I’m sick of being laidoff. Got laid off again today, second time in 4 years in a big corporate layoff. Seems I can’t ever find any respite these days. No matter how hard I work or how much I put in, just bound to be laid off and even though I’ve been recognized officially through merit repeatedly, these companies here in the USA just keep laying people off And then passing all the jobs on to India for 3K a year salary…
So disheartening. At this rate I might as well just retire from White collar work and go and learn a trade as a tradesman, completely redo my entire life goals
I’m really sorry you lost your job, again.
I work in healthcare IT and I had to do the layoffs this past year to send the jobs to the Philippines and it was eye opening what their salaries are compared to ours. They are good people there and they are smart and have ambitions just like we do, only for a fraction of the cost. And yes, in one case I had to layoff an entire team regardless of how good they were (they were really good). For them it was just the case that I could find replacements for them in the markets we were looking and if I laid them off then I could layoff fewer in other departments. This was the first time I have been faced with having to do this and it was pretty awful. I take my work really personally and treasure the relationships and I think this whole thing has had a lasting impact on my happiness level. So many times I was fearful that I would be in a position of lying to my teams if asked a direct question, something I would never do. Trying to navigate the whole thing was led to many sleepless nights. I went through exercises where I practiced my responses to potential questions I might be asked as the rumor slowly started churning.
I don’t know why I’m sharing all of this, but it helps me to talk about it. The mid tier management (that’s me) that gets given the marching orders and has to carry it all out suffers a different kind of pain, even if we did keep our jobs. I hope I’m never asked to do it again.
I’m sorry again. Don’t take it too personally is maybe what my winding story and opposing perspective is to mean. I’m sure you are good at what you do.
I have heard several stories like this from my boss who worked at a previous place where he was asked to remove an entire team like you did. He says he will never forget it and is soul crushing. He tried his hardest to cut budgets and even found a few things were he was able to save the money and brought this to upper management where they had to break it to him that it didn’t matter what was saved, that wasn’t the point… people are just names on paper to them and if they decide this is what they want there is pretty much no stopping them. He then said he was there long enough after that where they realized it was an awful mistake and the work you get in return is not nearly as good as the original team you had so they had to hire new people back. It’s a never ending cycle these days.
I also work in IT Healthcare! It’s a brutal industry huh! Thankfully I have been with the same place for 19 years now, but it have witnessed it all. When I started we grew exponentially throwing money at everything, then the owner sold and I got to witness the “no changes expected” followed by everything changing. Then saw partners separate from us completely which was crazy work, and then the boom of covid followed by almost going belly up with massive layoffs for the past 2 years and consolidation of everything basically back to when I started in 2006!
I’m in the situation you’re talking about right now. There’s an upcoming restructuring and on paper, I’ve been able to reposition my teams so there’s no job elimination and I’ve found homes for everyone. I’m actually excited about the plan. But I’ve been around the block enough to know that my plan on paper might not be accepted, and that this is just phase one. The funding to contract externally needs to come from somewhere. Laying off entire teams might be what causes me to finally put my own job on the chopping block to save a few others. I could go back to being a staff dev and it’s potentially not even much of a pay cut. But damn do I love everything else about my job, but mental load of these decisions, even when I know they’re the best ones I could make, is a lot.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Even if it seems insignificant, I know it must’ve been so hard to go through. That trauma is understandable and makes you human. I appreciate you sharing it.
I’ve thought about going into management too. I have 5 years in my industry. I could be manager next. But I’ve never been trained. Idk how to lead. Idk how to report progress, manage projects, delegate, answer questions I don’t have the answers to. Lie to my employees and subordinates as to why they’re average even if they’re exceptional. Meets expectations, everyone gets that. So many new challenges id have to face I’m nervous about.
But then again I could just get laid off again after landing a manager job. Who knows? It’s terrifying thinking about moving up