So today there was a “surprise” round of lay-offs at work. All morning they were picking people off, grabbing them, dropping the news, then escorting them out of the labs.
Our sales have been hit hard by the crumbling US economy, so we had all been kind of worried about something like this. What we weren’t prepared for was the magnitude.
When the smoke cleared, about 1/3 of our group was gone, including two friends of mine. At a site meeting later, our VP got too choked up to even answer questions.
Every person in my position except me was let go. This included two friends of mine. I’m not sure how either is going to handle this - they were both kind of shaky financially before this news.
So I’m pretty depressed. I left messages for them both, but neither has called me back. And tomorrow I have to go back to what will be a depressingly empty lab, and wonder how on earth I’m going to pick up the work of both. And as discouraged as I am, it’s of course much worse for the two of them. This isn’t exactly the friendliest job market.
I’ve gone through rounds of layoffs. It’s a terrible feeling wondering who’s going to get the axe next. Here’s a hug to you to help stop the shakes and to your buddies to help them get through this. Good luck getting through tomorrow.
That’s something I’ll never, ever understand how can it be done when firing someone for reasons other than “the cops came to haul his ass away, with the rest of him attached.” Even in the best-kept lab, with the best documenters ever, people need time to tell those who stay where everything is.
I hope y’all come out of it all right. Please distribute a few more {{{{{{{{{{{{{}}}}}}}}}}}} as needed.
I’ve seen how the layoffs go many times at a smaller company. The salaried contractual people stay and have to cover the jobs they supervised. The rest of the company goes. I’ve worked when about two other non management people besides myself have remained on the job. The management people do have to do all the crap jobs too. The lower people can’t just step in to the highest jobs for the most part.
And I’ve seen cases where management was slashed. It was all the rage in the 1980s to cut out middle managers when you laid off. And I’ve yet to see a layoff in my currently company that didn’t involve letting go a VP or two.
