To clarify - based on reading further into the article he's on a six month notice period and still being paid. As far as I can tell he's still employed, he just knows he'll be fired later.
So less unhealthy and the title is fairly misleading. I hope he isn't working too hard though
It was mentioned that by Danish law he has a right to a six month notice. Question is though if one “accepts” that right, are they now obligated to show up everyday as if nothing happened? Thinking not, because he seemed to be very laid back about if/when he decides to go to the office.
He is obligated to show up but in practice if he didn't want to work they couldn't really do anything. He could just call in sick or work very slowly, what are they gonna do, fire him?
If he still has the laptop it means there is trust on both sides. Otherwise they would have revoked all his accesses and just exempted him from working to protect the company from possible harm.
At least that is how it works in Germany but should be basically the same in Danish law. Getting laid off is really not so bad. Firing people is expensive, as it should be.
To be fair, he is still officially employed until November. Legally, he has to show up.
It it just that often that people get excepted from working because the corporation does not trust them anymore and they don't want to risk anything. Or on the other side the employee calls in sick to avoid working.
He got 6 months until the contract expires plus 3 extra months of pay as severance. Dude is pretty happy about being laid off, no hard feeling.
It is really not that crazy to still answer some questions from time to time after being laid up, especially if the company is still paying you full time anyway. Not like he is putting in 60 hours a week, dude is enjoying early retirement with some side gigs.
There is definitely a problem with people being being married to their job but this is just clickbait.
That's messed up, because now he's working for the employer for free, hoping the company will somehow replace the social connections it made him lose in the first place. It's definitely not something to look up to - it's just sad.
No, he has a six month notice period, so officially he's still employed until November. I'm surprised they let him keep his badge, that's a huge risk after firing someone.
> I was laid off in May, and per Danish law, as an employee of over nine years, I have a six-month notice period. I've been relieved of my duties, but I am still officially an employee until the end of November. I'm also entitled to three months of severance pay after my notice.
Agree that it's messed up, but it's _not_ working for free:
> I was laid off in May, and per Danish law, as an employee of over nine years, I have a six-month notice period. I've been relieved of my duties, but I am still officially an employee until the end of November. I'm also entitled to three months of severance pay after my notice.
As someone currently living and employed in Denmark, I can confirm that this is how it works as per Funktionærloven § 2 s. 2-3. Once you've worked somewhere for 6 months, the employer has to give you 3 months notice when terminating your employment. Every 3 years, that notice period increases by 1 month.
Depending on circumstances, other regulatory requirements, etc. employees let go might be placed on garden leave: they get paid for the notice + severance period, but aren't expected to come in.
On the other hand: he mentions working 60 hour work weeks. That is _very_ unusual in Denmark, mostly because in many cases it's illegal by the 48-hour rule (see e.g. https://english.ida.dk/working-hours).
He hints that he was taking work home on the weekends and I'm guessing for no extra pay. I used to do stuff like that when I was much younger. Cannot imagine it at his age.
Are they not allowed to lock offices in his country? Does Microsoft not do the badge thing? This would be completely physically impossible at every company I've ever worked at (except one where I personally knew the CTO) because they take your badge when you leave.
He's still technically an employee because he's under notice period. In Europe you can't fire people effective immediately. That's why he can still go to the office for six more months
> I was laid off in May, and per Danish law, as an employee of over nine years, I have a six-month notice period. I've been relieved of my duties, but I am still officially an employee until the end of November.
It would also be pretty easy to tailgate at a place you’ve worked for 20+ years, but it sounds like that isn’t even necessary.
This is what neoliberal serfdom looks like... "60 hour weeks" until 60, unhealthy attachment to employer, using your 9 month severance as a "foundation" for the business you plan on starting... why not just retire? If the guy spent that long working in tech and lives in Denmark and still isn't able to retire comfortably, I don't know what to say...
Currently, Danes retire at the age of 67. In 2030, this limit will rise to 68, and in 2035, it will reach 69.
Copenhagen raised its retirement age last week to 70 for Danes born in 1971 or later.
There's some possibilty to retire earlier, I know a guy there in his early 60s who did it. Perhaps accepting reduced benefits? Or still having to wait until 67 to start collecting?
If I got an offer to retire early with 9-12 months salary I'd take it in a heartbeat. IT is absolutely no fun anymore. As soon as you learn something it's obsolete. And the treadmill keeps getting faster and faster. I used to go to work feeling like I was an expert at what I did. Now I feel like I'm babysitting technology that nobody really understands but has decided we need to be using. There's no training for it because anything you learn is already out of date. Problems are solved by googling (or more recently, asking an LLM) and trying stuff until you find something that works. I.e. vibing. It's totally demotivating.
Key distinction here: he's still employed and has a working badge and computer until the end of November. He's just been relieved of all official duty.
This is a very misleading title. I don't know why this is newsworthy. This is a common thing in Europe for people to be on notice period as you can't fire people without notice here.
It's not entirely benign. It makes it riskier to hire and is powerful incentive for informal hiring structures (contracting and the like). Everything is tradeoffs.
It does make hiring riskier, but don't forget the 3 month probation period at the beginning of every employment during which the employer can terminate the contract with a reduced notice period if there are indications it's not going to work out, without much risk to the employer.
It’s actually a nice concept (imo). The longer you work for a company, the longer is the period.
For example if you work for two years they have to give you notice 4 weeks beforehand.
At 10 years it’s 4 months.
(German law).
The best thing is, that applies only to your employer.
Employees can always quit with a 4 week’s notice.
To the many responses calling this sad, messed up, unhealthy, serfdom, etc. I’d bring more curiosity to this.
The reality is that we’re talking about a human navigating the impending restructuring of human relationships and being removed from a product that they clearly cared about.
I’ve been there — working on something I believed in, for a company that treated me well, with customers and colleagues who also believed in the product.
It’s common advice to treat work as something separate from your personal life, to not rely on work as a social/support system, etc. and I think that’s mostly decent advice.
But it doesn’t change the complexity of the relationship someone can have with their work and the people associated with it.
When I finally left, it was voluntary and after much planning. If I had been laid off instead, and if I had 6 months to prepare, I’d still be going into the office too.
My loyalty would not be to my employer at that point, but to the many humans around me with whom I had relationships and still have relationships years later.
What the article describes sounds like a period of transition. Not something to be derided.
What’s sad is not his dedication and loyalty to his workplace, but that he needed to go public with being fired and tell how many hours he poured into it.
I’m sure he really made an effort during his long career at Microsoft. And I’m unsure why he was let go. But the repeated theme of “60 hour weeks” and “20 hour weekends” seems like trying to win an argument that he was, in fact, valuable.
I don’t know what it’s like to be fired, much less at the age of 59. But it’s nice to hear of the silver lining. I’d want to feel the way he does, and blog less about it.
People say this, and I understand the sentiment behind it, but this is not true. Work is a large % of most people's lives, and to pretend it is not is to deny the reality of many people's existence.
Most people aspire to work less, myself included, and it's absolutely true that many of the best things in life happen outside of work, but I think it's a bit problematic to pretend people are automatons who can compartmentalize their work and home life. Most brains don't work this way, aspirations notwithstanding.
> Seriously, go outside more! There's a HUGE world outside of a cubicle. Expand your horizons. The rewards will vastly outsize any job satisfaction.
I've been on sabbatical for 3+ years now.
Getting outside more, traveling, spending time not working is exactly why I personally spent a lot of time preparing to leave my last job before I did. I wanted to feel free and unencumbered, and making sure I left things in a good place was an important part of doing that.
There are a lot of assumptions packed into your comment that don't align with my personal reality or lived experience, and many of the things you're describing are not mutually exclusive.
Diagnosing people with mental illness given the limited information available seems like a pretty questionable position to take as well. If caring about the people I built relationships with and investing time to make their lives easier on my way out the door is mental illness, then yes, I'm mentally ill.
45 comments
[ 6.1 ms ] story [ 104 ms ] threadSo less unhealthy and the title is fairly misleading. I hope he isn't working too hard though
If he still has the laptop it means there is trust on both sides. Otherwise they would have revoked all his accesses and just exempted him from working to protect the company from possible harm.
At least that is how it works in Germany but should be basically the same in Danish law. Getting laid off is really not so bad. Firing people is expensive, as it should be.
It it just that often that people get excepted from working because the corporation does not trust them anymore and they don't want to risk anything. Or on the other side the employee calls in sick to avoid working.
He got 6 months until the contract expires plus 3 extra months of pay as severance. Dude is pretty happy about being laid off, no hard feeling.
It is really not that crazy to still answer some questions from time to time after being laid up, especially if the company is still paying you full time anyway. Not like he is putting in 60 hours a week, dude is enjoying early retirement with some side gigs.
There is definitely a problem with people being being married to their job but this is just clickbait.
> I was laid off in May, and per Danish law, as an employee of over nine years, I have a six-month notice period. I've been relieved of my duties, but I am still officially an employee until the end of November. I'm also entitled to three months of severance pay after my notice.
> I was laid off in May, and per Danish law, as an employee of over nine years, I have a six-month notice period. I've been relieved of my duties, but I am still officially an employee until the end of November. I'm also entitled to three months of severance pay after my notice.
As someone currently living and employed in Denmark, I can confirm that this is how it works as per Funktionærloven § 2 s. 2-3. Once you've worked somewhere for 6 months, the employer has to give you 3 months notice when terminating your employment. Every 3 years, that notice period increases by 1 month.
Depending on circumstances, other regulatory requirements, etc. employees let go might be placed on garden leave: they get paid for the notice + severance period, but aren't expected to come in.
On the other hand: he mentions working 60 hour work weeks. That is _very_ unusual in Denmark, mostly because in many cases it's illegal by the 48-hour rule (see e.g. https://english.ida.dk/working-hours).
> I was laid off in May, and per Danish law, as an employee of over nine years, I have a six-month notice period. I've been relieved of my duties, but I am still officially an employee until the end of November.
It would also be pretty easy to tailgate at a place you’ve worked for 20+ years, but it sounds like that isn’t even necessary.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg71v533q6o
https://www.cnn.com/2025/05/23/business/denmark-retirement-a...
If I got an offer to retire early with 9-12 months salary I'd take it in a heartbeat. IT is absolutely no fun anymore. As soon as you learn something it's obsolete. And the treadmill keeps getting faster and faster. I used to go to work feeling like I was an expert at what I did. Now I feel like I'm babysitting technology that nobody really understands but has decided we need to be using. There's no training for it because anything you learn is already out of date. Problems are solved by googling (or more recently, asking an LLM) and trying stuff until you find something that works. I.e. vibing. It's totally demotivating.
Danish law requires a long notice period.
https://archive.ph/cqGUI
https://seinfeldscripts.com/TheBizarroJerry.htm#:~:text=I%20...
The best thing is, that applies only to your employer. Employees can always quit with a 4 week’s notice.
The reality is that we’re talking about a human navigating the impending restructuring of human relationships and being removed from a product that they clearly cared about.
I’ve been there — working on something I believed in, for a company that treated me well, with customers and colleagues who also believed in the product.
It’s common advice to treat work as something separate from your personal life, to not rely on work as a social/support system, etc. and I think that’s mostly decent advice.
But it doesn’t change the complexity of the relationship someone can have with their work and the people associated with it.
When I finally left, it was voluntary and after much planning. If I had been laid off instead, and if I had 6 months to prepare, I’d still be going into the office too.
My loyalty would not be to my employer at that point, but to the many humans around me with whom I had relationships and still have relationships years later.
What the article describes sounds like a period of transition. Not something to be derided.
I’m sure he really made an effort during his long career at Microsoft. And I’m unsure why he was let go. But the repeated theme of “60 hour weeks” and “20 hour weekends” seems like trying to win an argument that he was, in fact, valuable.
I don’t know what it’s like to be fired, much less at the age of 59. But it’s nice to hear of the silver lining. I’d want to feel the way he does, and blog less about it.
This is seriously mental illness.
You are WAY too psychologically invested in your job.
Work is not life!
Seriously, go outside more! There's a HUGE world outside of a cubicle. Expand your horizons. The rewards will vastly outsize any job satisfaction.
I'm not being derisive, I'm trying to suggest a path to an improved life experience.
People say this, and I understand the sentiment behind it, but this is not true. Work is a large % of most people's lives, and to pretend it is not is to deny the reality of many people's existence.
Most people aspire to work less, myself included, and it's absolutely true that many of the best things in life happen outside of work, but I think it's a bit problematic to pretend people are automatons who can compartmentalize their work and home life. Most brains don't work this way, aspirations notwithstanding.
> Seriously, go outside more! There's a HUGE world outside of a cubicle. Expand your horizons. The rewards will vastly outsize any job satisfaction.
I've been on sabbatical for 3+ years now.
Getting outside more, traveling, spending time not working is exactly why I personally spent a lot of time preparing to leave my last job before I did. I wanted to feel free and unencumbered, and making sure I left things in a good place was an important part of doing that.
There are a lot of assumptions packed into your comment that don't align with my personal reality or lived experience, and many of the things you're describing are not mutually exclusive.
Diagnosing people with mental illness given the limited information available seems like a pretty questionable position to take as well. If caring about the people I built relationships with and investing time to make their lives easier on my way out the door is mental illness, then yes, I'm mentally ill.