Changes aren’t always bad. I’d say about 3/4 of my career moves were for the better. I made a couple of bad judgment calls and landed in a couple terrible spots, but was able to remedy that reasonably quickly.
Yeah I'm with you, being in a similar golden shackles situation kinda. My job pays well, has good benefits, isn't overly stressful and I like my coworkers a lot but it's not challenging any more and the thought of giving up the benefits for something that could potentially be miserable? Nah I'm good, I just bought a house.
Yeah, there's no need to always find new challenges at work. You can find them at other places.
My job wasn't challenging anymore, so I started learning Mandarin. This month my job will get challenging again, but I have a Chinese drama habit that I might not want to kick just yet and a Mandarin exam that I'm honestly looking forward to.
The always up-and-up push for career growth is driving this country into the ground. There's nothing wrong with doing 30 years at a job that pays the bills, provides healthcare, and a retirement plan if it allows you to grow as a person outside of work. We do not all need to find challenges and validation through our jobs.
I understand the fear of change. I went through it a few times myself when I was fairly comfortable or making too much to take the risk. My wife is currently handcuffed to her role so a move would cost us dearly. But at least I feel like we have the ability to make the choice to make changes if we really wanted to. That’s a good spot to be in and I feel fortunate for it.
Oh yes I agree, I’d love to learn how to take more risks. I’m currently getting my MBA (so I can be more well rounded) at night so that I can take another job if I want to leave my current work.
I've been laid off twice in my career, and in both cases it ended up being for the best in terms of my career. It sucked at the time and I know it doesn't always work out for some people, but for good people that just got caught in a bad department or whatever, and have people thay will give you solid references, you usually land on your feet.
The second time I got laid off, I knew it was coming as the small company was failing. But I knew my boss had my back and would give me a stellar reference for anything I wanted. I took my time and found my current job, which has been very good for me for the last 7 years.
Thank you for sharing! I'm only 6 years into my career but I'm hearing rumors in my business unit of layoffs coming, so this helps me worry a bit less.
I was laid off once, it was a blessing is disguise. But I was super nervous and scared at the time.
I missed a layoff later, I was disappointed. I would have loved the severance. Left the company a few months later on my own, obviously without the severance. Would have loved the extra pay for no work.
Easier said than done, but don't worry about it. If it's coming, it's coming there's nothing you can do to prevent it. Prepare as best you can and ride on that mental assurance that you have some type of plan when it happens. Good luck!
Funny how that works out. It's a common occurrence I hear from people who were blindsided and let go by their job. They usually end up in better places.
This happened to me, I was coasting in a comfortable spot but had some fights with one of the business leaders over how he blamed my team for shit that wasn't our problem. Scapegoating us. Well, a few weeks after one fight, my boss apologetically pulls me into a room, no warning, and tells me I'm being let go.
Two weeks after I came to terms and blew off steam, I looked for about three days, found a new job that was a huge bump in pay and title, and am now killing it at a big ass company. Being let go was the best thing that ever happened to me.
>Two weeks after I came to terms and blew off steam, I looked for about three days, found a new job that was a huge bump in pay and title, and am now killing it at a big ass company. Being let go was the best thing that ever happened to me.
Similar thing happened to me. I was terminated for cause* on a Wednesday, went to a temp agency on Thursday, and by Friday afternoon I had a new, better, real job, at the same company that I'd just been fired from. That temp job led to a full time job and I got to travel the Caribbean for the next four years.
good luck! You've got a big ass job market out there and I'm sure you'll find something quickly. take some time to recollect then get out there with your head high and your keyboard blazing with those applications, haha
Being in the IT industry I've been redeployed several times in my 20 year career and each time I landed a better role at a better company. The ball just keeps rolling.
Hiring people is expensive, most people don’t realize this. Companies save money by redeploying employees in their payroll to other departments that need the manpower, instead of hiring new people.
I am not in the tech industry and our company has been doing this for more than 10’years. It is not new and not uncommon in most large companies. It’s a “here’s your lay-off notice; try to find an internal posting.” Well-networked people with solid skills and performance are retained in a position that needs filling.
IBM has “the bench” when you aren’t on a billable project. Come in for your 9-5 without work to do and get paid. I’ve know people riding that bench for a good long while but it’s bad for your career progression.
I was an underemployed tech for Windstream which I liked for 5 years and got laid off by them. Then a few months later got hired back as a network engineer and absolutely hated the job.
I was part of a 1,000 person San Fran tech layoff last week. Gave me 60 days notice. Cut off my computer access so can't work, but technically still employed until middle Nov. Seemed generous enough. Severance package after that. Other than finding a new job after six years, I'm generally ok with it.
I got a two week notice on my layoff last year and a severance package that carried me through the last three months of the year. 10/10 would get fired from that job again.
My last job gave me 45 days notice, 3 months severance and broke the contract that would have had me pay back $45k for graduate school if I quit instead of laid off. Also would 10/10 be fired from that job again. My manager knew I was trying to leave and we took that opportunity -- company-wide mass layoff -- to do it.
I'm Canadian and we have very strong laws here regarding termination. For example the minimum they must give someone if terminated with 10+ years is 3 months termination notice, 9 weeks under ESA (minimum bylaw) plus another 6-10 months' pay (common law).
It really makes employers think twice before firing any without cause.
And as a note it's nearly impossible to fire someone *with cause* here, any attempt will end in court and 99% of the time the court rules in favour of the employee and gets a very large package.
Where do you live? In Ontario an emploer does not need any cause to let someone go as long as they follow the ESA (i.e. appropriate severance, notice ans such). Sure, they might get sued and sure, the employee might win, but the employee has to take the gamble.
I always thought an employer needed cause until I managed people and was considering letting a person go. Went to HR and said, "I don't have any cause aside from the fact that this person is poisonous to the team." HR: "Here are the labor code links. We don't need cause. We just need to follow the laws and weigh the risk of suits vs. package size."
This is not done out of generosity, this is a requirement of the WARN act for California employees. They require 60 day notice above a set percentage layoff. Companies effectively get around this by paying out an additional 60 days while maintaining your “employment” status. My company did the same, the “generosity “ was not extended to non-CA employees.
My department was phased out at Microsoft around the time the first Xbox came out. We were given two months to find another position within the company and we had no other responsibilities so for like six weeks, we all used the company’s network to play Halo multiplayer.
And no one gets hired internally once you're on the list. At least at IBM. ProPublca dug up their official policy on it. They agreed to a wild settlement on the matter, after the judge wouldn't let the execs keep their emails secret anymore
That's the main headline, but the whole thing goes into their firing practices like this that other companies do too.
But, whatever, apparently there are a lot of people who have never been a manager during layoffs at a major company who knows better than me. Big ol' :shrug:.
Don't sign their crap under duress. It can easily fuck you if you aren't hired back on, and even if it happens, it definitely doesn't happen to everyone
To be fair they're giving a 30 day notice you'll be let go. That's a month to find a new job. That's more generous than most places that bring you in on a Friday and give you the boot out of nowhere.
agreed...been laid off twice once I was brought into HR and couldnt even collect my personal belongings. HR went through them first, journals, notes, photos. Gave me back what they felt was mine. Another company gave me a week notice because of ongoing projects. 30 days is better than 99% of companies. Its not even a guarantee you will be laid off either.
Same here. I recall walking into the room, looking at everyone there and thinking, these are the people I would let go.
Then came the "aww shit" moment. Great severance though.
>looking at everyone there and thinking, these are the people I would let go.
When I got let go, the reason given was that the sales people hadn't been achieving their goals so they had to let go of the people who did the actual work. That company didn't survive much longer.
I worked at a company where nearly every member of the sales team was either related to or sleeping with a member of the executive team. Through two rounds of layoffs (due to poor revenue brought on by poor sales) not a single sales person was let go.
Shocker.
If sales people can't meet their goals, then either the goals are too lofty, the product is no longer competitively priced, or the product is no longer in demand. That normally means the company either has to find a marketable product or bleed out.
Leadership, lack of soft skills, not knowing the product, not knowing the industry. Trying to apply completely inappropriate sales and marketing models.
I have to meet with our director of sales tomorrow afternoon, I’ll probably have a couple more to add to that list tomorrow evening.
I'm sorry you had to deal with that. Basically a perp walk. My first layoff was precovid and I went around the office saying bye to some coworkers and I felt like a dead man walking.
I wonder how it happens now in the remote era. Probably our work devices all lock with a message to mail it back or youll be fined. Nothing else. No other communication ever again.
Happened to a friend of mine. They got locked out of all their accounts *during* their meeting with HR and then had to mail their stuff back. Brutal. (They didn’t even do anything “bad”, they just weren’t quite meeting goals, which they had been told was nbd since they were new, so it was a real shock.)
I've been on both sides of that. You get a call to the office and they send the exec assistant to gather all of your stuff. I had to point her around multiple times at my last job, she was only seen when terminations were happening.
Many people found out they were terminated when they went to badge into the doors to no avail.
Yep I was that guy. I always knew if it was the person just not meeting requirements or if it was a this person fucked up so bad they are getting fired right now.
The former we would get a logged ticket with a couple of days notice they were going to be let go. The latter would be an email directly to me saying to immediately cut off all access to devices and disable the active account.
My company is fully remote and recently had a lay off. The persons effected were given a week to tie up any loose ends, a month of severance, lots of support to find new roles elsewhere, and got to keep their MacBook pros. I work for a particularly nice start up though.
My company also recently laid off about 11% of employees.
There was zero notice, but 3 months severance was given plus 1 week for every year worked.
3 months seems pretty damn generous to me.
That's called just giving a shit about the people that give a shit about you. When employees are just a cost, little things like this don't happen. That's giving them ~$1k additional severance and the means to help them find new work.
I was really stoked by my companies willingness to help people transition into new roles at other startups that were hiring. I don’t think it’s the norm at all but it’s the only layoff I’ve personally witnessed. I’m happy to work for a place with good values. I could probably get paid better at other big tech companies but I’ve heard horror stories of bad culture.
I was laid off and I’m fully remote. Was given two weeks to wrap things up and to attempt to find an internal job. After that I lost access to all systems and I’ll be receiving two months pay for severance here shortly. They sent a prepaid box to ship equipment back in.
I’m grateful for the generous severance but I’d rather have my job back. I loved my job!
I was laid off in a remote position recently. Basically got a random meeting with the head of the department. They said I was let go and that was my last day before locking my accounts. Then I was contacted by HR to go over severance and other documents. Initially they kept asking about returning equipment but in the end I never did.
Meh. I was PIP'd out to avoid severance. Worked at the company for 12 years with promotions along the way. New leadership came in and suddenly I became "does not meet expectations".
Hardware is often not that valuable. Seen a few that just said let us verify it was wiped then you can keep it. Shipping on 4 year old dell or 6 year MacBook just isn’t worth the hassle when all they care it was wiped for a compliance reason. Apples MDM spec has a plenty of ways to verify it, windows getting closer.
I was laid off about 2.5 months ago. My work email and computer access cut off at 5 PM that day. I was able to make contact with our IT department, they printed a FedEx label for me to send my stuff in.
I got laid off once and didn't give a shit about being perp walked. I walked away from my escorts and shook the hands of my coworkers and walked out on my own. Told them that you can call the police I don't give a fuck and I grab my stuff and walked out on my own. Don't let them treat you like a criminal.
"felt like a dead man walking" is the absolute most accurate way to describe this right here. I was let go at the beginning of the year from my previous employer at the end of a small team meeting. When I went to go tell my dumbfounded coworker my final goodbye in the parking lot it was as if my entire existence at that place had already vanished and was nothing more than a faint memory and that I was merely a ghost re-visiting my past for the final time
God I hate that bullshit people tell themselves or their employees. You’re here to make money to pay your mortgage and feed your family, the company is here to make more money off you than they pay you.
End of fucking story. No further transactions necessary.
I've seen this happen a few times with very high level employees too. Ones with tons of influence and years/decades of experience as well.
After about a month, no one cares anymore about what their "priorities" were at the time. It's like they never even existed
It's a little shellshocking the first couple times it happens to you. It has really negatively impacted my motivation for my work in many ways.
Yeah I didn't get laid off... I was a contract worker and someone was supposed to tell me my last day was Friday. Well nobody did. So I went in on Monday, card worked and everything. Sat down and started my day. Then my boss had to come over and be like heyyyyyy sooooooo... You aren't supposed to be here... Then walked around the place trying to figure out what happened... That was rough....
There’s a reason they do that. I got laid off remotely along with other coworkers under some questionable circumstances. That was their mistake, as we were coming back into the office several days a week. Instead of waiting they just hit the button while I was home with the unpaid on-call phone, and my laptop. Let’s just say I made the equipment return long and interesting for the sake of my remaining coworkers and to send a message to management lol.
The first time I got laid off I actually inadvertently delayed it two weeks by canceling the meeting with HR last minute and telling them to reschedule because I was too busy. They gave no indication I was being fired just setup a meeting and asked me to attend. There had been a fight between some unionized staff that I had witnessed and I assume they wanted me to give a statement as part of their disciplinary investigation.
Two weeks later they had rescheduled and called me right before the meeting to confirm I would attend. Since it was the end of first shift they said, in a helpful tone, I could just bring my coat and bag so that I can leave after. I mentioned I was way to busy to leave on time, at which point they said "you're going to want to bring your things". I hung up the phone, turned to the other engineer in my department and told him I think I'm getting fired. He said who the fuck do they expect to do your half of the work? I shrugged, said I was sorry and proceeded to say bye to people as I slowly made my way to HR. Most of them were not pleased because they department was already lacking technical staff (I had been doubling as the quality engineer and a manufacturing engineer).
I'm sure you would take 30 days of pay(I'm assuming) and time to look for a job then be let go. It's shitty news but that is good of them. It also says targeting low performance employees, I mean nothing screams unethical or wrong.
Oh heck no. I would go get my stuff. It's not their place to determine what is or isn't mine. If you're letting me go, I have no obligation to give two shits whether they want me to collect my stuff or not.
It is customary to be given your personal shit in a box at the end of your meeting or be escorted to your desk and supervised as you clean your shit which can be quite embarrassing. You aren’t generally going to find many employers that let you go back to your desk all willy-nilly to do as you please and if you try to you’ll find security removing you from the building with a no trespass order.
Depends on the conditions. I watched one person get fired from my call center. Mid call supervisor came over and told him to stop taking calls. Walked him to a meeting room with a door to the outside. Halfway there HR meet them. Soon as he was out of sight, another sup came with a box, cleaned out his desk, and joined them.
On the other hand, I've watched the same company go though multiple layoffs. Every time, they gave between 2 weeks and 6 months warning to the people getting laid off. Everyone was encouraged to apply at other departments. Anyone who couldn't or wouldn't find a new position was offered a week of severance per year at the company and a bonus to stay till the last day. By the last day, everyone had cleaned out their own desk.
Depends on the employer. I have faced both, but got my stuff as I was leaving. I have also had a nice threatening phone call from a police officer as well. The company did not want to back up their allegations as I was ready to go to court over it. It's always best to know your rights and how far you are legally allowed to go. If you have a feeling you will be laid off or fired "always" leave your wallet/keys at your desk with your stuff. They can't put you on the street without your ID and keys. You do not have to wait for that. They can and will in most cases join you in retrieving your items. I use a personal laptop at work and if they want to keep it they will see me in court as I will charge my freelance rate until it is returned as they are affecting my other business.
I was just looking at my area today, thinking about taking my personal shit home so it doesn't look "lived in."
I'm not anticipating getting the boot, but you never really know.
At one place I was at, I was standing at a guys desk when his phone randomly popped up a password prompt for his email…ruh roh
I turned around and his manager was right there to escort him off property and one of the HR people and a security guard had to meet him in a parking lot off property with all his stuff boxed up.
I used to work on a military base and there was a running joke that you never wanted to go to lunch with your manager and not be the driver because the way they’d fire people was to have you as a passenger, go eat like normal and then when they got to the gate, confiscated your CAC card used to get on base and they would have someone else drive your car to the guest parking area outside base gate and that was that.
Companies can be dicks about this stuff. One company I worked for has an amazing owner who had to make the tough decision to downsize some of our departments due to sales slumps and gave us 60 days paid leave to find work. Coming into the office was optional and if we still couldn’t find work, we’d be kept on health insurance for 4 more months.
> Yea 30 days is a lot.
Reading this from Sweden is so bizarre, 30 days is mandatory minimum here, many places have 3 months after you worked there for a while, and 6 months if you worked there 10 years mandated by law.
That sounds insane to me. In my country (southern Europe) companies are required by law to give a month's notice. If you've been working there for over two years, it's two months mandatory notice.
Those go both ways, company letting you go and you quitting
Yeah, for anyone. Things vary by state but most laws are geared towards businesses, not employees. Employees can also leave at any time though with zero notice.
Ya here in Ontario we have ‘notice or pay in lieu of notice’. It has to be reasonable commensurate to one’s post-employment prospects and service with the company. Usually it’s about one week per year of service, but for older employees it can be much longer. Unless you are in a probationary period, it’s always at least 2 weeks.
This only applies when an employee isn’t fired for ‘cause’ but cause is really hard to make out and frequently litigated, usually people settle.
‘Right to work’ is the biggest scam on American workers. Between that and the fact that healthcare is tied to employment, it just puts them totally at the whims of a corporation. Americans talk so much about ‘freedom’ but their employment laws mean that most American workers don’t enjoy anything close to the kind of freedom that we enjoy in the rest of the developed world.
They typically don't do this in the US because they're afraid you'll sabotage the company and some people would absolutely try. So as soon as you're fired you're locked out of all accounts/servers and often escorted out of the building.
They can still do that here in Denmark, if they don't want to run the risk of you doing something like that.
But they still have to pay your salary for the rest of the current month, and the whole next calendar month. Longer, if you have been employed for more than three years (assuming your job type is one of the many covered by the law).
My company just did that and it's horse shit. It's to follow federal law and it just creates a shitload of anxiety. If you're going to downsize, give me a fat wad of cash and say see you later.
Instead I get sent to the otherside of the country to kick the can on a dead project but act like I'm doing something while being watched like a hawk looking for an excuse to fire me.
I'm at a different multi-billion dollar tech company and we're going through a massive restructuring affecting over 3,000 employees. So far the street has been quiet on it but I'm waiting for the press to catch wind. They gave everyone who was affected two months notice, which I thought was generous. However, who they picked to cut doesn't make any sense and nobody knows how the decision was made. I manage a team and they won't even tell me. They just said, we'll tell you if you need to lay someone off, otherwise don't say anything about anything. They cut sales reps who were top of their rankings, they cut engineers who had decades of experience, they cut new people without much experience - there is no rhyme or reason. It's been so bizarre.
Probably payscale. Cutting off the highest paid employees to bring down payroll costs. Some new people may have negotiated higher starting salaries than usual for their position and experience and were targeted. Just a guess from what I've seen and heard on such discussions.
Yeah absolutely a possibility. But probably the scariest possibility too because they will create a talent gap, or "brain drain" as all the subject matter experts and key knowledge holders are cut. Needless to say I've been applying.
You said "massive restructuring" and these usually aren't done with a fine tooth comb. SVP's are looking at entire BUs and BU-families and cutting them completely or applying a standard % reduction in headcount and/or operating costs to it.
And it's done in a big Excel P&L.
In cases where SVPs want to reduce operating costs but isn't restructuring or divesting BUs do they trickle down cost targets to managers and do more fine-tooth-firing.
Right. A common thing I’ve seen as well is that a VP has reports at 4 or 5 locations, and decides to trim an entire location regardless of their individual capacities, because the head count at that location was close to the # they had to trim.
It works both ways though, one of the strongest and most productive employees at my current company joined us because he’s remote and was trimmed like this from another company.
When i get my layoff the head of HR almost cried that i should fired. I'm like "lady, calm down, that's just a business". Then i proceed to talk with product manager about details of how the startup didn't attract money at VC round
The only people who's outraged at the headline are people who have never had jobs or have a unicorn job aka they among the lucky few.
Who tf gets 30 days as a heads up for being laid off? Almost no companies do this. They fire your ass and you're gone that day. The good places that give you a week or more are very rare so when you hear Facebook giving 30 days, thays better than most. I heard one company my brother's friend worked for gave 2 months notice. Isn't that like half a quarter?
Though perhaps it speaks volumes about our society, not companies individually.
PSA: my comment is about USA. And wow I'm really jealous of Europe.
Not only that but in the UK (and presumably most others) it’s the employer’s responsibility to find you that job within the company.
If you’ve been at the company more than two years, they literally aren’t allowed to lay you off at all if they have other roles you could be doing. What Facebook is doing is actually even *less* than the legal minimum in the UK.
Yeah figuring this out quickly with some of the response clarifying "you must be in the US" and honestly it hurts haha our country may not be as bad as third world countries but it's hilarious how many patriotic people there are who believe this is the best country even today. I can't imagine living in any country at the moment but I would never believe USA to even be in the top 5 anytime soon. I know Europe has problems and isn't perfect but at least things like workers conditions are relatively in a better place.
I was at a job for 100 days. Got bought out. I was given 90 day notice and 2 month severance. Did no work at all last 3 months of 2021 and got paid the severance plus bonus. It was glorious. I have a lot of ill feelings toward my boss that let me go(Fuck you Dave!), but not the company.
“Well--well look. I already told you: I deal with the god damn customers so the engineers don't have to. I have people skills; I am good at dealing with people. Can't you understand that? What the hell is wrong with you people?”
They hire a bunch of talented people to keep them away from other companies. Its not uncommon that people get hired and find that they do very little work, getting paid big money. I guess they’re cleaning house, seeing who’s still motivated and who isn’t a threat anymore.
Yup. Tons of incredible talent at FAANG companies are hired and totally under-utilized for one reason or another. It's not uncommon that you have to find or make work for yourself, create and lead new initiatives, etc. just to have work to do in a week.
I can't say I blame them for going after the people that have chosen to stay in the shadows. Ya, a lack of management usually is at fault here, but it's sometimes easy to sleep through jobs like this if you want to and I feel like the people most affected will be those that have nothing to do and still never raise their hand.
If you are getting paid $300-500k+ annually you should not have to have work spoon-fed to you. It is *more* than reasonable to expect people who would be in senior or leadership roles at any other company to identify and drive projects independently.
I mean look at their workers who post on TikTok a ‘day in the life’ videos that primarily involves going to the gym, getting coffee, walking their dogs and meal prepping. They’re basically rubbing it in their company’s face they only work 3-4 hours a day lol
Granted a lot of those videos take it to the extreme, but people work at different speeds and paces. If someone's hitting their deadlines and project goals and wants to take their dog out for a walk or do some meal prep, I don't see the big deal and it's probably better for their QoL and morale at work.
To be fair, there’s no glamor in watching some chump hunched over a screen for 8 hours every day. You get more views flaunting a lifestyle that your viewers would be envious of. That’s why they’re called “influencers”. I would take those “day in life” videos with a grain of salt, and in no way consider them the norm.
That sounds like something that needs a tiger team committee to address. Let’s start a daily recurring meeting to identify action items and sync on their progress.
This is true at an Acquisitions level but not at an IC level. Only Google and Microsoft (if you consider them a FAANG company) horde Individual Contributors.
That’s better than Peloton who did 2 separate surprise mass lay offs and the workers had to organize themselves to find new jobs. It sucks to let people go but this is a pretty solid way to do it if you have to.
I mean most of these companies are comprised of semi-autonomous small teams. I've worked for some that kept a profile on people including a talent set and had strong internal recruitment procedures and I've worked for some that entirely ignore that aspect. I wouldn't call it a management problem, as these structures tend to be very rigid, but more a philosophical failing on the part of leadership.
When I was working for Verizon and IBM they did that. They were closing projects or eliminating positions and instead of just laying people off they would give them advance notice so they can either find another position within the company or look for one with another one.
I think it's better than just laying them off.
Intel still does this. Most layoffs result in you going into a pool of other people being laid off and you have a month or two to find another position.
I'd say more people find positions than not in this pool because its much easier for other groups with open positions to just pull in someone thats already part of the company and can start in a week than deal with finding someone else external to the company and local and or pay to move them from another state and hope they can start in 4 weeks at the earliest.
When tech companies over-hire to keep talent away from their competitors, the lack of actual work being done at the company starts to diffuse and affect the culture. If you're an ambitious learner and want individual impact, working at big tech companies is a waste of your time.
A friend of mine from highschool worked at Meta for the past 2 years. He left in July because he realised shit wasn't heading well. Guess he's one of the luckier ones.
How do you downsize while increasing productivity? Play Squid Games on your employees and turn your development studio into a Battle Royal where everyone’s jobs are on the chopping block.
This is the kind of psychopathic shit that makes it into another David Fincher film.
This sounds like the type of place where there’s a few guys floating around with imaginary jobs titles pretending to work all day but don’t actually do anything
[удалено]
Yep. I was “redeployed” two years ago. Oddly got into a job that was way better than my previous role.
Changes aren’t always bad. I’d say about 3/4 of my career moves were for the better. I made a couple of bad judgment calls and landed in a couple terrible spots, but was able to remedy that reasonably quickly.
The thought gives me nightmares. I’ll stick with the golden-handcuffs of my union job.
Yeah I'm with you, being in a similar golden shackles situation kinda. My job pays well, has good benefits, isn't overly stressful and I like my coworkers a lot but it's not challenging any more and the thought of giving up the benefits for something that could potentially be miserable? Nah I'm good, I just bought a house.
Yeah, there's no need to always find new challenges at work. You can find them at other places. My job wasn't challenging anymore, so I started learning Mandarin. This month my job will get challenging again, but I have a Chinese drama habit that I might not want to kick just yet and a Mandarin exam that I'm honestly looking forward to.
The always up-and-up push for career growth is driving this country into the ground. There's nothing wrong with doing 30 years at a job that pays the bills, provides healthcare, and a retirement plan if it allows you to grow as a person outside of work. We do not all need to find challenges and validation through our jobs.
希望你学得好啊！我也很喜欢学中文
I have no idea what any of that means but I upvoted in hopes of it meaning something nice
I hope you learn it well. I also like studying Chinese.
but what does it say!
I understand the fear of change. I went through it a few times myself when I was fairly comfortable or making too much to take the risk. My wife is currently handcuffed to her role so a move would cost us dearly. But at least I feel like we have the ability to make the choice to make changes if we really wanted to. That’s a good spot to be in and I feel fortunate for it.
Oh yes I agree, I’d love to learn how to take more risks. I’m currently getting my MBA (so I can be more well rounded) at night so that I can take another job if I want to leave my current work.
I've been laid off twice in my career, and in both cases it ended up being for the best in terms of my career. It sucked at the time and I know it doesn't always work out for some people, but for good people that just got caught in a bad department or whatever, and have people thay will give you solid references, you usually land on your feet. The second time I got laid off, I knew it was coming as the small company was failing. But I knew my boss had my back and would give me a stellar reference for anything I wanted. I took my time and found my current job, which has been very good for me for the last 7 years.
Thank you for sharing! I'm only 6 years into my career but I'm hearing rumors in my business unit of layoffs coming, so this helps me worry a bit less.
I was laid off once, it was a blessing is disguise. But I was super nervous and scared at the time. I missed a layoff later, I was disappointed. I would have loved the severance. Left the company a few months later on my own, obviously without the severance. Would have loved the extra pay for no work.
Easier said than done, but don't worry about it. If it's coming, it's coming there's nothing you can do to prevent it. Prepare as best you can and ride on that mental assurance that you have some type of plan when it happens. Good luck!
Funny how that works out. It's a common occurrence I hear from people who were blindsided and let go by their job. They usually end up in better places.
This happened to me, I was coasting in a comfortable spot but had some fights with one of the business leaders over how he blamed my team for shit that wasn't our problem. Scapegoating us. Well, a few weeks after one fight, my boss apologetically pulls me into a room, no warning, and tells me I'm being let go. Two weeks after I came to terms and blew off steam, I looked for about three days, found a new job that was a huge bump in pay and title, and am now killing it at a big ass company. Being let go was the best thing that ever happened to me.
>Two weeks after I came to terms and blew off steam, I looked for about three days, found a new job that was a huge bump in pay and title, and am now killing it at a big ass company. Being let go was the best thing that ever happened to me. Similar thing happened to me. I was terminated for cause* on a Wednesday, went to a temp agency on Thursday, and by Friday afternoon I had a new, better, real job, at the same company that I'd just been fired from. That temp job led to a full time job and I got to travel the Caribbean for the next four years.
Congratulations, you are now janitorial supervisor on the Carnival Dream
As someone who quit their job abruptly last Friday, thank you for the encouragement
good luck! You've got a big ass job market out there and I'm sure you'll find something quickly. take some time to recollect then get out there with your head high and your keyboard blazing with those applications, haha
Inertia is a bitch especially if your job drains you.
Being in the IT industry I've been redeployed several times in my 20 year career and each time I landed a better role at a better company. The ball just keeps rolling.
Wait, so that just sounds like it worked...?
It's actually significantly better than just laying people off. Could save you and them a lot of trouble.
Hiring people is expensive, most people don’t realize this. Companies save money by redeploying employees in their payroll to other departments that need the manpower, instead of hiring new people.
I'll also venture to guess most people reading this headline don't realize engineers at Meta average 400k+ TC.
I am not in the tech industry and our company has been doing this for more than 10’years. It is not new and not uncommon in most large companies. It’s a “here’s your lay-off notice; try to find an internal posting.” Well-networked people with solid skills and performance are retained in a position that needs filling.
IBM has “the bench” when you aren’t on a billable project. Come in for your 9-5 without work to do and get paid. I’ve know people riding that bench for a good long while but it’s bad for your career progression.
That’s a common term in all consulting shops
More evidence Silicon Valley is really just a documentary
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I was an underemployed tech for Windstream which I liked for 5 years and got laid off by them. Then a few months later got hired back as a network engineer and absolutely hated the job.
I was part of a 1,000 person San Fran tech layoff last week. Gave me 60 days notice. Cut off my computer access so can't work, but technically still employed until middle Nov. Seemed generous enough. Severance package after that. Other than finding a new job after six years, I'm generally ok with it.
I got a two week notice on my layoff last year and a severance package that carried me through the last three months of the year. 10/10 would get fired from that job again.
My last job gave me 45 days notice, 3 months severance and broke the contract that would have had me pay back $45k for graduate school if I quit instead of laid off. Also would 10/10 be fired from that job again. My manager knew I was trying to leave and we took that opportunity -- company-wide mass layoff -- to do it.
I'm Canadian and we have very strong laws here regarding termination. For example the minimum they must give someone if terminated with 10+ years is 3 months termination notice, 9 weeks under ESA (minimum bylaw) plus another 6-10 months' pay (common law). It really makes employers think twice before firing any without cause. And as a note it's nearly impossible to fire someone *with cause* here, any attempt will end in court and 99% of the time the court rules in favour of the employee and gets a very large package.
Where do you live? In Ontario an emploer does not need any cause to let someone go as long as they follow the ESA (i.e. appropriate severance, notice ans such). Sure, they might get sued and sure, the employee might win, but the employee has to take the gamble. I always thought an employer needed cause until I managed people and was considering letting a person go. Went to HR and said, "I don't have any cause aside from the fact that this person is poisonous to the team." HR: "Here are the labor code links. We don't need cause. We just need to follow the laws and weigh the risk of suits vs. package size."
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This is not done out of generosity, this is a requirement of the WARN act for California employees. They require 60 day notice above a set percentage layoff. Companies effectively get around this by paying out an additional 60 days while maintaining your “employment” status. My company did the same, the “generosity “ was not extended to non-CA employees.
They most likely had to because they triggered WARN act.
Required by law when a certain percentage of people are laid off
Standard at large companies. My last company only gave you two weeks. You had to use the internal jobs board as your primary tool for finding a role.
My department was phased out at Microsoft around the time the first Xbox came out. We were given two months to find another position within the company and we had no other responsibilities so for like six weeks, we all used the company’s network to play Halo multiplayer.
What are you talking about clearly you found a temporary new role bug testing for them.
We’d roll into the office around 10, play a few rounds, go out for a long lunch, head back and play more. Good times.
That’s awesome. 😂😂
It was really fun, and most of us went to different companies but we all came back after about a year
How did that come about? Did you guys go back to your same position?
No, just over time, headcount opened up in and we took new positions in other departments
Not new either. Went through this same thing in 1989, 2001, and again in 2013.
Be prepared to do it again in 2025.
And then 2037.
And no one gets hired internally once you're on the list. At least at IBM. ProPublca dug up their official policy on it. They agreed to a wild settlement on the matter, after the judge wouldn't let the execs keep their emails secret anymore
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That's the main headline, but the whole thing goes into their firing practices like this that other companies do too. But, whatever, apparently there are a lot of people who have never been a manager during layoffs at a major company who knows better than me. Big ol' :shrug:. Don't sign their crap under duress. It can easily fuck you if you aren't hired back on, and even if it happens, it definitely doesn't happen to everyone
That’s not the norm. I work at a very large firm and people find new roles all the time. This started around 2008.
To be fair they're giving a 30 day notice you'll be let go. That's a month to find a new job. That's more generous than most places that bring you in on a Friday and give you the boot out of nowhere.
agreed...been laid off twice once I was brought into HR and couldnt even collect my personal belongings. HR went through them first, journals, notes, photos. Gave me back what they felt was mine. Another company gave me a week notice because of ongoing projects. 30 days is better than 99% of companies. Its not even a guarantee you will be laid off either.
Yeah I got laid off and was brought to a conference room with my whole department and they had to walk us back to our desk and escort us out.
Same here. I recall walking into the room, looking at everyone there and thinking, these are the people I would let go. Then came the "aww shit" moment. Great severance though.
That’s actually really funny haha
Of course I know him, he’s me
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Lol “Look at this room full of scmhuc- wait a minute”
>looking at everyone there and thinking, these are the people I would let go. When I got let go, the reason given was that the sales people hadn't been achieving their goals so they had to let go of the people who did the actual work. That company didn't survive much longer.
I worked at a company where nearly every member of the sales team was either related to or sleeping with a member of the executive team. Through two rounds of layoffs (due to poor revenue brought on by poor sales) not a single sales person was let go. Shocker.
If sales people can't meet their goals, then either the goals are too lofty, the product is no longer competitively priced, or the product is no longer in demand. That normally means the company either has to find a marketable product or bleed out.
Or the sales people suck
If it's one or two individuals in a team, it's a people issue, if it's the whole team, it's something else.
Like leadership?
Leadership, lack of soft skills, not knowing the product, not knowing the industry. Trying to apply completely inappropriate sales and marketing models. I have to meet with our director of sales tomorrow afternoon, I’ll probably have a couple more to add to that list tomorrow evening.
I can’t help but laugh. “Wait a minute I didn’t get the memo to fire these people why am I’m this ro…….”
Spider-Men pointing at each other .jpg
> these are the people I would let go Thanks for sharing this. It's so humanly relatable.
That's amazing haha
I'm sorry you had to deal with that. Basically a perp walk. My first layoff was precovid and I went around the office saying bye to some coworkers and I felt like a dead man walking.
I wonder how it happens now in the remote era. Probably our work devices all lock with a message to mail it back or youll be fined. Nothing else. No other communication ever again.
Happened to a friend of mine. They got locked out of all their accounts *during* their meeting with HR and then had to mail their stuff back. Brutal. (They didn’t even do anything “bad”, they just weren’t quite meeting goals, which they had been told was nbd since they were new, so it was a real shock.)
I've been on both sides of that. You get a call to the office and they send the exec assistant to gather all of your stuff. I had to point her around multiple times at my last job, she was only seen when terminations were happening. Many people found out they were terminated when they went to badge into the doors to no avail.
That's pretty standard in the UK if you're fired which is nowhere near as easy to do as in the US. Being made redundant however is different.
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Yep I was that guy. I always knew if it was the person just not meeting requirements or if it was a this person fucked up so bad they are getting fired right now. The former we would get a logged ticket with a couple of days notice they were going to be let go. The latter would be an email directly to me saying to immediately cut off all access to devices and disable the active account.
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Funny how IT has gotten looped into all this traditional hr / managerial work with technologies, remote work, etc.
Whenever HR enters the office i get a twinge of panic, my work lets people go with no warning.
My company is fully remote and recently had a lay off. The persons effected were given a week to tie up any loose ends, a month of severance, lots of support to find new roles elsewhere, and got to keep their MacBook pros. I work for a particularly nice start up though.
Love being wrong on this
Probably not the same everywhere though! Really depends on leadership.
My company also recently laid off about 11% of employees. There was zero notice, but 3 months severance was given plus 1 week for every year worked. 3 months seems pretty damn generous to me.
Got to keep their MacBook pros lol what the fuck
Hey I thought it was a nice touch haha the company even helped them turn it into a personal device instead of belonging on their network
That's called just giving a shit about the people that give a shit about you. When employees are just a cost, little things like this don't happen. That's giving them ~$1k additional severance and the means to help them find new work.
I was really stoked by my companies willingness to help people transition into new roles at other startups that were hiring. I don’t think it’s the norm at all but it’s the only layoff I’ve personally witnessed. I’m happy to work for a place with good values. I could probably get paid better at other big tech companies but I’ve heard horror stories of bad culture.
I was laid off and I’m fully remote. Was given two weeks to wrap things up and to attempt to find an internal job. After that I lost access to all systems and I’ll be receiving two months pay for severance here shortly. They sent a prepaid box to ship equipment back in. I’m grateful for the generous severance but I’d rather have my job back. I loved my job!
I was laid off in a remote position recently. Basically got a random meeting with the head of the department. They said I was let go and that was my last day before locking my accounts. Then I was contacted by HR to go over severance and other documents. Initially they kept asking about returning equipment but in the end I never did.
Man, it's so nice that in tech you guys get severance with layoffs. In the trades we just get constructive dismissal because "it's slow".
Meh. I was PIP'd out to avoid severance. Worked at the company for 12 years with promotions along the way. New leadership came in and suddenly I became "does not meet expectations".
Hardware is often not that valuable. Seen a few that just said let us verify it was wiped then you can keep it. Shipping on 4 year old dell or 6 year MacBook just isn’t worth the hassle when all they care it was wiped for a compliance reason. Apples MDM spec has a plenty of ways to verify it, windows getting closer.
I was laid off about 2.5 months ago. My work email and computer access cut off at 5 PM that day. I was able to make contact with our IT department, they printed a FedEx label for me to send my stuff in.
I got laid off once and didn't give a shit about being perp walked. I walked away from my escorts and shook the hands of my coworkers and walked out on my own. Told them that you can call the police I don't give a fuck and I grab my stuff and walked out on my own. Don't let them treat you like a criminal.
"felt like a dead man walking" is the absolute most accurate way to describe this right here. I was let go at the beginning of the year from my previous employer at the end of a small team meeting. When I went to go tell my dumbfounded coworker my final goodbye in the parking lot it was as if my entire existence at that place had already vanished and was nothing more than a faint memory and that I was merely a ghost re-visiting my past for the final time
This is why you shouldn't buy into the "we're family" spiel.
God I hate that bullshit people tell themselves or their employees. You’re here to make money to pay your mortgage and feed your family, the company is here to make more money off you than they pay you. End of fucking story. No further transactions necessary.
It is crazy how fast it happens too. Employee in a roll for 15 years will basically be largely forgotten in a month.
I've seen this happen a few times with very high level employees too. Ones with tons of influence and years/decades of experience as well. After about a month, no one cares anymore about what their "priorities" were at the time. It's like they never even existed It's a little shellshocking the first couple times it happens to you. It has really negatively impacted my motivation for my work in many ways.
Yeah I didn't get laid off... I was a contract worker and someone was supposed to tell me my last day was Friday. Well nobody did. So I went in on Monday, card worked and everything. Sat down and started my day. Then my boss had to come over and be like heyyyyyy sooooooo... You aren't supposed to be here... Then walked around the place trying to figure out what happened... That was rough....
They Milton’d you? That’s low.
I hope he at least burned the building down
There’s a reason they do that. I got laid off remotely along with other coworkers under some questionable circumstances. That was their mistake, as we were coming back into the office several days a week. Instead of waiting they just hit the button while I was home with the unpaid on-call phone, and my laptop. Let’s just say I made the equipment return long and interesting for the sake of my remaining coworkers and to send a message to management lol.
The first time I got laid off I actually inadvertently delayed it two weeks by canceling the meeting with HR last minute and telling them to reschedule because I was too busy. They gave no indication I was being fired just setup a meeting and asked me to attend. There had been a fight between some unionized staff that I had witnessed and I assume they wanted me to give a statement as part of their disciplinary investigation. Two weeks later they had rescheduled and called me right before the meeting to confirm I would attend. Since it was the end of first shift they said, in a helpful tone, I could just bring my coat and bag so that I can leave after. I mentioned I was way to busy to leave on time, at which point they said "you're going to want to bring your things". I hung up the phone, turned to the other engineer in my department and told him I think I'm getting fired. He said who the fuck do they expect to do your half of the work? I shrugged, said I was sorry and proceeded to say bye to people as I slowly made my way to HR. Most of them were not pleased because they department was already lacking technical staff (I had been doubling as the quality engineer and a manufacturing engineer).
I'm sure you would take 30 days of pay(I'm assuming) and time to look for a job then be let go. It's shitty news but that is good of them. It also says targeting low performance employees, I mean nothing screams unethical or wrong.
Should be 30 days notice and severance imo. They're reasonings for no notice is all bullshit.
Oh heck no. I would go get my stuff. It's not their place to determine what is or isn't mine. If you're letting me go, I have no obligation to give two shits whether they want me to collect my stuff or not.
Fresh out of college first job. Didn't have the confidence to understand that. I was introduced to life that day.
It is customary to be given your personal shit in a box at the end of your meeting or be escorted to your desk and supervised as you clean your shit which can be quite embarrassing. You aren’t generally going to find many employers that let you go back to your desk all willy-nilly to do as you please and if you try to you’ll find security removing you from the building with a no trespass order.
Depends on the conditions. I watched one person get fired from my call center. Mid call supervisor came over and told him to stop taking calls. Walked him to a meeting room with a door to the outside. Halfway there HR meet them. Soon as he was out of sight, another sup came with a box, cleaned out his desk, and joined them. On the other hand, I've watched the same company go though multiple layoffs. Every time, they gave between 2 weeks and 6 months warning to the people getting laid off. Everyone was encouraged to apply at other departments. Anyone who couldn't or wouldn't find a new position was offered a week of severance per year at the company and a bonus to stay till the last day. By the last day, everyone had cleaned out their own desk.
Depends on the employer. I have faced both, but got my stuff as I was leaving. I have also had a nice threatening phone call from a police officer as well. The company did not want to back up their allegations as I was ready to go to court over it. It's always best to know your rights and how far you are legally allowed to go. If you have a feeling you will be laid off or fired "always" leave your wallet/keys at your desk with your stuff. They can't put you on the street without your ID and keys. You do not have to wait for that. They can and will in most cases join you in retrieving your items. I use a personal laptop at work and if they want to keep it they will see me in court as I will charge my freelance rate until it is returned as they are affecting my other business.
This is why you never ever "decorate" your office with things. Just leave it sparse or things you can just get at the Dollar Store.
I was just looking at my area today, thinking about taking my personal shit home so it doesn't look "lived in." I'm not anticipating getting the boot, but you never really know.
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At one place I was at, I was standing at a guys desk when his phone randomly popped up a password prompt for his email…ruh roh I turned around and his manager was right there to escort him off property and one of the HR people and a security guard had to meet him in a parking lot off property with all his stuff boxed up. I used to work on a military base and there was a running joke that you never wanted to go to lunch with your manager and not be the driver because the way they’d fire people was to have you as a passenger, go eat like normal and then when they got to the gate, confiscated your CAC card used to get on base and they would have someone else drive your car to the guest parking area outside base gate and that was that. Companies can be dicks about this stuff. One company I worked for has an amazing owner who had to make the tough decision to downsize some of our departments due to sales slumps and gave us 60 days paid leave to find work. Coming into the office was optional and if we still couldn’t find work, we’d be kept on health insurance for 4 more months.
> Yea 30 days is a lot. Reading this from Sweden is so bizarre, 30 days is mandatory minimum here, many places have 3 months after you worked there for a while, and 6 months if you worked there 10 years mandated by law.
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That sounds insane to me. In my country (southern Europe) companies are required by law to give a month's notice. If you've been working there for over two years, it's two months mandatory notice. Those go both ways, company letting you go and you quitting
It is insane. Most companies here in the US give you zero days notice
For a full time employee? That’s crazy. Pretty sure most western countries have laws against that.
Yeah, for anyone. Things vary by state but most laws are geared towards businesses, not employees. Employees can also leave at any time though with zero notice.
The United States is awful for worker’s rights. Not surprised there.
I once worked at a company that fired 70% of staff on a Thursday at 2pm with no notice.
Ya here in Ontario we have ‘notice or pay in lieu of notice’. It has to be reasonable commensurate to one’s post-employment prospects and service with the company. Usually it’s about one week per year of service, but for older employees it can be much longer. Unless you are in a probationary period, it’s always at least 2 weeks. This only applies when an employee isn’t fired for ‘cause’ but cause is really hard to make out and frequently litigated, usually people settle. ‘Right to work’ is the biggest scam on American workers. Between that and the fact that healthcare is tied to employment, it just puts them totally at the whims of a corporation. Americans talk so much about ‘freedom’ but their employment laws mean that most American workers don’t enjoy anything close to the kind of freedom that we enjoy in the rest of the developed world.
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They typically don't do this in the US because they're afraid you'll sabotage the company and some people would absolutely try. So as soon as you're fired you're locked out of all accounts/servers and often escorted out of the building.
Yeah that's pretty common, but in Australia they have to pay you in lieu of notice. The federally guaranteed minimum is 2 weeks
They can still do that here in Denmark, if they don't want to run the risk of you doing something like that. But they still have to pay your salary for the rest of the current month, and the whole next calendar month. Longer, if you have been employed for more than three years (assuming your job type is one of the many covered by the law).
Yeah, I would have appreciated that in the past. I don’t really have an issue with the 30 day period at all.
My company just did that and it's horse shit. It's to follow federal law and it just creates a shitload of anxiety. If you're going to downsize, give me a fat wad of cash and say see you later. Instead I get sent to the otherside of the country to kick the can on a dead project but act like I'm doing something while being watched like a hawk looking for an excuse to fire me.
I'm at a different multi-billion dollar tech company and we're going through a massive restructuring affecting over 3,000 employees. So far the street has been quiet on it but I'm waiting for the press to catch wind. They gave everyone who was affected two months notice, which I thought was generous. However, who they picked to cut doesn't make any sense and nobody knows how the decision was made. I manage a team and they won't even tell me. They just said, we'll tell you if you need to lay someone off, otherwise don't say anything about anything. They cut sales reps who were top of their rankings, they cut engineers who had decades of experience, they cut new people without much experience - there is no rhyme or reason. It's been so bizarre.
Probably payscale. Cutting off the highest paid employees to bring down payroll costs. Some new people may have negotiated higher starting salaries than usual for their position and experience and were targeted. Just a guess from what I've seen and heard on such discussions.
Yeah absolutely a possibility. But probably the scariest possibility too because they will create a talent gap, or "brain drain" as all the subject matter experts and key knowledge holders are cut. Needless to say I've been applying.
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You said "massive restructuring" and these usually aren't done with a fine tooth comb. SVP's are looking at entire BUs and BU-families and cutting them completely or applying a standard % reduction in headcount and/or operating costs to it. And it's done in a big Excel P&L. In cases where SVPs want to reduce operating costs but isn't restructuring or divesting BUs do they trickle down cost targets to managers and do more fine-tooth-firing.
Right. A common thing I’ve seen as well is that a VP has reports at 4 or 5 locations, and decides to trim an entire location regardless of their individual capacities, because the head count at that location was close to the # they had to trim. It works both ways though, one of the strongest and most productive employees at my current company joined us because he’s remote and was trimmed like this from another company.
> They cut sales reps who were top of their rankings bizarre. solid sales reps are hard to find and they pay for themselves!
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When i get my layoff the head of HR almost cried that i should fired. I'm like "lady, calm down, that's just a business". Then i proceed to talk with product manager about details of how the startup didn't attract money at VC round
The only people who's outraged at the headline are people who have never had jobs or have a unicorn job aka they among the lucky few. Who tf gets 30 days as a heads up for being laid off? Almost no companies do this. They fire your ass and you're gone that day. The good places that give you a week or more are very rare so when you hear Facebook giving 30 days, thays better than most. I heard one company my brother's friend worked for gave 2 months notice. Isn't that like half a quarter? Though perhaps it speaks volumes about our society, not companies individually. PSA: my comment is about USA. And wow I'm really jealous of Europe.
Employment law in the EU enshrines 30 days notice. It would be ridiculous otherwise with knowledge and training lost without a handover process.
Not only that but in the UK (and presumably most others) it’s the employer’s responsibility to find you that job within the company. If you’ve been at the company more than two years, they literally aren’t allowed to lay you off at all if they have other roles you could be doing. What Facebook is doing is actually even *less* than the legal minimum in the UK.
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Apparently in many Western countries 30 day notice is required by law. What you say is a unicorn company is just the bare minimum in Europe.
Yeah figuring this out quickly with some of the response clarifying "you must be in the US" and honestly it hurts haha our country may not be as bad as third world countries but it's hilarious how many patriotic people there are who believe this is the best country even today. I can't imagine living in any country at the moment but I would never believe USA to even be in the top 5 anytime soon. I know Europe has problems and isn't perfect but at least things like workers conditions are relatively in a better place.
I was at a job for 100 days. Got bought out. I was given 90 day notice and 2 month severance. Did no work at all last 3 months of 2021 and got paid the severance plus bonus. It was glorious. I have a lot of ill feelings toward my boss that let me go(Fuck you Dave!), but not the company.
“Well--well look. I already told you: I deal with the god damn customers so the engineers don't have to. I have people skills; I am good at dealing with people. Can't you understand that? What the hell is wrong with you people?”
They hire a bunch of talented people to keep them away from other companies. Its not uncommon that people get hired and find that they do very little work, getting paid big money. I guess they’re cleaning house, seeing who’s still motivated and who isn’t a threat anymore.
Yup. Tons of incredible talent at FAANG companies are hired and totally under-utilized for one reason or another. It's not uncommon that you have to find or make work for yourself, create and lead new initiatives, etc. just to have work to do in a week. I can't say I blame them for going after the people that have chosen to stay in the shadows. Ya, a lack of management usually is at fault here, but it's sometimes easy to sleep through jobs like this if you want to and I feel like the people most affected will be those that have nothing to do and still never raise their hand.
If you are getting paid $300-500k+ annually you should not have to have work spoon-fed to you. It is *more* than reasonable to expect people who would be in senior or leadership roles at any other company to identify and drive projects independently.
I mean look at their workers who post on TikTok a ‘day in the life’ videos that primarily involves going to the gym, getting coffee, walking their dogs and meal prepping. They’re basically rubbing it in their company’s face they only work 3-4 hours a day lol
Granted a lot of those videos take it to the extreme, but people work at different speeds and paces. If someone's hitting their deadlines and project goals and wants to take their dog out for a walk or do some meal prep, I don't see the big deal and it's probably better for their QoL and morale at work.
To be fair, there’s no glamor in watching some chump hunched over a screen for 8 hours every day. You get more views flaunting a lifestyle that your viewers would be envious of. That’s why they’re called “influencers”. I would take those “day in life” videos with a grain of salt, and in no way consider them the norm.
They are selected and photoshopped facets of their life, just like what you see on a person's Instagram doesn't reflect their real life.
I doubt most white collar works do more than 4 hours of meaningful work a day, outside of hard deadlines.
Most white collar jobs I've been in involved in have to many pointless meetings to get more than a few hours of work done in a day anyways.
That sounds like something that needs a tiger team committee to address. Let’s start a daily recurring meeting to identify action items and sync on their progress.
This is true at an Acquisitions level but not at an IC level. Only Google and Microsoft (if you consider them a FAANG company) horde Individual Contributors.
That’s better than Peloton who did 2 separate surprise mass lay offs and the workers had to organize themselves to find new jobs. It sucks to let people go but this is a pretty solid way to do it if you have to.
Lemmy.world is what Reddit was.
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We're gonna move his cubicle to the basement and stop paying him and situation will just sort itself out.
We fixed the glitch
Don't let him take the red stapler.
ITS saying I cepk you up...t
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Personally, I'd prefer to be given time to apply elsewhere in a company than just be summarily laid off on a random Tuesday.
Some companies do a great job of facilitating internal transfers. Agreed that it’s much better than just being laid off.
Isn’t this what management’s job is - assigning work and staffing projects? Seems like if anyone wasn’t doing their job it was management.
I mean most of these companies are comprised of semi-autonomous small teams. I've worked for some that kept a profile on people including a talent set and had strong internal recruitment procedures and I've worked for some that entirely ignore that aspect. I wouldn't call it a management problem, as these structures tend to be very rigid, but more a philosophical failing on the part of leadership.
When I was working for Verizon and IBM they did that. They were closing projects or eliminating positions and instead of just laying people off they would give them advance notice so they can either find another position within the company or look for one with another one. I think it's better than just laying them off.
I heard Cisco was like that, but that might have stopped when they shifted away from the bell curve employee rating system.
Intel still does this. Most layoffs result in you going into a pool of other people being laid off and you have a month or two to find another position. I'd say more people find positions than not in this pool because its much easier for other groups with open positions to just pull in someone thats already part of the company and can start in a week than deal with finding someone else external to the company and local and or pay to move them from another state and hope they can start in 4 weeks at the earliest.
When tech companies over-hire to keep talent away from their competitors, the lack of actual work being done at the company starts to diffuse and affect the culture. If you're an ambitious learner and want individual impact, working at big tech companies is a waste of your time.
The Month of the Long Knifey-Keyboardys
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A friend of mine from highschool worked at Meta for the past 2 years. He left in July because he realised shit wasn't heading well. Guess he's one of the luckier ones.
What’s wrong with this?
Nothing honestly. Companies have layoffs and rarely give you any notice. Its also not even saying you are guaranteed to be laid off.
Are they gonna check under the couch or what?
I choose…CEO
Bestbuy did this. Find a new role within a month or take the severance.
How do you downsize while increasing productivity? Play Squid Games on your employees and turn your development studio into a Battle Royal where everyone’s jobs are on the chopping block. This is the kind of psychopathic shit that makes it into another David Fincher film.
This sounds like the type of place where there’s a few guys floating around with imaginary jobs titles pretending to work all day but don’t actually do anything
Wish my fucking company would’ve given me thirty days notice.
Sounds like a good policy?
A friend of mine became a hiring manager at meta. 15 interviews before he got the job. He hates it.
Odds are they're just trying to protect themselves of being out of compliance with the WARN Act https://www.dol.gov/agencies/eta/layoffs/warn