I’m sick of being laidoff. Got laid off again today, second time in 4 years in a big corporate layoff. Seems I can’t ever find any respite these days. No matter how hard I work or how much I put in, just bound to be laid off and even though I’ve been recognized officially through merit repeatedly, these companies here in the USA just keep laying people off And then passing all the jobs on to India for 3K a year salary…
So disheartening. At this rate I might as well just retire from White collar work and go and learn a trade as a tradesman, completely redo my entire life goals
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It, Programmer, biotech all are being outsourced to h1b visas. tried entering biotech, apparently alot of those jobs always ask for “visa help” you can guaranteed theyw ill never hire you, additionally the amount experience needs to get in the industry. shouldve went on adjacent health, CLS, but apparently that is a grad school just for a certification and not a degree. i looked back on my schools yelp, and so many people were disastified with the school with thier “career development”, it does make sense why someone at my school who transferred from a cc, said she wanted to transfer away asap, the school has gotten so bad they had to cut classes because of enrollment shortage.(this isnt the only school in my area(yes its in west coast us) many other schools have suffer severe shortages of thier ":Cashcow(undergrad freshman), on low-level non-prestigious state schools, some schools are faring better, but im betting even those will suffer enrollment problems 4-10years down the line, why because the job market is very stagnant for alot of fields. and an article came out about my school, the “laid of faculty said it was birth rates issues,” i commented it was the least of thier problems, its like the last problem they should be worrying about. and said it was poor job prospects, experiences, and expensive COL, it was pretty bad before covid, and it got worst during covid. additionally trump is making all stem fields more unstable than it already is.
alot of jobs keep upping thier experience requirements, which is by design so they can make an excuse “we cant find any qualified people, so we just go cheaper”
I left a job that required a college education and professional licence to work in a factory and it has been amazing. I feel like I was lied to. People told me go to school and get a job with a fancy title, but the pay was terrible and my bosses were worse.
People have done blue collar work dirty. I get paid more now than at my fancy job and my bosses treat me with respect because of the work union. The only difference is the reaction you get when you tell people your job title. I’d rather money and respect than a fancy title.
I had the opposite experience. Left a shitty blue-collar job (it was even a union job, but the union was toothless and mostly just existed to get work from places that would only place orders with union shops) for an office job.
The hours are better, the pay is better, the co-workers are less bigoted, and I no longer smell like grease and sweat whenever I come home.
There will always be trade-offs in any job. Whether it’s blue-collar, white-collar, or whatever ever other collar you can think of. There is no perfect job type for everyone.
whenever I come home
How rarely does that occur??
I am on my 3rd layoff in 10 years.
First one I had all sort of dirt on my boss who was kissing ass to climb the corporate ladder. I was a massive liability as I knew what a waste of space he was. They laid me off with some really week excuses and a years wage/benefits to keep me quiet.
Second one we got a new CEO who decided to make massive changes to the company “to make it more profitable”. It hasn’t shown a profit since and the layoffs are a yearly tradition now.
The last one was this past fall. Smaller company over-invested when times where good. Then the market turned around and they are in trouble. One of those small “family” businesses, me and 20 others got kicked out of the family.
So as of now I have my own business. I am on track to make 100% more than I ever have before working for someone else.
Just for shits and giggles I also have an interview tomorrow for a C-suite position in a tropical country. It’s too fucking cold here.
I’m really sorry you lost your job, again.
I work in healthcare IT and I had to do the layoffs this past year to send the jobs to the Philippines and it was eye opening what their salaries are compared to ours. They are good people there and they are smart and have ambitions just like we do, only for a fraction of the cost. And yes, in one case I had to layoff an entire team regardless of how good they were (they were really good). For them it was just the case that I could find replacements for them in the markets we were looking and if I laid them off then I could layoff fewer in other departments. This was the first time I have been faced with having to do this and it was pretty awful. I take my work really personally and treasure the relationships and I think this whole thing has had a lasting impact on my happiness level. So many times I was fearful that I would be in a position of lying to my teams if asked a direct question, something I would never do. Trying to navigate the whole thing was led to many sleepless nights. I went through exercises where I practiced my responses to potential questions I might be asked as the rumor slowly started churning.
I don’t know why I’m sharing all of this, but it helps me to talk about it. The mid tier management (that’s me) that gets given the marching orders and has to carry it all out suffers a different kind of pain, even if we did keep our jobs. I hope I’m never asked to do it again.
I’m sorry again. Don’t take it too personally is maybe what my winding story and opposing perspective is to mean. I’m sure you are good at what you do.
I have heard several stories like this from my boss who worked at a previous place where he was asked to remove an entire team like you did. He says he will never forget it and is soul crushing. He tried his hardest to cut budgets and even found a few things were he was able to save the money and brought this to upper management where they had to break it to him that it didn’t matter what was saved, that wasn’t the point… people are just names on paper to them and if they decide this is what they want there is pretty much no stopping them. He then said he was there long enough after that where they realized it was an awful mistake and the work you get in return is not nearly as good as the original team you had so they had to hire new people back. It’s a never ending cycle these days.
I also work in IT Healthcare! It’s a brutal industry huh! Thankfully I have been with the same place for 19 years now, but it have witnessed it all. When I started we grew exponentially throwing money at everything, then the owner sold and I got to witness the “no changes expected” followed by everything changing. Then saw partners separate from us completely which was crazy work, and then the boom of covid followed by almost going belly up with massive layoffs for the past 2 years and consolidation of everything basically back to when I started in 2006!
Thanks for sharing your experience. Even if it seems insignificant, I know it must’ve been so hard to go through. That trauma is understandable and makes you human. I appreciate you sharing it.
I’ve thought about going into management too. I have 5 years in my industry. I could be manager next. But I’ve never been trained. Idk how to lead. Idk how to report progress, manage projects, delegate, answer questions I don’t have the answers to. Lie to my employees and subordinates as to why they’re average even if they’re exceptional. Meets expectations, everyone gets that. So many new challenges id have to face I’m nervous about.
But then again I could just get laid off again after landing a manager job. Who knows? It’s terrifying thinking about moving up
That’s just the nature of corporate world. The beatings will continue.
Smart move is to not get emotionally invested.
Do bare min to keep the job and focus on your family and friends.
Fuck the parasite. Also, always be looking for a better job.
Yep. They’ll demand loyalty from you, but not return it. The second a new CEO arrives, they’ll want to show improvements on the bottom line. Fastest way to “save” money is to sack some people.
Unless you’re in sales, you are a line item in a cost centre. Your salary is a dollar value they can save if they get rid of you.
HR exists to protect the org, not the individual people in it.
If you’re looking for loyalty, get a dog.
Same thing here, twice in 3 years. Stopped caring about companies, culture, all that bullshit. I’m there to do my job and clock out. 5 years I’d be devoted, work nights and weekends if I needed to, but now? Naw, fuck the companies. I do what I’m paid for. My time is my own. When I can be let go tomorrow for random cost cutting then why should I care about the well-being of the company?
Luckily I’m somewhere semi decent now, but I stay frosty. One thing is for sure, I’m 0 and 3 for private equity companies. Private equity is a red flag to anyone who doesn’t own stock in it - and even if you do it’s probably a short term gain before they tank it.
Do it. My buddy went into the trades after being laid off a few years ago and hasn’t looked back. He’s enjoying it.
In fact, he reminds me about it while I’m stuck in meetings…
If you’re young enough the trades are definitely a good idea. If you’re 35 yo or older I wouldn’t risk it, for one youll be paid very very low starting out, two the trades are very hard on your body, and this is coming from a guy that switched to the trades late in life.
Hang in there dude or dudette. Youll be ok in the end
pretty much it destroys your body before 40s, so anyone who already had a degree cant find a job, but have some physical limitaitons are pretty much out of luck. also its heavily geared towards men too, women dont find trades appealing, thats why they go for degree in bio, or grad degrees for better jobs.
At this rate I might as well just retire from White collar work and go and learn a trade as a tradesman, completely redo my entire life goals
You wouldn’t be the first, i’ve seen it happen. And you’d most likely be happier.
My layoffs have been interesting.
1st was after working my 1st year a as a junior dev. The tech lead thought i didn’t have what it takes.
2nd was 'cos a higher up didn’t like my sarcastic remarks.
3rd was 'cos my boss got offended i refused to work on weekends.early in the pandemic, someone i knew was a civil engineer in NY(i assume NYC) he got laid off and went to work at a"inb etween job" at a retail job, im betting managment laid off all the important people first before themselves. and another a IT employee working in the same place, (they left early in the pandemic from the inbetween because azm was purposely putitng out limited jobs so very little go stay. i suspect alot of these "skilled " labor will be truncated to outsourced employees, or a desperate employee(usually the targets are people with more skills) willing to take a lower salary
There should be a requirement where the people who decide to lay folks off actually have to show up and tell them in person.
My first layoff was this, and the CTO was genuinely distraught. I hold no ill feelings towards him. The company was not doing well, and we saw the writing on the wall for a while. That was a brave man, he got up there and took it himself.
Later I was laid off again by cowards. The CEO and CTO were offline when most of the people got the gauntlet, a 5 minute meeting with HR only. No feedback, no questions. HR woman we all knew, and she was crying, obviously crushed and was pushed to do all of this herself while they hid with their tail behind their legs. Heard the next day that the CEO bravely told the reset of the org that they had some “adjustments” that had to be made and no shit - direct quote “We’re feeling a little heartburn today”. Coward.
they knew, they dint want to deal with angry employees, and potential lawsuits for "unfair firings or discirmination. ive seen these in alot of job reviews(before the companies started coming after the review sites for making them “look bad” with the truth.
