvent themselves.
After UBS laid him off, Frank Lugossy bought a wine
shop last year in Greenwich, Connecticut. The former equity trader, whose inventory
includes bottles of Sauterne and Cheval Blanc, says sales are robust.
"For sure, it's not the same pay as Wall Street," Lugossy
says. "But I like working for myself now."
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