If you were laid off recently, especially if you are taking it personally, I recommend reading The End of Loyalty. It covers the shift over the 20th century from companies providing lifelong employment (retirement watch, pension, etc) to mass layoffs at the drop of a hint.
Take home message is that the future promises not only little job security, but less *career* security. Have to be prepared to retrain/retool, and possibly even change careers multiple times during your working years.
@kyle even where one might have job security I wonder if it is worth staying put and trying to last to retirement or better to make a move every so often?
Thanks for the recommendation I'll check it out.
@thrrgilag I suppose it depends on whether you are happy enough with the work you are doing, your advancement (if you want that), and the employer. The key is to keep an eye on where your industry is heading and prepare to make a change if it is going away, or changing in a way you don't want to follow.
I moved from sysadmin to security because I saw the industry moving more to software dev managing proprietary infrastructure, instead of the sysadmin work I enjoyed.
