"I Was Retrenched At 27 And Ended Up With Less Than $100 In My Bank Account"

I was 27 when I found out my department was closing down. It hadn’t been announced—I deduced it because my boss refused to give me an answer for a future project although it was pretty urgent.

“Is the department closing down?” I asked out of curiosity. She was surprised. She admitted that the decision was just made and told me not to tell the rest of the team before the formal announcement.

At 27, I was jobless after four years into my first job. I remained unemployed for almost seven months and my bank account balance dwindled to less than $100. Here are the mistakes I made five years ago that you could probably learn from:

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Text: Hana*, for CLEO / Additional reporting: Natalya Molok

*name changed to protect identity as requested