Ask HN: Have you been affected by layoffs?
Hello,
1. Have you ever been laid off from a job for reasons that were not related to your performance?
2. Did this affect your job search / career afterwards?
3. Do you feel that being laid off from a job prevented you from recovering due to social stigma around being under / unemployed?
Context:
Yesterday I made a comment about layoffs, corporate ethics and the behavior of C-level folks as it affects the working population. I respect the comment I made wasn't helpful, but I do think there is a meaningful conversation to be had about the topic. I hope this can lead to more constructive criticism about the actual subject, which is how layoffs affect people beyond the job they are immediately losing.
121 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 459 ms ] threadWhen I’ve talked to long term unemployed people in the past, I tend to find their perception of the effort involved is not what it ought to be. Specifically, I hear about how they can’t find the right job, or that they’re only applying to a handful of positions.
What they seem to not understand is the numbers game involved. Applying thoughtfully to ~10 jobs a day is extremely doable, and is the kind of effort that a person may need to put in to quickly find another job. Hundreds upon hundreds of positions over a month will almost invariably result in an offer and if it doesn’t, you need coaching to figure out what you’re doing wrong.
It’s hard to find a job yes, but it’s a kind of hard that responds well to additional effort.
From my experience, there tends to be something holding the chronically unemployed back that is blindingly obvious to everyone else, but that the unemployed person either doesn’t want to see or can’t.
This is true in my experience as well. The only exception I can think of was a very smart guy (Phd) who had severe autism and really struggled to speak with other people. It's just hard for him to make that conversion even though he is well aware.
Besides shear numbers, they only look in obvious places. The worst case is people only applying to listings on big sites for remote jobs.
2 Yes, positively. I found a better job within a few months
3 Absolutely not. Imo, getting laid off doesn't come with a big social stigma. Professionally - yea, I sugarcoated it for recruiters. But everybody else treated it like I broke my leg: an unfortunate, mostly random occurrence, after which I may need some help.
Edit to add, for context: I got laid off from a pivoting startup in a hot market. I suspect my experience would've been different if I was hit in the layoffs over the past year.
So they didn't SAY it was performance related, (I've actually called and am listed in their system as "eligible for rehire", they say), but I know it was.
The time between "the call" and end date was long enough that I had my next job lined up and basically took off Wed-Fri of my last week before my next job started. Truth be told I actually accepted the offer of $nextjob before $laidoffjob's "the call" came. I knew it was coming, so _officially_ I can say I never looked for a new job as a result of layoff given the timing.
So to #3, yes and no. It hurt. It still hurts. It's a gut punch, so it's something I'll just have to live with. It gets better, but to date it hasn't gone away.
2. No at all.
3. Never expirienced social stigma. But my self esteem suffered. There is definetely a psychological damage of a layoff.
Self compassion takes a lot of work and I'm still awful at it.
"There was just a better candidate for the job" helps me deal with getting turned down.
You are worth the effort, your work deserves compensation at a reasonable value. You deserve a place and space in the world. You are gonna have to fight for it and you are not guaranteed it either, but you are deserving of it if you put the work in.
Self compassion takes work.
1. No
2. N/A
3. N/A
1. How long have you been continually employed for?
2. If more than one job, have you ever moved between jobs?
3. Have you changed jobs due to forces that were outside of your control? (i.e. you chose to move on out of practicality or necessity)
4. If your job moves were unrelated to #3 please expand on why
1. 18 years total, 3 jobs (9 years, 4 years, 5 years).
2. I did choose to relocate for my 3rd job. I was specifically looking for companies in new locations where I wanted to live. I will specify that my job's locations were as follows: in office (10 mile commute, suburb only), fully remote, in office (16 mile commute, suburb and city driving)
3. no
4. n/a
For more context, I should say that I'm no longer at job #3 because I quit to start a new company, but that company did end up doing layoffs, but not for a few months after I left and had I stayed I wouldn't have been affected. Every time I've gotten a new job it's because I've decided I wanted to pursue something else.
Can you think of anything in particular that you did that helped you get ahead of any of these "out of your control" type disruptions that seem to derail and upend other peoples careers? I don't want to talk about dumb luck... maybe it's soft skills?
Or maybe it was it just dumb luck? Being in good places at the right time consistently in your career? I want to believe there's more than that but also sometimes life is unexplainable and that's also a valid but unfulfilling answer to these kinds of broadly too-vague questions.
I am trying to move past the knee-jerk resentment I feel for folks that have been successful. I want to understand what they have done differently from myself so I can try to better align myself with people and society.
Really appreciate the comments, thanks
Biggest challenge I've seen is with stalled advancement, particularly for people with 10+ years of experience.
That said, those impacts are less severe (for ppl like me) these days as recent layoffs are more broadly recognized as resulting from executive and management failures.
That said, the general lack of a useful social safety net in the US can easily lead to chaos for US-based employees who are laid off.
For a limited amount of time and they only cover a portion of your income. I know people who were laid off who had to upend their entire lives as a result. As just one example, their kids schooling was impacted as they had to drop everything and move during the middle of the year. One kid ended up getting held back as a result. They also lost of ton of money because they had quickly sell their home.
Anyone working on a sponsored visa has a very short period to find a new job, or they have to leave the country.
Unemployment insurance maximums is below minimum wage in some states (e.g Arizona). In Washington, where I live, it's higher, but would barely cover the typical mortgage payment for an experienced software engineer.
The lack of universal healthcare means that anyone who uses medical services regularly (or has family that does) may end up having to navigate whether or not to find an exchange plan or spend most of their unemployment benefits on COBRA.
2. Yes. It gave me the kick up the arse that I needed to look for something outside my comfort zone.
3. No. Being fired may come with social stigma, but everyone knows that companies sometimes engage in untargetted bloodletting. There's no shame in that.
The hardest thing is the sudden brutality of it. You may not get a chance to say goodbye to people. It feels impersonal and you don't get a chance to defend yourself. Your ego is tied to your profession - as is your ability to provide.
Thankfully, I was part of a strong Trade Union. They were able to negotiate a very generous severance package, and they obliterated my non-compete. If you are at any risk at all of getting laid-off (and everyone is) then you should join your Union.
They're as worthless of a piece of paper as your degree when shit hits the fan.
And a first-party issuer is essentially training you on specific software.
Probably the most/only aligned scenario is first-party certificates from widely-used technologies (e.g. AWS/Azure/GCP).
I think in general a lot of the reasons against unions are fairly valid; it's just the same points are also valid in the scenario without unions.
Everybody will get paid the same -- Your company already has pay bands for each title.
You can just talk to us about your problems -- People complain so much about decisions and they happen anyways!
Poor performers won't be fired -- My experience is you need to do something illegal to get fired anyways.
I had something similar happen to me, and I realized that being unilaterally excluded from a social group is basically exile, which historically was one form of the death penalty [1].
[1] Socrates, for example, was supposed to choose exile, but chose poison to make a point.
2. Yeah, so it made it a lot easier to network. I didn't have to schedule interviews clandestinely late at night, on lunch breaks, take time off. I could be out front about my objectives and be fully in charge of my career without worrying about blowback. 2 weeks of interview, 2 weeks of reference and background checks. I was collecting my next paycheck before unemployment even finished processing, LOL.
3. Layoffs aren't personal. They definitely can drive morale down for those that remain. And as soon as you have a steady, new job guess who start reaching out to you for referrals?
I wasn't laid off during the 2000s dot bomb, but I quit to finish school. I was not laid off during the 2009 GFC. I was definitely laid off during COVID19, because of COVID. At no point did I think it was even about me. It just sucks and those feelings of inadequacy are real. While my colleagues were feeling sorry for me I sent an email to every business card I've collected through the network events. I had 3 job offers by the 2nd week. You grow, get older, learn from your experience.
The downside is the bad performers and the good performers don't get valuable feedback. Good workers assume they are in the former group which feeds their paranoia.
We've had some really likable good guys who just couldn't keep up either technically or functionally, and it's obvious to everyone around, even if no deadlines are missed, and margins are met.
Can confirm this. My employer dropped about 10% of staff in order to back fill those positions with contractors from low-cost centers (India, Hungary, Costa Rica). Managers were not consulted in the decisions, and simply told they were losing employees $x, $y, and $z.
2. I would have preferred the stability and benefits the job offered, but life happens and I moved on. I was reasonably angry at the employer for about six years after. I've moved past it now. I threw myself into graduate school work and getting supplemental income for my small family.
3. No. Any employer who reads personal performance or morality into a candidate's layoff isn't worth the time or effort to engage.
They did some shenanigans to try to fabricate reasons to let me go with cause, presumably to save money. It had absolutely no impact on me afterwards in any way whatsoever. I got a new job within a month or so. It was a much better job that I stayed at for way too long.
I feel worse about the people who were laid off before me. The company took everyone on a big team building type trip to a tropical place. I refused to go. After everyone got back from the trip they started the layoffs just before the holidays. I told that CEO straight to his face he was a scumbag. That people probably would have rather had their paychecks through the holidays than some vacation with their co-workers, would they have known.
And yet, somehow the person who didn't go on the company trip, and stuck it to the CEO was one of the last ones still around.
The "party before the storm" pattern is something I have experienced myself.
I would think cancelling most of this type of spending would be more common. Maybe management didn't know how urgent the need to cut spending was
I was not laid off, but the experience hit me hard. I've seen a lot of really crummy behavior in my career, but that really did it for me. I am sure to stop working at 5PM every day now. I will never give an employer extra after experiencing that.
The only thing is, you save ~30-60% of your money, but when compared to salaries, it’s probably not enough to make a meaningful difference. Anyway, it’s usually not just about the money, but getting away and doing stuff as a team (even if the team doesn’t know about the layoffs).
VP first tries to do this re-org. In the middle of it, announces they are closing our office as part of the reorg. Our office was a remote one in the suburbs, and probably looked pretty good on paper that we should be the first to get cut. The kicker was we were a power house of the org. ~25 engineers with the majority being senior/principal engineers, each responsible for huge parts of the software stack, and also responsible for actually making sure projects were shipped. Everyone had some experience over the years having long nights working with OEMs in Germany, Japan, etc. for final deliveries.
They made the announcement with an end date in 2 months and everyone got some severance package on top of that. That's not a bad deal at all. Everyone was laid off, including my manager, except me. I had a few meetings with the VP and others to figure out what they were going to do with me. I asked for California salary while working remote. They said no, but they can offer me a ~60k bonus with a fork-back clause if I leave (or get fired) within 2 years. I said that's a joke, I'd rather take a severance package and we part ways. VP was not happy about it and he was quite heated about it. IDK maybe be was used to getting what he wanted. Negotiations stopped there. No severance was offered and I was demanded to work in the office even if it was empty (they still had a lease). I started applying like crazy and landed a FAANG job, but with a start date a few months out.
The 2 months were honestly just excellent. Everyone had a great time shooting the shit around the office. Helping each other interview, playing ping pong, long lunches, etc. Most landed at good jobs within the 2 months so they banked the severance. Nobody did any work. As I mentioned, our manager was let go too and he gave 0 shits. Projects got fucked. The company sent ~3 people from India in the last week to do a "brain dump" with the seniors. Calling it a disaster was an understatement. They all flew home and the office was emptied... except for me!
My start date was still in a few weeks, so I decided to just pester my VP's bosses about his terrible decisions, asking about a severance package, etc. Leaving messages for c-suite a few times a week. Sure enough, I got an email back from c-suite! They said the severance offer will be coming soon.
VP waits another week before sending me the package. The offer was beyond ridiculous. I needed to stick around for another ~4 months and had a ton of AIs that they would determine if I satisfied or not. It included: (1) ship a bunch of shit, (2) go to India to train several hundred engineers, (3) continue shipping a new SDK I had spearheaded up until the layoffs. The icing was they gave me a lower offer than the standard severance. I forwarded it to everyone and said this is ridiculous, there's no way I am accepting this. Please give me a workable severance package. HR and VP set up a call with me the next day. I took the call, got berated by HR for being a bad employee and will be put on a performance plan, yada yada. I just hung up in the middle and walked out of the office for good and enjoyed the vacation.
The worst part: VP moved to a different FAANG the following year. Definitely an overpaid POS.
The best part: I worked with a lot of really great people and those last 2 months were definitely a highlight, even if it came from a shitty situation.
I get looking at salary cost and axing on the basis of that.
What I don't get is not doing due diligence to figure out what a person is actually doing before cutting them.
How can "Oh, {this person} was actually keeping {this core project} on the rails" be a surprise after they've separated from the company?
VPs have incredibly large spans of control, counting reports-to-reports.
However, they also have a ton of authority to pull information. I've gotten ad hoc requests all the time that "X wants a presentation on Y."
Consequently, firing high-level technical folks without doing due diligence is exercising authority without living up to responsibility.
There aren't that many senior folks. Requesting a list of what projects each potential fire is attached to, and who will pick up their duties, seems a modest investment to avoid serious pain.
1. No
2. N/A
3. N/A
But my workload increased drastically after this years cuts. My team has to shoulder additional responsibilities that are neither interesting or fun. I am in Switzerland and in hindsight I would've loved to be offered voluntary redundancy and take home the severance package.
2. I received multiple offers for data engineering / data management roles within 2 months.
3. No. All of tech deciding to do cuts is a great cover.
In case someone is looking for open positions: https://www.ratherlabs.com/open-positions
- Small startup, no more money
- Covid
- Company tried to grow too fast
2. I feel like it’s a call from the universe to focus on what I really want. At the same time, not having the stability and the experience and growth from a job where I stayed long term is, I think, affecting my resume negatively versus someone who stayed 5 years at one company and was able to grow and have a bigger impact.
3. I was really ashamed the first time and didn’t even ask for Employment Insurance as I didn’t even know I was eligible. I didn’t ask for help and it was a big mistake. This time I’m doing it differently, asking for help, introductions, referrals. It’s nerve wracking though. Having to reinvent yourself that often and applying to hundreds of jobs isn’t fun at all. I’m now applying every morning and take the afternoon to focus on my hobbies or everything else that’s good for my mental health. At least it forced me to understand that I’m not my job and my worth is not dictated by my job or my employer. I also stopped reading news/reddit because of the negativity around the current market. I know it won’t be easy but I don’t want to be reminded about it every day.
2. Not sure if it affected my search, but I did find a job that I enjoy more and that is less stressful, and I'm much happier now.
3. Not really. I don't worry about stigma, I don't even accept that the stigma in this case exists. Why should it? An entire group of people were laid off, not just me.
Because I could afford to, I took six months off before even starting to look for a new position. Aside from also recovering from cancer surgery at the same time, I really enjoyed spending a lot of time with my dog before she died, reading books I'd been meaning to read for ages, and slowly thinking about what I want to do next. It took me a month or so of looking to find a new job.
2. Yes and no. Emotionally, yes. I felt a lot more desperate and took negative signals in the process far more personally. No in that I think the market is chilly to begin with and so my layoff was not a contributing factor to how the process went.
3. Nah, if anything it socially improved my life. Got back into touch with a number of former colleagues/friends and had more time to shore up my personal life while going through my job search.
All in all this sucks, no way around it. But we're gonna make it through.
2 Not great short-term (got the first job I could), but turned out better in the long run (got a much better job few months after)
3 Not really: Was unemployed for under 1 month, and was honest about the interim job just being a means to an end while interviewing for better job.
Getting laid off is a part of life, happens to the majority nowadays. It's what you do (or can bullshit you're doing) between jobs that will count.
1a. My first job laid me off after 10 months, the CEO decided to relocate the company to the Caribbean for a tax break/shelter, which required hiring 70% local people. As the core company was small, the only people retained were the C-level, VPs, and their secretaries. Only 2 of 10 people from my office were retained (and forced to relocate).
1b. My Second job laid me off after 2 months. This small software company had split in two just before my arrival because the two lead programmers did not get along. I was placed with the disagreeable lead, who didn't want me on his team. When a newly degreed former employee, who left on good terms, stopped by one day looking for a job. My boss volunteered my position. The day before layoff I had talked to my leads boss about the good work I had been doing and the next project I would tackle, the next day they laid me off telling me they decided to go a different direction.
2. Yes, negatively. Both times.
3. Kinda some social stigma after the second layoff. I had relocated for both jobs, and didn't have a great support system either place. After the second layoff, recruiters/hiring managers treated me as I was the problem not just some misfortune.
2. A bit. I took that job because they offered me a lot of money, and in the end I really enjoyed working there, I still hand out with people I met there now. But I knew I wanted to work at a startup, so once I knew we were going bankrupt I limited my search to startups I liked the look of.
3. No. I got another job pretty quickly, as did most of my co-workers.
It was not a good experience for me, but I did not feel like it had any long term consequences.
I ended up at a body shop shortly after which helped me gain some perspective.