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Layoffs in the WFH era are weird. Back in the day you had a pretty good idea of who got laid off because you saw them walking out the door with a box of their

• orangevelcro 3y ago
  Also the language everyone uses to tip toe around saying people got laid off. Some employees 'were affected' or were 'part of the RIF' or whatever other acronym is currently popular.
• timeagain 3y ago
  IMO their slack avatar/posts go gray within minutes of them being sacked.
  • Hamuko 3y ago
    Yeah, whenever I want to find out if someone still works at the company, I just search them on Slack. If it has "(deactivated)" after their name, they're no longer employed here.
    • supportengineer 3y ago
      There must be a Slack API that could be used for this, and written to git periodically as the other post said.
  • jedberg 3y ago
    At Amazon, when someone was laid off their Slack still worked for the 60 day WARN period. It was actually a problem because you would Slack them and get mad that they didn't reply. The only way to know for sure was to ask their manager, but you didn't want to do that because if they weren't laid off you didn't want to throw them under the bus!
    • petesergeant 3y ago
      > their Slack still worked for the 60 day WARN period So weird companies can’t just pay that out as severance
      • jedberg 3y ago
        That's effectively how it ends up, except with a slight advantage to the company. They cut you off and tell you that you don't have to work anymore, but in the off chance you get a job within 60 days, they don't have to keep paying you. They can also preserve their cashflow by not paying you up front. But since you technically have to be "on the books", if something like Slack is tied to your status in the company directory, it's easier to just leave it.
        • vineyardmike 3y ago
          Just an FYI - you can still get paid the WARN severance even if you take another job, just don't "quit" during warn. Your employment contract may or may not say you can't do side work, but (1) what, will they fire you? (2) it probably just says that you can't do work that interferes with your current employment, which is not a problem. The WARN period exists to give you the money, but also keep you on for insurance and 401k vesting purposes (and similar). Getting cut off immediately, and suddenly losing insurance would be much much more disruptive, even with COBRA.
  • sharkweek 3y ago
    My org had a big cut last year but nobody would tell us how many people were laid off for some reason. I happened to remember the total number of people who were in our org’s giant slack channel before the layoffs and thus was able to do some hardcore detective work subtracting the new number of people in the channel from the previous amount to get the answer…
• jiehong 3y ago
  In the company I knew, it’s usual for people to send an email telling others “hey, it’s my last day, thanks for all the memories. Here is my contact info if you want to.” Others colleagues would also usually organise a virtual envelope with money inside to wish you farewell.
  • brnt 3y ago
    We had biweekly team videocalls, so I just announced my last week in my last call. I find it hard to imagine you have no such contact at all, or that you would say nothing in those meets. You are planning work every now and then, aren't you?
    • away271828 3y ago
      >You are planning work every now and then, aren't you? In the past, I've tried to give key people on longer-term projects I'm working on a heads-up. But I trusted them and it was longer-term. At the end of the day, I'm not going to let the word out before I'm ready if I'm worried it has the potential to bite me financially, e.g. because of vesting.
• _the_inflator 3y ago
  The email sentiment is both true and somewhat strange. Simply shut down, just like a service or API that got deprecated. It is a weird experience, if you happen to know these leaving people only by email.
• purrcat259 3y ago
  Yeah I actually asked for a few weeks ago when we experienced 10% cuts and I was told they won't share one because of privacy reasons... But we were seeing the list of deactivated slack accounts crop up slowly anyway.
• ThrowawayR2 3y ago
  I regret to have had a recent opportunity to notice that MS Teams shows an empty status icon for deleted/disabled accounts. Their documentation describes it as "status unknown": https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/presence-admins https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/presence-ad...
  • 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 3y ago
    My family's chat server still shows "Offline" for the account of a deceased relative. Like yeah... they're pretty well offline.
  • picadores 3y ago
    The user was disappeared
• namdnay 3y ago
  This may be the only time I ever say this, but thank god for LinkedIn. At least you know you can always catch up with someone who has left
  • jedberg 3y ago
    Assuming they have LinkedIn and you bothered to connect while they still worked with you. :)
    • 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 3y ago
      idk I added a lot of people after I quit my last place
    • xboxnolifes 3y ago
      First part is a personally solvable, and as for the second part: you can still add them if you know their name.
    • TeMPOraL 3y ago
      Between jobs is the only time you touch LinkedIn, lest HR sees some activity on your profile and buckets you into a "actively job-searching" risk group.
      • fullspectrumdev 3y ago
        Conversely: being in that “risk group” can, in many situations, be extremely useful when it comes to negotiating raises. May depend on your job market, but it’s a pretty normal tactic for a lot of people I know.
      • namdnay 3y ago
        > lest HR sees some activity on your profile and buckets you into a "actively job-searching" risk group well.... yes? HR considering you "at risk" is a pretty good thing :)
        • 3y ago
• ZaoLahma 3y ago
  In a large enough company, the experience will be exactly the same even if you do go to the office. It might take weeks or months before you have a reason to reach out and finally realize that you haven't seen someone around for quite a while. And "large enough" is surprisingly small. For close colleagues leaving, WFH makes absolutely no difference though. Those you keep track of regardless.
• hiremelocally 3y ago
  This is just a natural consequence of WFH. Communications are work tasks are so isolated and transactional, there's no reason termination would be any different.
• Aurornis 3y ago
  Watching people’s accounts go into deactivated status in Slack with no goodbye is sad. The most toxic boss I ever worked for would request access to former employee’s Slack accounts under the guise of looking for data to transition their job. Their accounts would periodically go green when he logged in as them. Spooky to see ex-coworker accounts go green and know the boss is scouring their private messages. I know companies can get slack messages anyway, but seeing your boss do it in real time is extra creepy.
  • earthnail 3y ago
    Wow, that is creepy.
  • economicalidea 3y ago
    You can’t get private Slack messages easily if you don’t have direct access to the account. There is an audit feature on the Enterprise version that allows it, and you can appeal to slack to open the messages due to a crime or similar - but AFAIK on the normal plans you are out of luck of you want to read private messages as workspace owner.
    • adastra22 3y ago
      Request access to former employee’s corporate email and reset the password.
      • sillysaurusx 3y ago
        Yep. That’s how it happened for me.
        • planede 3y ago
          Ouch. My takeaway is that I should probably delete my slack account before leaving the company.
          • 3y ago
• silisili 3y ago
  It's one thing I miss from the work from office lifestyle - the more human connections. People stopping by your desk to chat about life, the joking - I'd never laughed so hard in my life. Closer connections in general, and being sad when people left, but happy when they were for greener pastures. WFH feels so sterile and impersonal in comparison. I've been WFH since 2015 or so, so this isn't a RTO endorsement, just reminiscing.
  • jedberg 3y ago
    I miss that too. Some of my best friends are former co-workers. Especially from when I was younger and we spent nearly every waking hour together either at work or at a bar after work. I don't miss it enough to want to go back to an office though!
    • ryandrake 3y ago
      The way I see it I go to work to exchange my skills for money. Often that involves working with others, but I’m not there to socialize and make friends. I have friends. So given that outlook, WFH seems just kind of more “pure.” It’s distilled work, unencumbered by phony pseudo-friendships and awkward water cooler chit chat about sportsball. When we start a zoom meeting I can just launch right into the agenda without having to do that offtopic pre-meeting banter ritual. To me it’s work without waste. I feel like with WFH I get more done per hour and that means more time for me to do what I enjoy: things that aren’t work.
      • wolletd 3y ago
        I also have friends, but I rarely see them on workdays. Having other people around me on those days feels good, I don't like being alone for several days. I totally can do and have done that, but I prefer to not be alone. Additionally, my colleagues and I share big parts of our life: every damn workday. None of my friends are capable of talking as long and nuanced about things happening at my workplace. They don't really want to hear emotional rants about bullshit projects because they have no way to relate to those feelings. But I want to rant about bullshit projects and thankfully, I have colleagues that like hearing such rants from time to time, as they totally can relate. When I am mad about some shit, start talking about it and they ask "oh, was that XY who said that?" and it totally was XY, that is comforting. I have friends, yes, and I don't need to meet my colleagues after work. But I still have healthy social relationships to them.
• elgenie 3y ago
  The attributes that would let one reliably eyeball a person who got fired doing their walk of shame also made for a soul-sucking workplace. That "back in the day" algorithm required an office that emphasized butt-in-seat, lacked flexible working hours, and lacked both personal offices and multiple exit points.
• kristopolous 3y ago
  The lockout always struck me as dumb and I didn't do it as a manager. If I trusted them for the 3 years they worked for me, I can trust them for another week or two. Tie up loose ends, take your time. We're all adults here. I understand that under the worst circumstances bad things can happen but that's always the case.
  • at-fates-hands 3y ago
    I worked at a large web dev company and for years they had this attitude. Then one designer put in his two weeks and spent the majority of the time downloading all the site files for all of the sites the company had built over the two years he was there. We're talking hundreds of static sites where he took the all the design docs and static HTML/CSS/JS files one would need to recreate them somewhere else. Instead of going after the guy legally, they passed and then instituted the same policy. You put in your two weeks? Nah, you're out the moment you hit send on that email. Manager alerts security, who then come over to your desk. You get your jacket and whatever you walked in with and get walked out. The one designer totally ruined the company from ever letting someone stay for their two weeks.
    • kristopolous 3y ago
      Anyone could have done that at any time. The two weeks isn't magic. It could have been unannounced and they just stop showing up. You either trust your people or you don't. If you don't, get rid of them and lock them out. If you do and you still have to let them go then don't worry about it. People are far too inhuman in professional relationships and I strongly dislike that tendency. You likely spend as much time with your colleagues as your spouse, make it a real connection.
      • supriyo-biswas 3y ago
        But once they receive the bad news, their motivation for revenge increases, which is why similar policies exist in many workplaces. Trust isn’t a univariate, piecewise defined function like you suggest.
• at-fates-hands 3y ago
  I work at a large corporation. Most of the people have transitioned to WFH now. At least five times I can say I had no idea someone had been laid off or sacked until weeks later. I just assumed they were on PTO or something, and then in the middle of a meeting, I'd say something like, "Yeah, where's James been, I haven't seen him online for a few weeks now." Then the manager would chime in and say they got laid off or let go several weeks ago and they were waiting to announce it to everybody. Twice my director had a meeting with the team and forgot to include myself and two other devs to announce someone had been let go - which is scary AF when we're all on Teams wondering why they just randomly left us off the meeting, which then made us all paranoid AF for a few weeks. The whole process with laying people off or people getting sacked has just been handled in such a ham handed way, it doesn't inspire confidence at all, and people are constantly looking over their shoulder when a team loses people and have to pick up the slack immediately.
• bsimpson 3y ago
  During layoffs session last year, the company I work for immediately removed people from the corporate directory, and then went to the guy who had made the unofficial facebook and made him hide them in his tool too. They still technically worked there during the WARN period, so they didn't have epitaphs either. That went over about at well as you'd expect. This time around, the laid off people show up as on vacation. If you see a team of people all on PTO until the end of May, you can presume that team is donezo.
  • scarface_74 3y ago
    I worked at AWS in the Professional Services department and people got cutoff in the middle of customer conference calls during the first round of layoffs and then found out about their layoffs.
  • saagarjha 3y ago
    The infuriating part is when they spin this as some sort of employee privacy move, as if the employee (now ex-employee? But not really, because of WARN) has no input in that decision.
• neilv 3y ago
  I've seen a company during WFH let a laid off employee (who asked) keep their access for an hour, to post a goodbye message. It's not good practice for all situations -- you need some trust, despite the stressful situation, when people tend to show character and weaknesses -- but in this case, it worked out. The departing employee posted a message of encouragement to the remaining people. Kind words and contact info were exchanged, etc.
  • eru 3y ago
    You can get nearly the same result with less trust: let the employee draft a goodbye message and have the boss (or so) forward that to the other employees.
    • neilv 3y ago
      Good idea. Though I think the fact that they trusted the departing person, and the departing person delivered -- if it plays out that way -- is much more positive message than effectively implying that the company didn't trust the person. The company letting a manager relay a message, with any censoring, is certainly better than the person having no way to get their contact info to people, and they might also say something nice for morale.
      • eru 3y ago
        You are right that the other way sends a stronger signal. My suggestion was meant as something that's feasible even for a company that already got burned by vengeful leavers; and also something that an individual manager has an easier chance of pulling off, without having to change all of corporate policy.
    • dpig_ 3y ago
      > A man moves from East Germany to Siberia, where he knows his letters will be censored. He establishes a code with his friends: anything written in blue ink is honest and true; anything written in red ink is false and only there to get the truth past the censors. A month goes by and the man’s friends receive a letter written in blue ink: “Everything is wonderful here. Stores are full of good food. Movie theaters show good films from the West. Apartments are large and luxurious. The only thing you cannot buy is red ink." [1] [1] https://www.guernicamag.com/tomas-hachard-the-red-ink/ https://www.guernicamag.com/tomas-hachard-the-red-ink/
• javcasas 3y ago
  I got fired from the office on a Friday evening when more than half the company already logged off. What is the wonderful closure you get? Anyway, welcome to the corporate world. It pretends to be personal, but it's business.
  • jedberg 3y ago
    I'm sorry you had a bad experience, but most people get laid off Friday morning (it's the most common time). > Anyway, welcome to the corporate world. I've been in the corporate world for 27 years, and been through many layoffs (usually as a survivor, sometimes as a victim). The ones during WFH have all been worse.
• saagarjha 3y ago
  After going through my first layoff (not affected personally, I just saw people who were), I just started posting my personal contact information preemptively. I've seen others start to do the same. It's kind of depressing but I think it really helps to be able to reach out after the termination is done.
• washadjeffmad 3y ago
  We tried at first, but we were so overwhelmed by the rate of deaths from the earliest moments of the pandemic that the org couldn't keep reporting them. It was a demoralizing effort for HR to try to put something, even a few words together for everyone, and it's left a lasting pallor where vibrant personal touches once were. People continue to vanish, and there's still no notice that, or how, they've moved on. Our General Counsel and I met for the last time during the early months of the pandemic. Like most people during the shutdown, he hadn't seen anyone outside his immediate family or had a chance to tell a good story in a few months, which would have eventually killed him, anyway, and I got an earful as he unloaded all the work he was wrapping up. After, as lawyers excel at, he wrote a great letter to our CIO about it that led to probably my favorite exchange between us. Six months later, someone called me to say they were headed to Legal because someone had died, and I was struck by an immediate sense of dread. I searched our website for any word, then our directory, and then for local obits and found nothing. Even the grapevine was silent, so I called his admin who pretty casually told me our GC had died six weeks prior. Almost a year to the day later, the mechanisms caught up, and the org put out a "Remembering $generalCounselor". By then, we'd missed his funeral, his family had relocated, and many felt awkward trying to send condolences so late. Watching other's surprise, shame, and sadness wasn't reassuring, even if it told me I wasn't the only one. We're not small, but we're personal, and each death has left a little void that we collectively haven't acknowledged or addressed. We still don't have a way to handle the losses and haven't talked about it. Having old saved contacts pop up after their extensions are reassigned is inevitably like a call from the grave. I try to keep in touch to keep track, but little by little, the connections are fading, and the memory and history of us with them.
  • michaelcampbell 3y ago
    > rate of deaths from the earliest moments of the pandemic that the org couldn't keep reporting them Truly sorry for your collective loss, but where/what industry did you work in where this was a significant number?
    • kridsdale1 3y ago
      Healthcare would be one place where a very large number of workers died.
• wil421 3y ago
  Office layoffs are weird too. A friend worked for Oculus. One day they went to lunch and the manager muttered something quietly about the whole team being laid off then ran off. A team of like 10-15 people had to stand outside and wait for security to bring out their stuff. Sounds pretty awkward. Another large company I worked for sent out random meeting with the CIO, if you got the meeting you were laid off. At least the CIO did it himself.
• whywhywhywhy 3y ago
  Was it ever really real anyway if you're just little faces or icons on a video call while you worked together.
• 7thaccount 3y ago
  I had an old boss with a Powershell script that auto-ran each morning and did a diff with the employee list in Outlook or something (can't remember what)to see who got terminated or left. I think it was the only sure fire way to know.
• burnerburnson 3y ago
  I don't understand the secrecy about firing somehow. If I were an employer, I'd want my remaining employees to know that what the fired person did was unacceptable.
  • bombcar 3y ago
    Companies very rarely do not want to open themselves to liability so they usually go for the blandest possible description, even laying off and paying unemployment for someone who should be fired for cause.
• chiefalchemist 3y ago
  When someone new comes on board, I make it a point to send a LinkedIn connection. While I'm no fan of LinkedIn per se, it's neutral enough that nearly all of those connections are accepted. If necessary, it then becomes a non-company channel for having safe (ish) discussions about the company.
• Angostura 3y ago
  At least it’s made LinkedIn useful for something
• tonnydourado 3y ago
  > you saw them walking out the door with a box of their stuff That's cool, I've never seen anyone that worked in a 90's movie before! Seriously, though, is that a thing? Was it ever?
  • drchickensalad 3y ago
    ...yes? That's why it's in movies
  • Aeolun 3y ago
    I mean, I have a bunch of personal stuff in the office. On my last day in the office I’ll bring it all home because I need it until that time. I can imagine myself bringing it all in a handy box if I were suddenly fired (which is impossible in my country of residence, but it’s about the idea)
• htrp 3y ago
  linkedin ?
• Mountain_Skies 3y ago
  On the first project where I was team lead one of my team members was laid off and nobody told me. I worked with her on Thursday, took a PTO on Friday, and on Monday around noon noticed she hadn't been in at all. I asked the guy who sat in the space next to her, and he told me she had been laid off on Friday. I had no idea there had been any layoffs as there wasn't an email sent out like in earlier rounds. Turned out she was the only person laid off. Really weird way of handling things.
• lazyasciiart 3y ago
  There’s also Blind, but only if you’re on it before the layoff: you need access to your company email account to create an account.
• smugglerFlynn 3y ago
  There are no more people in that process, just “resources” that you “let go”. Welcome to 2024.