What do you do in a complicated financial market?

It's a question I get a lot whenever I do talks like this, or whenever I say what I do, people are always like, oh, what should I invest in, should I do this? The first thing, everyone wants a magic answer. And this is a tough time. No one knows. No one has absolute certainty about what's going to be happening in the world. The best thing that all of us can do is stay organized, stay informed.

If you're thinking about your personal finances, if you haven't thought about having a budget before, if you're one of those people that, oh yeah, I worked at this place, I left my 401k over there. Get yourself organized. And a lot of that work you can do on your own. Or most of us have a relationship with the bank. You don't need to necessarily hire a financial advisor. Just know what you have, know where you're starting from.

In times like this, a lot of people will ask if they have to change their investments drastically. Ideally, if you have an investment plan, it's a plan that is for the long term. A long term plan would be one that would factor in times of recession, as well as boom times. And the idea is that those things all ensure that you have the money that you need when you need it. So for the most part, while it's tempting to say, oh my gosh, is the market going to go down? Should I sell everything? No.

The thing to do, if you really are feeling insecure, think about what your cash needs over the next year are. If you're someone who pays tuition, or has big expenses that you're going to be facing, maybe gradually move that to cash so you don't have to worry and you know that you'll have the cash that you need. But let your investments work for you.

If you're someone with a longer time horizon, investing is made for weathering through these hard times, too. It's not fun, but the longer term investing does pay off.

I think another thing, especially when we're seeing headlines of large tech companies or others announcing massive layoffs, obviously, we all look at our own companies, and whether they're big or small, and think, oh my gosh, is that me? And you look at things like, “hey at my office, they've stopped serving the good coffee. Does that mean we're doing cutbacks?” All that kind of stuff. Do an exercise where you plan ahead if the worst were to happen, if you were to lose your job, if you're a business owner, if you were to see a drop in revenues. Do that thinking now, like, what would you do? Because something that happens going into times of financial uncertainty is we forget that we adjust. We think like, oh my gosh, I lost a job and that's it. Well, no, you will get another one. It might be different, it might be whatever. But we can always adjust our spending, we can always adjust things.

Just think about that. Go through that exercise. If that were to happen tomorrow, whatever the thing is that you're worried about financially in these times were to happen tomorrow, what would be my next step? And hopefully, that doesn't come to be true. But if it does, you're at least going to be prepared.

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Carleton English is a reporter at Barron’s, where she covers banking, activist investing, and markets. In addition to her writing for Barron’s magazine, Carleton is also a panelist on the Barron’s Roundtable, which airs weekly on Fox Business. Prior to joining Barron’s, Carleton covered hedge funds and other Wall Street shenanigans for The New York Post, was a writer at TheStreet.com and a producer at CNBC.Before journalism, Carleton spent the first part of her career in finance, first working as a credit and pricing analyst with LEAF Financial in her native Philadelphia.

Three thousand miles later, she found her passion for financial education when she started working for Laird Norton Tyee in Seattle (now Laird Norton Wealth Management) as a Client Service Associate. In addition to assisting high-net worth families with their financial planning needs, Carleton also developed a financial literacy curriculum for Laird Norton clients that was also used in Seattle public schools.

Carleton is a graduate of George Washington University, where she studied International Relations and Anthropology. She spent a semester in Buenos Aires, where her love affair with Latin American literature and tango dancing began. When not working, Carleton can be found dancing or taking in a Broadway show.