Ask HN: Laid off today for the first time, anything to be wary of? Advice?
Hello HN, posting under a throwaway since I've been around for quite a while.
Long story short, I got laid off this morning for the first time ever (without cause). The reason for the termination was cited as an internal re-org. Truth be told I was planning on quitting at 3pm during my bi-weekly one-on-one with the CTO, so I'm taking it in stride/happy.
I've worked here just under a year. The company is paying me 4 weeks salary as severance, with medical benefits ending 1 week after pay ends. This is contigent upon my signing a release which essentially ensures I maintain confidentiality and prevents me about the company publicly, due one week today.
Just posting to ask if there's anything I should be wary of, and if there's any advice from people who've been through a similar situation, thanks!
94 comments
[ 0.18 ms ] story [ 165 ms ] threadThey make you sign a paper that says you resigned, so you can't claim unemployment, but the severance sounds better than unemployment since you were leaving anyway. Negotiate that severance, too...they offered me 4 weeks at first but I asked for 2 more and got it.
So it makes sense that a company might want to discourage people from claiming unemployment because it could effect their longer term costs where as a severance is a one time thing and giving a good reference to a potential new employer is free.
http://www.edd.ca.gov/pdf_pub_ctr/de231z.pdf
Unless you will be starting a new job in two weeks, why would you forgo 26 weeks of 50% of your income in exchange for 4-6 weeks of 100%. The math just doesn't work.
Making a counter offer can be taken as a refusal of their offer of severance.
Companies can't just not offer you severance if they make a habit of it so they may take advantage of being able to deny you the option.
I am not a lawyer but I know people who have lost their option of a severance simply by trying to negotiate for a better offer.
2. Reach out to as many people as possible, preferably people outside the company. Most people from the company won't help you and even if they did, they just remind you of the company again, what happened and this brings you again to a bad state and you need to start at zero and reframe again. Just let them go, all of them, really. So, look for prior peers, old friends. Further, write applications or just plain emails to many CEOs and tell them that you are out. You don't have to write that you look for a job. Just get into conversations with as many people as possible. It's more about staying connected and keeping a social context (after you lost the one of the company) than finding the next job.
3. Work on a pet project with a technology you always wanted to work with, get into flow and put it online. This will be the most fun and will give you tons of self-confidence in a very short time.
You should spend 30% of your day on 2 and 70% on 3 and 0% on thinking about the past.
Sounds good?
In addition to the personal mental benefits, as a hiring manager, I would look favorably on this. It shows initiative. It shows that you aren't wasting your time between jobs. Should your unemployment extend to a few months or more, if you can show you were doing something useful, that's a huge plus.
Having anything functional will put you ahead of the majority of candidates I see (DC area, enterprise software, so def. not the same market as SV/NorCal or start-ups in general).
Positivity that isn't based on logic is wrong, just like negativity that isn't based on logic is wrong.
It's better to be honest with yourself about any given situation. Accept what you could have done better at without feeling inadequate. Recognize what you did well at without feeling complacent. You grow in response to your failures, not your successes.
Recognize what was good about the job and what you'll miss, so you can factor it into your next search. And obviously avoid the bad parts. If making yourself believe the job was only bad in an effort to save face and stay positive leads you to seek out the opposite, that's likely counter-productive.
These situations are rarely black and white. Everyone has a combination of failures/micro-failures, successes/micro-successes at every job whether they get fired/laid off or not. So there's plenty of logic to refraining from beating yourself up. Seeing a situation clearly and learning lessons from it happens more easily in hindsight than when you're stuck in it. So there's a lot of value in thinking about the past, if it's for the right reasons.
Staying dispassionate is more important than staying positive.
Why:
- You don't have the time and the energy to do so; the risk of getting depressed or apathetic in such situations is quite high (once you are depressed you have another problem you don't want and can deal with); so discipline is the most important thing; to stay disciplined you MUST stay positive, 100%; thinking about 'micro-failures' doesn't help your mood; and btw, every situation can be seen positive or negative, you remember when people say the glass is half-full?
- Maybe the OP didn't do anything wrong, how do you want to know? Maybe it was the financial situation of the company, or they changed the product strategy over night or, or, or...; he might never find out the real reason, so any time spent on such thoughts is wasted time he could use for new endeavors
- Maybe in a year he can think back and learn from failures; but you know what, he doesn't have to sit down, think and learn from potential failures now: I am pretty sure that when he faces similar situations in future where he did mistakes in the past, he will remember and will act accordingly and automatically without the need to prepare himself
When things are difficult is the most important time to be starting to build and have access to robust coping skills. Otherwise, when would you?
It's rare in life to get honest and blunt feedback about mistakes and you can either take the opportunity or ignore it. Building up criticism or rejection as such scary things that they have to be faced with denial is just another way of giving them too much weight and letting them control you.
If clinical depression is involved, by all means get professional help and don't get it through HN.
If you don't know them but there is some connection to them or to their company and if it's just that you like their product or brand, just write them. People say that cold mails are bad. I think they are only bad if you could have reached the person via intro. Otherwise they are better than doing nothing. And at the end, it's just a number game.
Re the emails and how they should look like: there is really no right and wrong. The best advice I can give: Just imagine if you were writing a good friend. Then your email will be balanced: not too needy or too formal. Keep it short, tell him who you are, why you write him and suggest a next step.
You got four weeks pay? Then don't work 30% on 2 and 70% on 3. Work at least 30% on 2, and as much more than that as you can usefully do in any given day. Treat it like a job. Don't stop unless there's really nothing more you can do that day. Fill up the remaining time with 3 (don't do make-work on 2).
It's great that you were thinking of leaving anyway. Rejoice that you get the benefits for slightly longer than you would anyway, and move on.
The release you've signed is pretty normal, nothing to really worry about (Unless they've done anything illegal, in which case you're not obliged to adhere to the release but I don't think that's the case).
Just get back on the horse. This happens to the best of us.
But if you have some funds to tide you over I wouldn't recommend jumping onto the first horse you find. Go for some fun pony rides first.
Most people have a list of "minor aspirations" that are constantly deferred due to the pressures of work. Now's a good time to achieve those. Much better than going on vacation, which I believe is a bad idea after a lay-off as your mind constantly replays what has just happened and you come back to the real World having achieved nothing but self-criticism.
They don't have to be World-changing aspirations, just something to achieve on your own schedule. For example I kept reminding myself to schedule time to take photos of some derelict local buildings as I passed them every morning en route to work, but I never found the time and eventually they were demolished and rebuilt as anonymous apartment blocks. I wish I'd taken one morning off work to photograph them.
so true
I agree, it can be a full time job and you should take the job search seriously. BUT it puts you also a very needy state if you are not careful. If you apply 24/7 30 days in a row, I am not sure if you will get that more job offers than if you just spend, let's say 2-4 hours every other day. It's more about being efficient and creating many job opportunities while spending little time on the actual job hunt.
Reason: If you are in a needy state everybody can feel, smell and see that you are needy. Actually, they don't need to see you in person, your voice and the chosen words on a phone call disclose your level of neediness already. If you spend 24/7 for job hunt, you MUST be needy or you will get needy at some point. And who wants to hire a needy guy (who just got fired)? Nobody.
Besides, the activity of applying (writing always the same emails, doing minor tweaks on your CV again and again, doing interviews with HR folks asking about your weaknesses, getting rejections or no responses) is not really fulfilling at all, therefore I suggest in the other answer to spend also some time on personal projects, they give you back your state and let you be perceived less needy.
Polish your resume on the plane.
...but yea, also file for unemployment immediately. Your former employer paid for that safety net.
When a potential employer inquires as to a gap in time on your CV just say you went and did some traveling and "recharged your batteries." It is completely respectable and envious thing. Also you will be glad when you are sitting at your desk at your next job working late that you went out and saw some of the world. Likewise you will also be glad when you are sitting on a beach in Southern Thailand somewhere :)
So, enjoy the time off. But keep an eye on your financials. Don't wait to start collecting unemployment benefits. Don't wait to start planning - whether that means contacting recruiters or planning a pet project - start doing something soon.
On the one hand, you may come back and land a job in two weeks and you might kick yourself for jumping right back in. However, just as possible--and it's easy to get a distorted view from sites like this--the process could take quite a few months. And, if that's the case, you might regret adding a month to the process, especially if events happen in the interim that make finding a job harder for whatever reason.
You absolutely can take some time off and work on projects, go hiking etc. For technical professionals, it's probably not that useful to make direct job hunting an 8 hr. per day task.However, there are advantages to making it a continuous process even if it's only part time. (Also, as someone else mentioned, there may be reasons to make it continuous because of unemployment benefits.)
If one is comfortable financially, I certainly wouldn't say you can't take off on a modest vacation. But it is a bit of a gamble.
Examples: create things (write, program, compose); exercise; meditate; start learning something.
Sleep 8 hours every day. Or whatever is your optimum. But no more and no less.
https://www.amazon.com/War-Art-Through-Creative-Battles/dp/1... -- this book might resonate especially well now.
A couple of years back I resigned from a job in the UK and although I was on good terms with the people I worked with the HR department (inevitably) did their best to try and screw me and having a good lawyer on my side made the process fairly painless as they actually did the negotiation with my former employer and I got 3 months salary and various other benefits.
http://www.expatsoftware.com/articles/2008/05/laid-off-one-t...
It was written by a fellow HNer a few years ago, but still relevant today, IMHO.
Edit: shortened overlong sentence.
1 month for each year served is fairly normal so again, nothing untoward.
Signing a release is also fairly standard. Under these circumstances I would always recommend showing the release to an employment lawyer. For me, peace of mind is worth a couple of hundred dollars but YMMV.
Also, in the UK at least, there are tax breaks on some of the redundancy package so it's worth looking into.
Otherwise, what you do next depends a lot on what your financial situation is. I was made redundant a number of years ago and it worked out great. I was married and had a child at the time but we had enough money for me not to work for a few months. I had a bit of a break, in hindsight I was quite burned out, then got a job at a startup, refreshed and raring to go.
Obviously, it's not always a positive experience but it's not always negative either.
Good luck. Hope things work out.
If the company is offering more compensation and you are ok with the strictures of the paperwork, then it is entirely sensible to sign. However, as I said further up the chain, this is a legal document and it's worth getting a professional opinion.
Obviously, if the document has strictures that you don't want to or can't agree to, then absolutely don't sign. You are definitely not obliged to but the company is then only obliged to provide the legal minimum.
I've heard 1 week per year is common.
I have been with my company for almost 10 years. You're not really suggesting they'd pay me almost a year if they laid me off.
Edit. I'm not suggesting that you'll get paid for 10 months. I have no idea what your company policy is. However, I received a year's salary with the first 30k or so tax free. So it may not surprise you that I was happy to sign the waver.
Saying on a public forum that you wanted to leave anyway was probably unwise btw as it makes it harder to negotiate a decent severance.
Essentially they wanted a major new system built off of a very old, limiting, and opaque tool. I won't go into the details of the tools for confidentiality reasons. Anyways, this meant I had a huge task to do, no one to go to for help, and many top levels within both ours and the client company overseeing and getting stressed over it.
This project was originally scheduled for 2 months, but due to scope creep and a lack of push-back from the PM in charge of this project, they begged for me to continue to help another month, after which they asked me to continue till the end of November after which I would be on my 5 week vacation.
Anyways, the reason I was quitting was partially because of all the frustration, stagnation (no learning opportunity) of working on that system, and because of the main person I have to work with (our product team is ~9 people but this "side" of it is only 3, and 1 is a junior with less experience/know-how).
During my whole time there, this person I had to work with only trained me on the existing system only when he felt like it, but only ever scratching the surface. Any further questions about this unfamiliar domain (very niche service for extremely niche work) that I was unfamiliar with and unable to learn from anywhere else was met with "I'm busy.", occasionally followed by expletives and heavy sighing. Often times this person would also get incredibly passive aggressive. Long story short, it was very stressful working with this person and the general environment at the company is very heads-down, hard working, so virtually no other social interaction was ever had (or very rare).
Be sure to get lots of exercise and sunlight. I'm serious you have be very careful about slipping into depression.
Make sure that you sign up for unemployment compensation immediately--sign up before you need it. If you're in the US, there's (often?) a waiting-week period you won't be compensated for; if you sign up immediately, you can get that out of the way first thing. Good luck!
I would recommend checking the box to take the taxes out when submitting your forms. Or however they have it set up online now.
I second the other suggestions about letting it be known that you're available for hire. I assume that you might have already been putting out feelers since you were planning on quitting anyway.
I was wrong. It is drop dead easy. Do it before all else, it is why you have been paying for that insurance.
I was only unemployed a month and a half but it still would have been nice to collect since I'd been paying into it.
That said, I like the question, I have never been laid off or terminated, I've resigned from all 4 jobs I've had (employed at the 5th) and so I'm reading other answers to see if there are real issues to be aware of should it happen to me.
Don't cave to the temptation of making an ass of yourself. You never know when you might run into someone in a future job.
They'll likely make you sign some papers for the 1 month severance. Pay attention. Sometimes there are unsavory clauses, like non-competes, non-disclosure, etc. It would be helpful to know where you are located. If you're in California, for example, you can sign a non-compete without reservation, as they are largely unenforceable.
>any advice from people
Was it a really large layoff? Sometimes, there's opportunity there. Often, some of the key people already smell blood in the water, and are thinking of either jumping ship to a competitor, or even starting up their own competitor. If you know any of the key folks that might b e planning this sort of thing, invite them out to lunch a week or two after the layoff and probe around a bit...you might find a place to land.
I was laid off from a firm that forced everyone to sign a non-disparagement of the CEO and company. For me, about $2000 was at stake. I was debating turning down the money but, after checking with lawyer friends, they also mentioned the lack of enforceability of those particular type of things (non-competes might be different). So I happily signed it and cashed the check.
* no admissions
* further claims (agree to not make claims against the Releasees)
* indemnity for taxes
* no denigration or defamation
* non-disclosure
* confidentiality
I don't believe it was a large layoff, in fact, I'm not sure if anyone else got hit. The reason was cited as an internal re-org, where the group of developers I belong to went under a different person within the company. I suspect it may have to do with the fact my options vest in about 2~3 weeks.
OK, that's a whole different kettle of fish. You may want to talk to a lawyer before signing, because if you sign, you most likely sign away your right to sue for the options. (On the other hand, you may not have any case for suing for the options anyway. And your expectation value of what you would get from the options, times the probability of winning them, may be lower than the cost of talking to a lawyer for an hour...)
From looking at people's LinkedIn profile, everyone from developers, to managers, to the L1, and L2 tech support staff had better jobs within a month. Once recruiters got a whiff of the company being in trouble, they started contacting people. Don't ignore recruiters. I have 15 recruiting contacts from different companies in my contact list.
I put "laid off" in quotes above because immediately after I was laid off, I did contracting work for one of my company's clients (based on a written agreement they had with the acquiring company). After that contract was over, I spent a day contacting every recruiting company I knew. Three days later, I had a phone screen with a Fortune 10 company, one day after that I had an in person interview. By that evening I had an offer letter. At the time, I was a an experienced developer but a middling .Net developer trying to get into full stack development.
Moral of the story, aggressively reach out to people, recruiters aren't evil, study up on interview prep, and don't be afraid to take chances on going after jobs that you might feel that you are not 100% qualified for. I've conducted about a dozen interviews over the past four years. I don't care if you meet all of the bullet points. I care if you are "smart and gets stuff done." And if you are an aggressive learner.
I was very lucky in that another division in the same company was having a different re-org. and a few jobs opened up, so I applied for, and got another job. Same company, different business unit. Less than ideal, but I count myself lucky. (Although jobs are posted out there, its extremely rare that companies hire or conduct interviews during the holidays!) But the feeling of having been laid off was quite devastating; again especially since I had never gone through something like that.
I think the advice that others have been offering seems pretty good. While my lay off period was extremely short, I myself woke up every morning - as if at any other regular job - and kept searching/applying for jobs. I think that "routine" helped me deal with the whole thing at least emotionally. I also like some advice throughout the comments here about working on a side project. That could help in several ways:
* Keep your mind off the challenges (physical, social, emotional, etc.) associated with finding new employment.
* Maybe it could turn into a little revenue on the side to supplement unemployment, etc.
* Possibly, it could turn into an opportunity to go into business for yourself. Even if it doesn't make you a millionaire, or is short-lived, its still work. Maybe it might pay bills, and you can feel good about putting it on your resume/linkedIn, etc. (In the state of NJ, you are allowed to collect unemployment and still have a part-time side business [1]...But there are caveats and of course I'll disclaimer that I am not a lawyer. So you'll want to seek out professional legal advice if you're considering this.)
* Even if the side project results in no new business, you will have picked up some new skills, or perhaps improved any existing skills. And, if it involves other people - like a meetup - maybe you can get some future business/opportunity contacts - i.e. networking!
The only other advice I can give you: stay positive, and keep yourself busy so as to avoid getting into a negative groove. Good luck!!!
[1] See "Part-Time Corporate Officer/Owner" section on http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/labor/ui/aftrfile/corporate.html
I was laid off last April and my employer gave me a severance package in exchange for a similar confidentiality agreement.
It took me several months but I was able to secure a new job with better benefits but with a lower salary.
Update your profile on LinkedIn. Update your résumé.
Talk to lots of recruiters. If you have friends in the industry, ask them if their companies are hiring.
Just keep pounding away at it and you'll find the right spot.
I am not sure if it works the same way in every state but in mine, we pay for Supplemental Unemployment Insurance (SUI) with every paycheck. You'd file a claim if you had a car accident, so why not file a claim when you lose your job through no fault of your own?
Right, and it's anything but welfare. That is "your" money, you pay into that every week. There's no shame in claiming it when you need to. And the fact that they were laid off rather than quit(as they mentioned doing.) means that they should have no problems getting it.