4 ms·

You don't need an excuse, but if you have one then management can save face. The theory would be it's a lot harder to hire people in the future if everyone thin

You don't need an excuse, but if you have one then management can save face. The theory would be it's a lot harder to hire people in the future if everyone thinks you're bad at management, and much easier if everyone just thinks you got unlucky with market timing.

kodah 4y ago
Came here to say this, it's one of the first things I investigate about a company. If the company does habitual layoffs or has done rather large ones in the past five years, I'll move on 90% of the time.
- bko 4y ago
  I disagree. I think it's healthy and more humane than firing people for cause. Hiring is hard and you mess up, or people grow out of their role. Everyone knows people at work that are incompetent. It's tough to get rid of them because they may not be grossly incompetent or malicious, but just not up to standard. The layoffs I've seen usually let people go that are not effective and frankly not very happy. They get a severance, can collect unemployment and usually land on their feet. It's healthier than an organization that essentially hires for life
  - vkou 4y ago
    You can't fire someone for cause just because your money losing business ran out of money. Firing for cause is when the employee screwed up, not when the CEO did.
    - sokoloff 4y ago
      This is true. “For cause” is “employee fucked up real bad [theft, harassment, etc]”, but many people think it means the plain English reading of “was individually underperforming” which would be a performance-related termination but not a “for cause” termination. IMO, it’s dumb HR/Legal lingo.
  - _jal 4y ago
    It isn't just about the employee abuse. A nonseasonal (or similar) company that has a large swing in employee-counts has a problem. If swings happen repeatedly, the problem isn't getting fixed.
  - travisgriggs 4y ago
    Ah. The trim the deadwood argument. This makes lots of sense. But I never see it play out this way. Because in a given company, if you ask people to identify “the deadwood” there will be a couple standouts, but otherwise quite a bit of variability. If nothing else because everyone has ego centric biases that over compensate their own contributions (or that of their function/department). And then it’s really just a mosh pit of politics that decides who stays and goes. Or put more succinctly “one man’s deadwood is another’s diamond in the rough.”
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
lookACamel 4y ago
It also lets the people being let go save face.

kodah 4y ago

Came here to say this, it's one of the first things I investigate about a company. If the company does habitual layoffs or has done rather large ones in the past five years, I'll move on 90% of the time.

bko 4y ago
I disagree. I think it's healthy and more humane than firing people for cause. Hiring is hard and you mess up, or people grow out of their role. Everyone knows people at work that are incompetent. It's tough to get rid of them because they may not be grossly incompetent or malicious, but just not up to standard. The layoffs I've seen usually let people go that are not effective and frankly not very happy. They get a severance, can collect unemployment and usually land on their feet. It's healthier than an organization that essentially hires for life
- vkou 4y ago
  You can't fire someone for cause just because your money losing business ran out of money. Firing for cause is when the employee screwed up, not when the CEO did.
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    This is true. “For cause” is “employee fucked up real bad [theft, harassment, etc]”, but many people think it means the plain English reading of “was individually underperforming” which would be a performance-related termination but not a “for cause” termination. IMO, it’s dumb HR/Legal lingo.
- _jal 4y ago
  It isn't just about the employee abuse. A nonseasonal (or similar) company that has a large swing in employee-counts has a problem. If swings happen repeatedly, the problem isn't getting fixed.
- travisgriggs 4y ago
  Ah. The trim the deadwood argument. This makes lots of sense. But I never see it play out this way. Because in a given company, if you ask people to identify “the deadwood” there will be a couple standouts, but otherwise quite a bit of variability. If nothing else because everyone has ego centric biases that over compensate their own contributions (or that of their function/department). And then it’s really just a mosh pit of politics that decides who stays and goes. Or put more succinctly “one man’s deadwood is another’s diamond in the rough.”
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

lookACamel 4y ago

It also lets the people being let go save face.